Sadie's dress is done for her birthday and she hasn't taken it off. . .well, she has now, she's asleep. But until then, it stayed on. It passed the twirl test and poor miss Delia cried for her own special birthday twirly dress, which won't be made until next month, so she got an old summer dress instead, which met her approval. It was crazy hot here today, so add some sweat, and you get the idea. This is in cotton flannel, all the layers, so Sadie was one toasty potato today. You can see more here.
Here's the petticoat that goes under the dress. You can see it peeking out in the above photo. It can also be worn as a skirt just on it's own. I didn't come up with this brilliance, it's all from the Ottobre issue #3, winter 2005. The dress is super cute in there. It's shown all in one fabric with the petticoat in another. I went a little crazy with all these prints, but I couldn't help myself. A bit back I was browsing Oilily, and then all these other sites. I got all crazy about these clothes and tried looking at ebay for a bit, seeing how much these dresses go for, used even, and man-oh-man, it became quite clear that I needed to sew a dress like this, even used, they are crazy expensive.
But all that research seeped into my brain, which is a good. This dress ended up much more detailed and ruffled than I would have done originally and I know Sadie is diggin' the extra flounce. And I just can't say enough how much I am enjoying my 2 back issues of Ottobre. I feel like there's enough in there to keep me busy for a long time. The designs are sweet and lovely-- not too modern, but not too old fashioned, and so easy to customize.
Here's the sweet girl with it all on. It goes with her jacket, and I am going to wrap it all up and give it to her, even though she has been wearing it. I still might finish the sweater jacket. . but actually, with mailorder going on this week, I am getting a bit deranged and it's not even Tuesday. I do this. Schedule all these things at once and then just spin like a crazy person. The dress and jacket are done and that can be enough. (Amy, please listen.)
The preparations for the 4 year old party are going well. It's very small, mostly family, but didn't stop Pete and I from finally getting this, which we rationalized quite easily. Sadie is going to have an ice cream sundae bar, because she isn't a huge cake fan, and we need real whipped cream for that, right? And it's so much more convenient using one of these than scooping from a bowl of whipped cream. . . I am planning a topping bar with candies and nuts. I'm getting hungry just writing about it.
And as I look at this dress, I realize I am a big dork. I love the brown, burnt orange, and light blue thing so much and I just realized that that the exact combination we just had our house painted in. Brown house, burnt orange shutters and light blue trim. Which was done as of Saturday. Now we just need to ditch that old Christmas tree in the backyard and we are all set to go!
