A Labor of Love

My little girl LOVES rainbows! She draws them everywhere, colors pictures with rainbow colors and I've even found her putting toys in rainbow order. When I saw this pieced jersey dress on kojo designs I thought it would be perfect for a rainbow dress for my Izzie! Now that I'm conquering my fear of knits I wanted to make the whole thing from scratch and not use one of her existing tops. As luck would have it Old Navy was having a sale on t-shirts so I went and bought all the colors of the rainbow in the biggest sizes they had. That night I searched the internet for a way to do the top of the dress and I came across the warhol dress pattern by Dana at MADE.  I took a deep breath, reminded myself that I was no longer afraid of knits and started sewing. It was harder then I thought it would be but I love how it turned out!

Let's just say that my original idea started out with the traditional ROYGBIV but I made an error in my measurements and had to add the pink at the top. Luckily I had leftover pink jersey from another dress I had made for Izzie (which I will share soon) and she loves pink so I didn't think she'd mind. 

I think it's safe to say she loves it!! I'm so glad she does and relieved it turned out as great as it did because I was STRESSING over it the whole time! I was going to do exposed seams but decided against it at the last minute so I ended up using my serger to attach each piece. I've been working with quilting weight cottons and home dec fabrics since I started sewing and working with knit is very different! Piecing the colors together and making the seams match up made me nervous and I kept second guessing myself. I nearly cried when I was ironing the yoke because it was so long and I couldn't get it to stay put. Once I finally had it all done I was sure it would be way too small on her. I'm so lucky that Jeff is so supportive, he kept assuring me that it looked great every time I started freaking out! When I showed it to Izzie the next day she started screaming with excitement and had to put it on right away. I'm so happy that it fit just right!

I think I will try this style again since I love how cute she looks in it and it's such a comfy dress for summer...without the piecing though, lol!

This was definitely a labor of love, but totally worth it once I saw the excitement on my baby girl's face when she saw it for the first time! I think I'm starting to like working with knits!