Zyan’s Christening Dress

February: Christening Dress (McCall’s 4641)

God has his way of directing your paths. That’s called His Will being done. I had plans for my daughter to be christened when she was 6-8 weeks old. That didn’t happen for one reason or another. She is now 6 months old. I have been planning this for a while but since I kind of felt like things would take their course according to not my plans, I held off for a hot minute. I didn’t want anything off the rack, whether it was cheap or expensive. I wanted something that I’d made. That in itself would make it more personal.

It’s not a new pattern. It’s circa 2004. Actually, I’ve made it twice before for my two older daughters. Just not for a christening dress.

I think the little baby model is so adorable on the front. It’s an infants’ tops, dresses, pants, and hat pattern. I used View A as a guide since I made a few changes. I made the size small.

I used, again, stash fabric. It is actually a ‘silk-like’ lining fabric for the underlay and a poly-lace for the overlay. It’s very soft and a bit slippery, too.

There are several changes I made to the dress. ONE: I used a lace overlay. TWO: I used started to use elastic in the waistband. THREE: I made the button placket a little different than “standard”. FOUR: For the hat, I self lined it. FIVE: I put elastic around the whole hat. SIX: To make it a bit special, I used a design card to make some fancy button holes. I couldn’t find the design card so I used two snaps and called it a day. I also kind of botched the snaps because my snap doohicky tool is somewhere in the sewing hut - where? It only knows.

Photo of snaps. Unfortunately, I don’t have a photo of them. Yet.

I also made a pair of bloomers to go with the dress.

Photo of bloomers This part never happened.

The pattern is OOP but I like it because it’s a simple run-to. You can make it as fancy as silk or as playground-ready in denim as you want. There is really nothing to dislike.

Here are a few photos of the dress in try-on mode.

Until Later, Scheryka

Brad's Newsboy Cap

I tried my hand at this free program named Wild Ginger. It was a long time coming, I just kept putting it off so that other things can be done. My youngest son asked me one day if I would make him a hat. "Ok". So a week went by then he asked again. "Ok, gotta get some things done". About another a week or so went by and again he'd asked. "If you keep asking you won't get it". So, then I decided to drop what I was doing and sew up a cap for this so very patient son of mine. Literally, i dropped everything! My PEPSI! Oh boy, my Pepsi.

At first the cap turned out looking like Dr. Suess's hat that he wears. Just not striped and it had sord of a rounded point thing going on at the top. I really wish I had taken a photo of this hideous work I thought I called art. But being so anxious to get this thing right, I kept working. Not to mention, I had already put him off for while. So, I made the decision to keep going...I mean keep sewing.

After a while I got it to a workable newsboy cap. I had to shorten the length of the panels by far. I didn't take the cap a loose to do it. What I did was cut that eyesore of a point off. The length was about an inch and a half. Then I had sewn the panels just a tad bit deeper so that the hole at the top would close up again. Now, I was starting to see this cap that I had so intended to sew from the beginning.

I won't make you wait for the debut any longer. So, here you are.
I present to you Bradley and the Newsboy Cap:

    You go boy!
Until later, Schey