Rose of Sharon, Bird House, and J&K's dresses

This Rose of Sharon bush has decided to start blooming. I love the big lilac blooms. At night they close up. The white bird house is the one my SIL built for me for my birthday/Mother's Day gift. I love it and think it looks great next to this bush. The other bird house is one my Grand ILs put up when they lived here. This view is from our deck.

As I said in my last post, I had to sandwich white cotton fabric between the layers of the girls' dresses. The first view shows how much you can see through the striped fabric while being held up to the window. The second view is with the white fabric between the others.

It wasn't as evident with the window pane checked fabric, but I went ahead and used the white in between anyway. It gave a little more body. This pattern is supposed to only have one layer of fabric. I just decided that it was very conducive to being reversible, so why not?

These are the two from the front views showing both the original and the reverse sides. As you can see I added ties on the shoulders before I took the striped photo.

I really like the back of this dress better than the front. The back sides wrap around and tie underneath the front. On the pattern (Butterick 5019) there was a button tab sewn on the inside of the front with buttons on the corners of the back, but since I made them reversible, I just did the tie thing.
On Jenna's I used bias binding and almost felt guilty because it was so quick and easy. As a matter of fact, I was thinking that this is a pattern the girls could make themselves with a little help and with just one layer of fabric. I liked that there was only one pattern piece. The front and back were all cut as one piece. There are darts on the shoulders.
On Kellen's I decided to sandwich piping in between the layers ( I treated the white cotton as one with the striped.) I didn't put piping around the neck line. I left it open so I could turn it. I then used narrow bias binding around the neck. As a little extra detail I zigzagged across the piping and bias binding, which is red, with blue thread. I like this look. I would not have done the piping if I had it to do again, though. The binding was so much easier.


This is a close up of the piping with the zigzag detail.

This is how much binding I had left over from two packs after making Jenna's dress. LOL
I used 2+ packs of piping for Kellen's. I usually make my own piping and binding, but was able to match these so well with the purchased kind and since they are just sundresses and made from cotton I decided to buy it. Also, I had to have SOOOOO much, and I felt rushed to finish.


Just as I finished Jenna's dress this morning my DH, who had been by the church on an errand, called to tell me that an ICON from our church had died this morning. As I posted a few days ago, there were no male role models in my family, but there were several in my life. This man was one of those. He and my mother have known each other all of their lives. They were in church together and in the same class in school. I have lots of photos of them and their friends during their teen aged years. My middle daughter's name is Elizabeth. I named her for this gentleman's wife. This couple sat behind my family in church throughout my life, and they still sat there just a couple of Sundays ago behind my DH. I sit in the choir. I dreaded telling my mother that he had died, but she took it very well. Last week when she was confused she thought she saw this couple and tried to wave at them. I saw his wife at church just last night and asked about him. She said he was doing well, except that his back and legs hurt from sciatica very badly. He was scheduled to have an epidural today to help ease his pain. I went out to their house after helping Mother with her lunch. I took sandwich fixings. They have two daughters and 4 grandchildren and other family members who will be coming in. I need to start keeping the fixings for a cake or something so that when something like this happens I can cook something to take. They will have more food than they will ever be able to eat, though. That's just how people in this small town are. Also, he was very well known by everyone in the town.
There is a blessing; he died in his sleep.
OMG, I just went upstairs and listened to messages on my phone and found out that a lady who has also been in my church all my life died today, too. It was three years ago today that her husband, who was one of the other positive male models in my life, died, along with my mother's absolute best friend in the world who was also a member of my church. I played with all of these folks' children. I went to their homes, spent the night with some of their kids, and on day trips with them, etc..... This town is the classic "It takes a village" kind of town. You must realize that this is a very small town where everyone knows (or at least used to know) everyone else. A lot of people from the north and from Florida have moved here over the years. Don't get me wrong, it is great having new people move in. Progress is a good thing. I love the innovation that has been brought here by new people. I am having so much fun connecting with people from every part of the world through this blog. But, when I was growing up, this was a Mayberry type of town. Our church is also very small, so losing two people in one day and on the same day as three years ago is just too much!