So Annabelle’s birthday was last month, and I am finally getting the directions for her Little Mermaid inspired dress on the blog. I had totally wanted to get it up in March, but it just didn’t happen. Better late than never, right?
I tried to take lots of pictures, and give lots of detail, so this is a bit of a long post. Grab a cup of coffee, or whatever drink you like, sit back, and find out how you can create your own dress!
Here’s what you will need:
– pattern (it’s nothing super fancy, it’s a hand drawn pdf file)
page one page two page three page four page five page six
**Note: this pattern is for a size 4/5T.**
– lining fabric (1 1/2 yard-2 yards, depending on the size of your dress)
– bodice main fabric (1/2 yard-1 yard, depending on the size of your dress)
– skirt fabric (1 1/2 yards)
– Tulle (lots and lots and lots I probably used about 4-5 yards)
Step one: Cut your material
From your lining material you will need:
– Bodice front
– bodice back (cut two)
– skirt front
– skirt back (cut two)
– sleeves (cut two)
Bodice main fabric (this is the purple sparkly fabric)
– bodice front
– bodice back (cut two)
-sleeves (cut two)
Skirt (“mermaid”) fabric
– skirt front
– skirt back (cut two)
– waist band
– ties (cut two)
Step two: Sew the bodice lining
Take the bodice front, and each side piece and sew together at the side seams.
Step three: gather the front bodice
Take the main fabric for your bodice (for me it’s the purple sequin fabric). Run a basting stitch (or the longest stitch you can) down the middle of the fabric, and around the arms. See the yellow in the picture below. That’s where you want to put the basting stitch.
Gather it so that it is the same size as the lining bodice. Then run a normal stitch down the same areas to help hold everything in place.
Step four: make the waistband
Fold your waist band in half. Match the raw edges of the waistband with the bottom edge of the bodice front. Sew in place.
Step five: sew the ties
Fold the ties in half, right sides together, and sew around leaving the bottom open. Turn the ties out and edge stitch if desired.
Step six: add the ties to the bodice
Take the ties you just made and match the raw edges to the raw edge of the bodice, and sew.
Your bodice should now look like this:
Are you still with me?? I hope so!! We are almost done with this part of it.
Step seven: sew the sides
Take the bodice sides (from the main fabric) and place them on top of the bodice front, right sides together. Make sure you are trapping the ties between the two main fabrics. Sew them on at the sides (you can see the pins in the picture. That is where you sew).
And you did the bodice with the main fabric! Phew! Put those aside, because it’s time to move on to the skirt.
Next up it’s time to make the skirts. Let’s start with the lining fabric.
Step eight: lining skirt
So I didn’t take a ton of photos of this, but I think it should be pretty easy. Sew your skirt backs to the skirt front at the side seam. Now you will have a super long rectangle. Next is sewing the skirt backs together, but leave a space at the top.
I tried to make a graphic, so hopefully it makes a little more sense. The front skirt piece is orange in the below example.
Run a basting stitch at the top of the skirt and gather, then sew to the bodice, matching up the opening in the back, with the bodice back.
Make four layers of tulle the same way (sewing the two skirt backs to the skirt front, then sewing the back partly up). Gather them, and sew them onto the bodice top.
You now have all the lining complete! The raw edges will be facing up, but that’s what you want. You want the finished edge to be on the under side of the lining (the part that will be against your child’s skin) since we will be adding the top layer over this. The tulle will end up being sandwiched between the lining fabric and top fabric.
Alright, now we need to add the main skirt (the “mermaid tail”) to the purple bodice.
Step nine: finish the main fabric (top layer) skirt
So, now you are going to take your main fabric skirt pieces, and sew them in the same way you did the lining skirt and the tulle skirt.
Here’s a little bit of a closer look of what I mean by leaving a space when sewing the back pieces together.
Step ten: make the sleeves
To make the sleeves, sew the lining fabric and main fabric wrong sides together. Be sure to leave openings on each side to run elastic through. I used about 3/4″ elastic, so my openings were about an inch.
Turn out the sleeves so the fabric is right sides out. then draw a line so you can sew a channel for the elastic.
Run elastic through the channel you just made and sew the ends so it stays in place.
Step eleven: sew the top and under layer together.
Start by putting the top layer in the under layer, right sides together, and sewing around the arm holes.
Step twelve: add the sleeves
Pin the sleeves between the two front bodices (the bodices should still have the right sides of the fabric facing each other). Make sure that the curved part is facing the armhole.
After that sew across the top of the back pieces. But be sure to leave an opening so you can finish sewing the sleeves in.
Next sew the open side of the back bodice (where the buttons will go).
Finally turn the dress the right way, and place the other end of the sleeve into the opening you left. Then run an edge stitch across the top of the bodice back to hold it in place.
Add buttons and button holes, and admire your work!
As I said I know that was a long post, but I tried to be as detailed as I can. In all honesty, it probably took me more time to write the post than it did to actually sew the dress!