Annie's Dress - a Refashion

A while ago, one of my friends mentioned that her daughter would love to learn to sew.  I've know this cute eight year old since she was a toddler. She's a darling, polite young girl and I love her and her family.  I was curious to see how hard it would be to teach a young girl this skill.  So, a few weeks ago, Annie came to my house for a lesson in refashioning.

Before we got together to sew this dress there was a little preparation which took place. First, I had her mother pin ideas for me to look at so I'd know what style she liked for her daughter.  Next, after selecting this idea, I needed something to refashion.  I found an extra large teen's dress made from soft blue chambray cotton for $4 from a local thrift shop. Lucky for us, it looked like the same fabric as the dress her mother had pinned.  From this dress, I cut off the arms and elastic. Then I took a pattern and the dress over to her house to see how this pattern might fit her.  As you can see from the above photo, this girl is not large, she's simply tall and skinny so we had a lot of extra width to take off of the original dress. Before she arrived for her lesson, I cut the dress out and pinned the seams together.  

Her mother suggested a flutter sleeve on the dress.  My pattern didn't come with this type of sleeve so I drafted my own pattern for it.  I used the original sleeves to make her new sleeves.

Once Annie got to my house for her sewing lesson, I discovered that she knew quite a bit about sewing.  She was careful, cautious and quick to learn.

Three hours later, this is what her new dress looked like:

My favorite part of making this dress with Annie was explaining to her about the alphabet on the sewing machine and how we could make our own special tag for her new dress. I know she liked making this tag and punching the right numbers to get the sewing machine to spell her name.

Last Sunday, Annie walked into class wearing her new spring dress.  She had the biggest smile on her face.  I practically melted seeing her wear it. There is a great satisfaction in helping others succeed. There is also great satisfaction in creating.  Wouldn't you agree?  xoxo Grandma

Linked to: Sustaining The Powers, The Dedicated House