A Floatilla of Purple

Hey! I'm back for 2014. Hope your New Years, Christmases, End of Harvests and whatever else you celebrated at the end of the year were fabulous. I'm looking forward to a fabulous 2014.

Pinks and purples were on the request list for Christmas dresses at the end of last year. Now, if you've ever looked at my sewing stash, you'd notice there are very few purples and even fewer pink fabrics! I just don't do pink. I have this "thing" that resists the commercial need to put girls in pink. I do handmade. I do what I like, how I like it. I just don't entertain pink very much and while I have a little girl who knows no different, I'm running with it! Don't get me wrong, I have got a bit of pink stuff there. It's just that there is so so much beautiful fabric that isn't pink, that I don't need to feel the need to do it too.

I took on this challenge to find something in pink that I did like. I looked predominantly online - Fabricworm is totally cool and fabulous and I love it and I  found some gorgeous stuff there. Australian based The Craft Depot has a massive range of gorgeous fabrics at good prices, which is where I found the pink I did like. I also bought fabric from Quilt Home. Sadly, fabrics from the US are much cheaper than buying locally, taking postage into account as well, but the selection is amazing.  I did shop locally too, from Southlands Sewing Centre for some ultra adorable purple prints - the flowers, spots and butterflies below all purchased in Perth.

These are the dresses I made with just some of those pinks and purples. I do still have plenty of others gracing my sewing stash. The dresses below are the Full Circle Dress from Kikoi Patterns.

This one is affectionately know as "the plate dress", because it spins out like a plate.

You might spy some new labels and buttons. Yup, buttons. They totally rock! I found a little shop on Etsy called Remember Wynn and they made these new ultrasuede, ultrasoft labels and buttons for me. They were fabulous to work with, they did a few variations before very happily I settled on these.  I'm still smiling.

The brim hats are from a pattern called Summer Daze. Now. If you decide to attempt this hat, I would advise you to double check that your pattern pieces are traced off correctly, because a slight 2-3mm difference in the patchwork brim piece WILL throw the whole thing out. Don't ask me how I know. I just do.  If you get all that right, and the bazillion pieces cut out, it is actually pretty simple to sew together. And I lurve that rolled hem stitching around the flower that my new overlocker can do. So so neat.

As lovely as these Summer Daze hats are, you wont find them with me at the markets as they are just not cost-effective to make and sell. I may be bribed  for special occasions.

 

The bonnet is of course the Miss Mary Bonnet. The smaller (0-18m) size does fit a 2yo pretty nicely, but this particular hat was for little 4 month old, Stella, who also received a Geranium Dress in the same elephant print.

I have a couple more of these geranium dresses to share, but their are not pink or purple, so I'll save those for tomorrow.

SUPPLIES
Patterns -
Full Circle Dress Patterns by Kikoi Patterns (now Amelie Clothing)
Geranium Dress Patterns by Made by Rae
Summer Daze Hat Pattern by Angel Lea Designs
Fabrics -
Pretty Please by Jennifer Paganelli - Jackie - Cerise 
Norweigan Woods Too Elephant Romp by Michael Miller  - Midnight
Kona solid - midnight or navy blue
Out to Sea by Sarah Jane (Michael Miller)- Mermaid Play Breeze - Blue
Out to Sea  by Sarah Jane (Michael Miller) - Chevron - Blue
Weekends by Erin McMorris - Lollies - Red 
And alas, I dont know the names of the flowers on the purple, the coordinating purple silver , spots or butterflies from Southlands Sewing Centre
Underskirts on Full Circle Dresses are all Homespun cottons
Buttons and ultrasuede labels from Remember Wynn