Blue dress in honour of Mam

I made my niece this beautiful blue dress over the weekend. I found the corduroy fabric on Bewick Street and got far too excited about it! I’d been thinking about making Amy a little skirt using pink cord fabric and the shop had exactly what I wanted and it was in their sale too! I ended up buying fabric in pink, blue and green. Peter has his eye on the green and announced that he would like a jacket. I don’t have a pattern for a men’s jacket and think it is probably beyond me at present.

I lined the dress with some fabric from my grandma Mam’s scrap bag. It was a bit of a jigsaw puzzle to get all the pieces cut out, but I got there in the end. Some of them are cut slightly on the bias and there had to be a seam down the front.

The pattern had a flap at the back, with two buttons at the top. I decided that the dress would be better with a zip down the back. Hopefully Amy will still be able to run about in the dress. Altering the pattern added an interesting twist as I had to work out how to put the concealed zip in and sew the lining in too. It does look great inside out and some people have commented that it could be reversible. I’ll leave that to my sister to see what she thinks!

The best bit are the flowers on the front. I sewed on some pretty yo-yos with button centres. I’m really pleased with how these turned out. My grandma, Mam died on Thursday and somehow sewing with fabric that had been hers helped me connect with her, it was surprisingly therapeutic.