Alice in the Wonderland Inspired

My wonderful friend Sara of Made by Sara  organized a very special event on her blog - a celebration of 150th anniversary of Alice in Wonderland. I am among many bloggers participating.

At first I wanted to recreate one of the costumes, but the truth is, I am not a costume maker. It doesn't interest me. I settled on a special occasion dress, but also something she can where anytime. I looked through all my patterns and books and nothing was grabbing my attention, until I came across The Manhattan dress in Sewing Clothes Kids Love book. It's essentially a book full of Farbenmix patterns.  It's not really my cup of tea, the fabrics and the styling are a bit overwhelming for my taste, but I appreciate the design elements. I bought it a few years ago, because I couldn't find a t-shirt pattern anywhere. Things have changed, ha!

The pattern is all sorts of nuts! I omitted the cap sleeves and the collar and still had 31 pieces to cut. Nothing looked like anything. I carefully labeled all the pattern pieces, and  managed to  mess up a few times. Also, the fit on Ania is not the best. I cut size 8 according to her chest measurements, however size 8 is usually quite short on her. She is a very tall 6 year old. And sure enough, the shoulder pieces were way to short and I lengthened them by adding some color blocking.

 We went to a wooded area not far from where we live to take pictures. It was quite and peaceful and we were the only ones there, until a guy rode a bike past us. Hmmm, I thought, good thing he was not a serial killer. LOL. I might have watched too much SCI when it was all the rage.

A magical forest to go with the Alice of Wonderland magical feel.

There was an option of adding elastic in the back, in retrospect I should have done it to make it more fitted. The pattern is listed as "advanced' and I have to agree with that. It's not that difficult to sew and the pattern pieces have all the appropriate notches and markings. However, there are many many curves and many pieces that need to fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. One thing that was lacking is there were no clear instructions of how many pattern pieces to cut. It would have been nice if it said something like, "cut 2, one mirrored image."Also the instructions were not very detailed and not every step had an illustration.

What the dress is not lacking is a major twirl factor. Ania loves it, and apparently has been dreaming of a twirly dress for a while. News to me.

To give you an idea how the front looks like. She just stopped spinning, so it bunches in front, but somehow among 300 shots that I took, this is the only close up of the front.

And the back. I have to admit I was pretty stoked when everything matched up so nicely. Yep.

And a collage for good measure. Thank you so much Sara for inviting me to participate, I had a lot of fun.

Check out Sara's blog for beautiful creations by talented bloggers. There is also a fabulous giveaway!
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Monday July 13th ||  Kid Approved  |  Call Ajaire

Tuesday July 14th ||  Sew Country Chick  |  Feathers Flights  |  StraightGrain

Wednesday July 15th ||  Sewpony  | As It Seams  |  Dotta

Thursday July 16th ||  Boy, oh Boy, oh Boy Crafts  |  Brooklyn Pattern Co.  |  Pienkel

Friday July 17th  ||  While She Was Sleeping  |  My Cozy Co. |  Girl Like The Sea

Saturday July 18th || Falafel and the Bee  |  Huisje Boompje Boofjes  |  A Jennuine Life

Sunday July 19th ||  Paisley Roots  |  La Inglesita  |  DoGuincho