Simplicity 9784 Baby Dress & Pinafore

 Our little Bubbles turned 1 year old last month!  I knew my mom didn't have time to make her a smocked birthday dress, plus I really wanted to make her birthday dress this year.  Last year just after Bubbles was born I really wanted to make big sister Ace, and her matching dresses out of Simplicity 9784.  I've had these 2 pieces of cotton fabric for about 7 or 8 years, meaning to make myself a dress with them.  But after Ace was born I felt that the print would be better suited for a baby outfit.

 Since there was so much of the fabric, I decided that it would be just as easy to make 2 matching outfits for both of my girls.  So last year while my mom was visiting while I recovered from giving birth, I asked her to cut out the dresses for me.  My thought was that if they were cut, an ready to go, it would be super easy to just pop in the sewing room when I had a little extra time and put the dresses together.

 But alas, I have since learned that after I have a baby, I can't do any significant sewing jobs for the first 6 months.  I put countless diaper covers together in that time, but they were a huge necessity, plus they only took a half an hour each to make.  I did get the bodice and front facing of the bigger dress put together, but then I realized that Ace had already outgrown it.  And Bubbles had outgrown the smaller one by that time as well.

 So I put the pattern and pieces away not knowing when I'd have the chance to get them out again.  As Bubbles' birthday started approaching I started looking to see if I had anything that would work for a birthday dress.  And I remembered that the larger dress had been cut out in a 12 month size.  Bingo!

 I got it out and sewed it up in no time.  The only thing that took extra time were the buttonholes.  You see, sometime last year my sewing machine decided it didn't want to make buttonholes anymore, and I haven't had the chance to take in it for a long overdue cleaning and check-up.  So I had to make them by hand.  It really wasn't hard at all.  I used a blanket stitch because I thought that was how you are supposed to work hand sewn buttonholes.  It wasn't until later that I was reading my copy of the Singer Sewing Book published back sometime in the 50's that I discovered that there is an actual buttonhole stitch, and it looks much sturdier than the blanket stitch.

Overall I'm very happy with the pattern, and love how the dress and pinafore turned out.  Miss Bubbles has worn it several times since her birthday, and I know she'll get much more use out of it over the rest of the summer.  I don't know when I'll ever get around to making the smaller dress, it's a size 0-3 months.  I do know now though that if I want to make something for one of my babies to wear in the first 6 months of their life, I'll have to make it before he or she is born!

I wrote this post in a different style than I normally do.  Please let me know if you like it.