Since DH
bought me a new sewing machine, I’ve been trying to sew a lot more and recently
I had the opportunity to actually make good on a Pinterest inspiration I told
my DIL I would try to re-create for her girls (My Grandgirls, B & C!)
Sweet Little
“C” had her first Birthday coming up and DIL “K” told me that she was doing a
Vintage Carnival/Circus theme.
I knew “K”
would love it, so I pinned it to my sewing board and
tagged her in the pin so she’d see it.
She really
fell in love with the dress, as did I, so I told her that I would try my best
to re-create it, but that I was sure my sewing skills were not up to the level of Ashley’s!
Fortunately,
Ashley sells the pattern for the skirt
portion of the dress and has a tutorial on
how to add the tank top and underskirt to make the finished product.
(*Update: 4/18/18 - The pattern is now sold here on Ashley's Etsy Store.)
I had a hard
time tracking down the adorable fabric she used though, so I e-mailed her and
found out it was called “To the Zoo” and she had purchased it from a store in North Carolina, called Mary Jo’s.
I found their website and called them, as I did not find
the fabric on their site.
They were
kind enough to search for me and finally came up with 3-5/8 yards remnant.
I was so
relieved, as I had searched “High and Low” on the internet and in stores to
find that fabric or something remotely similar to no avail.
Most of the
carnival/circus fabric I found was brightly colored and “K” wanted the vintage
look, with the more muted colors.
I pretty
much tried to re-create the dress exactly as it was on the Lil Blue Boo blog, with the exception of adding
Pom-Pom fringe to the bottom of the top skirts.
The
fabric I used for the underskirt was slightly different than what Ashley used, but it was a
close as I could come to it.
I found this fabric at: Hancock Fabrics
The plain white tank tops were purchased at Dharma Trading Co., but I know that WalMart usually carries a very similar tank
top to this one also, because I bought one to make a “test” dress before I made
the real thing. (That’s how paranoid I was that the dresses wouldn’t turn out!)
(LOL!)
The day
before the birthday party, I did a fitting on the girls, and here is a photo of
“B” modeling her dress:
At this
point, the dress was pretty much done with the exception of the bow
embellishments.
“B”s dress
fit perfectly, but I had to take the shirt up a bit on “C”s as the tanks were
long bodied and even though I trimmed them before sewing them to the skirt,
Claire’s had to be trimmed a second time and re-sewn.
Here are the
finished dresses:
The girls
really loved them and so did “K”!
(“B” really
liked that the skirt “twirled”!)
That made me
happy and I learned a lot by tackling this project, because it was a bit out of
my league, but I know the more I sew, the better I will get at it.
Here are
some cute photos from the Birthday Party where the girls proudly displayed
their new dresses from Gigi Lisa:
So many
thanks to Ashley at Lil Blue Boo for the awesome inspiration!
Go check it
out if you get a chance, www.lilblueboo.com not only are her
projects inspiring, SHE is one of the most inspiring persons I’ve ever seen and
she will enlighten you and brighten your day for sure!
Just a quick
note about the project: If you decide to try it, be sure to go to Ashley’s blog and follow her tutorial and pattern instructions
carefully, as she has more detailed info on this project than I have and she was very patient with me when I had a few questions during the process of making these dresses.
I hope one
day to be able to do detailed sewing tutorials of my own, but I am not quite
there yet in expertise and Ashley is really
good at it!
Take Care
Crafty Friends and thank-you for joining me today!
