2015 is already here and it’s really starting to feel nippy in the Bay area, which can be quite challenging if you have a girl like mine who always wants to wear a dress.  I would wake up freezing and seek out my warmest sweater, steal my husband’s thick socks (that roll up all the way up my calves) from his drawer, and slip on my fuzzy slippers before I even think to walk on the ice tiles in the bathroom.  Then in twirls my almost-5-yr-old with a piece of cloth draped over her in the shape of a dress with no socks or any tights! I immediately send her back to change which turns my twirling, prancing princess into a creeping, crawling slug bent on never making it back to her closet.  SOoo we compromise and we add a multi-colored jacket (with sequins) and pink polka dot tights which turns her into a walking rainbow with blinding sequins in the shape of a cat named Hello Kitty.

This bubble dress is really simple and easy to make and doesn’t have all those little pieces of bodice linings, interfacings, zippers, or buttons to make it complicated.  It’s meant to be made with knit fabric so it’s a comfy every-day dress that can be slipped on and off over the head.  

While making the dress I made a few notes to myself and one of those are that the sizing of the dress seemed to be quite a bit on the larger side.  I made two dresses, one for my almost-5-yr-old and one for my 3-yr-old.  The one pictured is the size 3T that fits my almost-5-yr old.  It was too big for my 3-yr-old so she’ll have to wait until it’s “handed” down to her, like a lot of her other clothes…  And the size 5T dress I made is way too big so my 5-yr-old, so she will have to grow into it later.  

A note about the neckline hemming.  The pattern and directions instruct you to fold in the neckline of the bodice fabric and sew it. Very simple.  I did just that with a stretch stitch setting but it stretched out the neckline so much it was warped and wavy.  It was ugly.  That didn’t happen to my other 5T dress so I think it’s a difference in fabric… So to remedy that problem, I added light pink bias tape with pink rickrack under to add a little something around the neckline and I think it turned out super cute! If you notice in the picture directly below, I didn’t add the bias tape and rickrack all the way around the neckline.  That’s to allow the dress to be slipped on and off over the head without having to cut the back and add buttons since the bias tape doesn’t have any stretch to it.  

She LOVES her dress!  And it’s long-sleeved! Or actually it should have been long-sleeved, but since this dress was actually for a 3T, the sleeves are three-quarter-sleeves on my 5 yr old, which is just fine.

The “bubble” part of the dress is really quite simple! Always wanted to make a “bubble” dress and finally made two!

Thanks for reading,

Toki