Roses for Ronja

This weekend I did some sewing. I bought a delicious Hilco velvet a few weeks ago at Dots N Stripes – who are having a sale at the moment. There’s still a few months of winter left in Denmark, so it’s not too late to make a nice and warm dress for Ronja, which is what I did. It’ll be great for our chilly spring as well – oh, just thinking about spring! 🙂

 

I have been looking at the fully lined “Betty” pinafore dress from Ottobre 06/07 a few times, but earlier the number of pattern pieces kind of scared me, so it took me a while to work up the nerve. However, with this fabric it seemed like an obvious choice, so I decided to go for it.

The dress did present a challenge to me, I assure you. I haven’t tried making pleats before, so that was something new – but that wasn’t really what I found difficult. The cursing started while I was making the pockets. Gathering the pockets and attaching the binding was terrible –  probably because I chose to make the bias tape for the binding from a very light weight quilting cotton. Next time I would definitely go with something more sturdy – a medium weight would do it, I believe. The binding continued to give me trouble, due to the light weight fabric, which was a bit of an agony. Also, I seem to never be quite sure as to how to finish the binding at the ends – folding it under, around, or whatever. I think it ended up looking ok, but it has a few imperfections (yep, that’s what I choose to call them) on the inside of the dress.

I gotta tell you though, on the positive side, one of the highlights of making this dress was the zipper. For Christmas I got an invisible zipper foot for my Pfaff 2027, and even though you do still have to make sure everything’s aligned and stuff like that, it just totally takes care of the most difficult thing about attaching the zipper for you – well, almost anyway. It worked wonders, and I’m really happy with the result – if you do a lot of invisible zipper sewing, I would definitely recommend this little thingy. I just realized, I didn’t even get a photo of the back – that’ll be included when Ronja models it.

Another highlight was just the thrill of making it – because even though I didn’t find it easy at all times, it was so pleasing to get out the sewing machine and work on a project. Oh, and Ronja loves the dress, so what’s not to be happy about?

Next up is making her a costume for shrovetide – she wants to go as an angel…

19 comments

  1. Stash Empress says:

    This is gorgeous! Wonderful fabrics & I love your binding. This is turning out to be another one of those favorite patterns — I’ve already made it for my 8yo daughter & also for my 3yo granddaughter.

  2. Jeannine says:

    Astrid, I love it. It is beautiful, and if there are any imperfections, then I cant see them. Oh, don’t let all those pictures from Karen make you feel inferior. I know I do. HAHA. No, seriously, Karen does such beautiful work, but sometimes when you are working on something difficult for the first time, and time is of essence, things don’t always go well. Ask me how I know? I cannot wait to see modelled pictures.
    Lovely.
    Jeannine

  3. Yvonne says:

    It is gorgeous! I love the fabric. It’s very pretty and the dress turned out beautiful. Most importantly Ronja loves it which always makes it all worthwhile.

  4. Holly says:

    Hi Astrid,
    I have been enjoying reading your posts about life and sewing. Life is different in so many ways from Northern California where I live but sewing for daughters is much the same. I wondered what pattern the dress is that your older daughter is wearing in the upper right photo of your home page. Is that from Ottobre?
    Thanks.

  5. Ulla says:

    Den er nu en fantastisk fornemmelse at stå med et færdigt og flot sytøj, som har givet udfordringer undervejs. At have udført det med ynde som det endelige resultat, giver også mod på mere.

    Det er virkelig en smuk spencer…

  6. Astrid says:

    Tara – thank you! 🙂

    Stash Empress – I did see yours, it is wonderful. Because of yours, I was thinking about making the pleat underlays in a different fabric, but the one I chose for lining was too light, and I couldn’t find anything else that matched, so I didn’t. But thank you! 🙂

    Teri – thanks! 😉

    Jeannine – thank you, you’re right, it’s not a big problem that things are not perfect – but then again, I would like them to be! 😉

    Yvonne – thank you so much! 🙂

    Amy – yep, that’s my sewing machine – and I love it! 😉

    Holly – thanks a bunch, and welcome to my blog! I love reading blogs from all over the world, and it’s so funny how sewing can be a thing that ties us all together. Thank you so much for visiting – it’s wonderful to hear from you! 🙂 The dress that Ronja is wearing in the picture is the one called the “China Grass” dress – I wrote about it here and Ronja is modeling it here.

    Jeanette – Tusinde tak skal du have – det er slet ikke min sædvanlige stil i stof, så jeg har været lidt i tvivl, men jeg er rigtig glad for det færdige resultat. 🙂

  7. Mor(mor) says:

    Mor’n Astrid
    Den er SÅ fin!
    Jeg synes, du skulle vise os lynlåsen (måske er den helt usynlig?)
    Dejligt, at du har fundet lidt frirum til at sy igen. 🙂

  8. Sarah says:

    Very pretty, Astrid! What a nice fabric and I like the box pleats very much. I haven’t been stopping by so much lately, but only because I’ve been caught up in work/projects!

  9. Julia says:

    ej, hvor er det flot! Så lækkert og sikken en fantastisk blig du har. bliver meget inspireret og må se at få tid til den symaskine igen. KH

  10. Astrid says:

    Ulla – tusinde tak skal du have! Du har fuldstændig ret, og det er så dejligt at være i gang igen. 🙂

    Sara – Thank you, Sara! 😉

    Mor – Tak skal du altså have – jeg lover at jeg viser lynlåsen, når jeg tager et billede af Ronja med kjolen på – men den er altså helt usynlig! 🙂

    Holly – You’re welcome!

    Sarah – Thanks! I’ve been busy as well, you know, so no need for apologies – life takes time! 😉

    Julia – tusinde tak skal du have – og velkommen til! Det var søde ord! 🙂

  11. Lara says:

    It looks really beautiful in the photos (and especially in the later photo of Ronja modelling it). The learning process can stretch us, but look at what a fantastic result you’ve come up with!

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