Gifts for little people

I recently acquired a brand-new nephew, and my youngest niece just turned two.  It was time to make some wee little things.

For the little guy, I wanted to sew a collared romper, but did not have such a pattern in my stash.   I did a little Googling, and found the Button-Up Baby Romper pattern, here from Peekaboo Patterns.  The free pattern comes in a 0-6 month size.

I used a length of mustard yellow cotton I found at the thrift store a few months back, trimmed with scraps of the gingham linen I used here, here and here.

I didn't initially intend to add an appliqué, but when I had finished, the romper, perhaps because of the color, was looking a little prison-jumpsuit to me.  I thought about using a whale appliqué (my favorite for little boys), or an elephant, but ultimately decided the colors of the romper were more giraffe-esque.  I found an outline on Google and used my computer screen as a lightbox to trace it onto my fusible web, then created the appliqué from there.

The pattern went together easily and all the seams match up, however, it only includes 1/4" seam allowances which mean it's hard to get a clean finish without thinking ahead (or seam binding).  That's my only quibble with this otherwise very nice (and FREE) pattern.

For my niece, I pulled out my Oliver+S Library Dress pattern, which I've used once before, and not in the way it was intended.  I had in my head that the dress would take awhile to sew, but it wasn't bad.  The cutting was a little less tedious than usual, because I block-interfaced my facings for the first time.  I cut out the pattern pieces in interfacing first, then turned them sticky-side up on my ironing board and laid my fabric wrong-side down on top of them.  Then I pressed.  It seemed to save a good amount of time and I'll use the technique again.

The actual sewing took me two evenings.  Not bad at all.

I made a 6-12 month size with the skirt lengthened to the 12-18 month.  My niece is a little peanut of a thing and I have always found O+S dress patterns to run quite large.  I think the resulting dress will be a good fit for this fall.

I used some quilting cotton from Spotlight, which was sent to me by a thoughtful Australian friend.  I love the print, and I don't at all mind using quilting cotton for little girls' dresses.  The waistband and sleeve facing was cut from gray shot cotton scraps from my stash.  Instead of bias trim on the waistband, I used black pre-made piping, also from the stash.  Looking at the photos, I wish it had occurred to me to trim the sleeves with the piping as well!  Maybe next time.

I hadn't appreciated how pretty the details are on this pattern before now.  That notched sleeve is really nice (though maybe it would have been tough to trim it in piping after all), and I love the little pleats on the front and back skirt.  I might have to buy the next size up to make this for my own girls!

Thanks for reading, and see you next time!