Patchwork Shirtdress Completed

 

This dress really looks cuter in person.  Even my husband thought so.  But, here it is anyway.  Remember, I started with 4 different fabrics: 3 black and white cotton prints and a fine welted black corduroy.   After cutting the 3 prints into strips, sewing them together into stripes, then zigzagging all the seams, I cut across the stripes into strips, turned everyother one in the opposite direction, then sewed them together into stripes again.  Again, I zigzagged all the seams.  I really didn't want all those frayed seams inside this dress.  Then, when I still didn't have quite enough fabric, I pieced the sleeves, and used the black corduroy for the placket, under collar, collar, cuffs, and sleeve tabs.  Rather than make a tie from the fabric, which would have been bulky, I used this black and white polka-dotted ribbon that I had in my ribbon stash.  White buttons completed the dress.  I tried to take closeups of the placket, collar and cuffs, but my lighting was all off.

Below, is a picture of a toy hammock that I made while I was in AZ for the girls' playroom.  I should have made it a little bigger, but you know what they say about hindsight.  I put grommets in the back center and on each end.  Actually the ends are gathered into two sections, front and back, because I felt that there would be too much thickness for the grommets to go through.   I love the wooden letters in the windows that spell PLAY.  The other window has GIGGLE in it.  The giraffe was given to Lil E by her Grammy.  She loves her to dress GiGi in dress up clothes.

 

My daughter covered this 3-D cardboard "B" to match the nursery fabrics.  She covered the edges with pink polka-dotted fabric to match the curtain fabric.  She has this hung above the crib, now.  The "B" is for the new grand's first name.  Isn't that clever!

Today, I am going to make some props for the next puppet show that our Heavenly Hands Puppet Team at church is going to present at a fall festival in the next town up from ours.  We are going to do a show about different Bible stories that all children are taught in Sunday School: Noah's Ark, Jonah, Daniel in the Lion's Den, The Wise Man Built His House Upon the Rock, and the Golden Rule.  We are starting off with the B. I. B. L. E. song.