Dress for Lexy

Lexy's 20th birthday was a couple weeks ago and she wanted me to make her a dress. While they probably don't get much use in Portland, Lexy loves sundresses and when I found a pattern for a simple shirred top sundress on Craftzine's blog she asked me to make her one.

For fabric she wanted something yellow or purple with a pattern so I bought this fabric from fabric.com:



I also had to buy elastic thread (couldn't find it on the island) and unfortunately the 11 yd spool from fabric.com wasn't quite enough so I had to get this instead:



To use elastic thread you need to hand wind it on a bobbin, being careful not to stretch it while winding. Like some decorative metallic threads the elastic thread is too thick to thread through a sewing machine and needle, so instead it goes on the bobbin.

When shirring the top (making the rows of elastic to gather the top) you sew rows from the right side (as opposed to the wrong side) of the completed dress in a continuous line that circles around the bodice for about 6-8" down from the top of the dress. The elastic ends up on the inside of the dress and the tension from the top thread helps to gather the fabric. You line of the edge of the presser foot with the previous row to keep them parallel and it's very important to pull the fabric flat while sewing.



One problem I had was that the amount of elastic thread that can be wound on a bobbin is not enough to complete the top. It took about 3 bobbins and when one ran out I'd just overlap the beginning of the next bobbin over the end of the last.

I shortened the pattern from Heather Ross significantly and according to Lexy it is still too long for her, so I'll have to shorten it when she is home for Christmas. Here's Lexy in the dress: