Refashion Woman Tunic to Sparky Dress

I love sewing but really drag tracing and cutting out the pattern and fabric at times. So, to motivate myself to keep sewing, I turn to refashion of unwanted clothes.

So, I took an old tunic of mine and turn it into a sparky dress for my girl.

 

This whole project was super fast since I've kept the original sleeve and didn't waste any fabric.  The pale pink sparky skirt was made from the leftover fabric from my previous Barbie and the Musketeers costume. I have also used my serger throughout the whole project which is good cause I didn't have to change out my needle. Yap, I'm so lazy like that..

Here's how I diy..

First, let your kiddo wear the tunic and get a sensing on the amount to cut off.  I need to pull up the shoulder seams by 1" and narrow the sleeves too and that's about it.  I cut off the sleeves.

Mark 1" away from the sleeve under seams and just serge away the excess.  Using the twin needles option on my serger, I can sew and serge in one go. See the new under seams.

Take apart the portion below the waist of the tunic. My tunic has a high waist gathered skirt so it is just right to turn it into an underskirt since my sparky fabric is a bit sheer.

I cut out a rectangle from my sparky fabric using the entire width of the fabric and the length will depend how long you want the skirt. Then, sew the side seams, right side facing.  Using the serger, I'm able to sew and serge the raw edge.

Then, adjusting my serge to the longest stitch width and length and adjust the tension to 5-5-6-6 (pink, yellow, green, blue) if you are using brother serger or if not, just adjust the tension looser and you will get a gathered skirt in no time.  I gathered my sparky skirt and pin it to my underskirt at the waistline. Both skirts should be Right Side facing up. Distribute the gathers evenly.

Turn the skirt Wrong side out and insert the bodice (right side out) so that both the bodice and skirts have right side facing each other. Get it? I hope you are not lost here. Again, pin the bodice around the waistline to the 2 skirts. Be sure to match the side seams and get the front and back facing correctly!

Cut an elastic 1" smaller than your kid's waist (depending on the elastic, you will need to make sure it is snug but not too tight). My elastic is quite stretchy so I can do away by cutting it smaller. Sew the elastic into a loop and then pin them to the skirts along the waistline.

Then, the fun and strenuous part. Change the setting on your serge to normal mode and sew the whole elastic and skirts together by hold and pull method. You only stretch your elastic and not the fabric. Pull from pin to pin and sew on the elastic which will catch both the skirts and bodice at the same time.  And when you finish sewing, tad a! You get a nicely gathered elastic skirt.

And there you have it. A nice sparky dress to twirl around.  Next up, I'll share another refashion sparky dress that I made for the younger girl. Had no choice since she was had to have one to be same as her sister. More to come in my next post!

Doll Carry Basket

For the last Christmas, my girls got the Baby Alive toys from their doting Uncle and Aunt. I thought it will be lovely to make a doll basket for them to carry the dolls around.

Here I'll just be sharing some tips on how I made one. I didn't really look for any tutorial since it is basically a oblong base with side panels and straps.

First measure your doll to get the rough size how big your basket should be. Leave some ease for the little hand to put in their baby and blanket. My doll is around 14" tall and I made it to 16" long.

You just need 3 basic shapes (base, side panel and strap) and 2 fabric for outer and inner basket. I use fleece to make it soft but you can also batting or interface the fabric to make it stronger. To make the base sturdy, I insert a plastic canvas in-between the fleece/batting and main fabric.  

Here's how I did it.  First, cut all the pieces out.

Then, sew the base Lining piece to the fleece/batting but leave about 10" gap unsew along the middle portion to insert the plastic canvas. Once you inserted in, sew up the gap. Set aside.

For the Inner side panel, I also sandwich the main, fleece and inner fabric and do a simple quilting so that it will be strong and will stand since I didn't interface the fabric. I think I should have done it to make it sturdier.

Right side facing, place the side panel onto the base, starting from the top middle portion and start pining away. Try to align the raw edge and coming to the end points, leave about 3" unpin and sew up the side seams of the side panel. Then, pin the remaining side panel (which is now a loop) to the base. This will ensure that your side panel fits the base exactly.

Do the same for the outer basket except that there is just the Base + Side panel, without the fleece or plastic canvas to battle with.  Insert the inner basket into the outer basket, align the side seams.

Pin like crazy along the top edge. Then, sew all around the top edge.

Take a double fold bias tape and start pining along the top edge that you've just sewn.

Sew around again.

Next, take the 2 long stripe and sew them right side facing along the long side and turn it right side out. Do the same for the other 2 pieces. Fold in the raw edge on the short ends and sew them onto the basket.  Measure your kid so you know how long you want the strap to be.

And, there is your Doll basket! Add a pillow or blanket and your baby are good to go.

Happy Birthday, My little Princesses

It's mid of January and I've not posted much except for the First Day of School post.  Lamentation seems to be the common theme for the recent month : (

January is always a busy month for me with the girls going to school and both of their birthdays fall in January too. As a tradition, I'll try to make a new dress for the girls for their birthday. This year, they wanted to be Disney Princesses - Belle and Aurora.

My eldest requested for Belle and I just love how it turned out. The chiffon shoulder shrug and overskirts really make the costume look so 'Belle', don't you think? The details on the overskirt is achieved using 8 thin elastic band. It was so easy and final effect so magnificent.

Princess Bell and Side Kick - Little Aurora!

I found this shop at Chinatown that sells lots of sewing accessories and found this chiffon rose in the exact yellow for the dress. It's quite pricy at $7 per yard but I love how the rose enhanced the look. Here I use the rose around the waist band and on the shrug.

Little sister is into Pink now so she wanted to be Aurora.  I needed to make her an overskirt so that her dress is like her sister but with a different style. She's into that 'I want the same as Jie Jie (sister)' mode now.  So, also made her a shoulder shrug in white satin and added a chiffon rose.  The shrug limited her movement so she took it off most of the time!

Here you can have a better view of the chiffon rose waistband. I hand sewn them onto the dress. The chiffon overskirts was just fold over and attach to the bodice before sewing to the main satin skirt.  I bought all the fabric from Arab street at $4 per yard.

I got their cakes from Bengawan Solo for $40 per Kg but it was delicious. I can't bake so I'll leave that to the professional.

I'm so glad I've finished the dresses way ahead of the time so it was less stressful. I got more order now for a Cinderella(s) and Rapenzul(s)!