A change of pace

My daughter asked me to make her daughter's First Communion dress and the time is closing in. We don't have a date yet, but it can't be far off. First Communion is usually in the month of May.
We had decided on this dress from Sense and Sensibility Patterns, and I ordered it before Christmas. It arrived in January and I made a mock-up of the bodice and mailed it off to Elena two weeks ago. This project is requiring long-distance fitting. And even little girls of 7/8 years old need tweaking, especially when they are average in height but tiny through the chest and waist. Hannah measures size 4 in the chest and waist, and size 6 through the hips, but she is average height for her age.



When I made the bodice up, I thought this is weird. I know that historical patterns have their own styling, things like the shoulder seam is set behind the shoulder on the back, the sleeves are different. But even I could tell without anyone trying this on, that this was just going to fit very strangely and Hannah would have virtually no arm movement. An email from Elena confirmed this is so.

So a quick internet search of patterns, links were sent for Elena and Hannah to check out, and this pattern won hands-down. Hannah just grinned when she saw it, what little girl would not want a dress like this one? Butterick 4967



Elena's only specification was "please no shiny fabric". A quick trip to Fabricville yesterday to pick up the pattern and I checked out the fabric choices in the bridal section. Plenty of really nice white cottons are in stock, if anyone is making white shirts, you are in luck. But plain cotton is just a little too plain for this dress.
I have a white eyelet in my stash that was going to be used, when the other dress was the choice, but it is a little too heavy for the tiers of this dress. But I lucked out and found a light white eyelet and it was even 40% off. Of course, everything is always marked down at Fabricville, just their way of eliminating the small independent fabric stores so that we will have no choice other than what they offer us.

I will put up a photo of the fabric later today but right now, the morning dishes are calling and some other important stuff that needs to be done.

Photo of eyelet for Butterick 4967