I don’t usually sew to sell, however occasionally my arm can be twisted. I was recently asked by one of the fabric hosts that I work with, if I could sew a swimsuit for her daughter. So, she sent me two different fabrics but we had a little breakdown in communication – I sewed up one swimsuit for my daughter in what I thought was the strike-off fabric, only to find the OTHER fabric was the strike!
It’s a good thing swimsuits don’t use much fabric!!
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For this swimsuit, I decided to try a Jalie swim pattern for the first time! I used the brand new Jalie Diane swimsuit 3893 as my base since it has some great color blocking options. Of course, I couldn’t leave it as is, and added ruffles at the butt and around the arms.
The butt ruffles were easy to do. I loosely used Marnie’s instructions on Pattern Revolution. When I made my second one (for my client) I decided to finish the raw edges with woolly nylon (narrow overlock), and also cut a seam line (and added seam allowance) to the butt piece so that I could serge the lower ruffle into the suit rather than attempting to stitch it on with my sewing machine and hope that it went on straight.
To do the arm ruffles, I followed the instructions in the Oliver +S Building Block Dress book*. I still haven’t actually sewn a dress from that book, but it’s a great resource… and I WILL make a dress from it… eventually…!
After photographing it, I realized that arm ruffles weren’t even, so I later went and seam ripped and redid them!
I fully lined the suit. The instructions mostly have you treat the lining and outer pieces as one, but I prefer to make my seams as hidden as possible. So while I treated them as one for the most part, I did use the burrito method for the crotch seam so that one would be completely hidden.
My one problem with this pattern were the instructions for mashing the sizes together. The pattern says to use the chest size and then lengthen it at the lengthening lines, but this has a couple of problems for children’s suits: 1) The arm holes can be too small, 2) there’s not enough fabric in the hip to cover the butt properly, and 3) the leg holes are the wrong size. SO, with my second one, I actually used the Boo! Designs Ultimate Suit* pattern blending instructions, and that was a lot more successful I think (well, client hasn’t tried it on yet, but my daughter who is a similar size tried it on and liked it a whole lot better, so I’m pretty confident it’s a better fit!).
Anyway, I love love love how this suit turned out and I will be making more! They’ll be perfect for my daughter’s swim lessons. And who knows… maybe I’ll make myself one of these too! (The Jalie Diane swimsuit pattern runs from size 2T up to adult – swimsuits for everyone!)
Fabric: I don’t know where the MLP fabric came from, but I got my swim solids from JoAnn!
I’m a Jalie Patterns Creative Ambassador and received this Jalie pattern complimentary for purposes of review and promotion.
auschick sews 
I love this suit so much! Beautiful work!
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Thank you! I love being able to make them for her 😀
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Adorable suit! Can you explain how you mashed the sizes together?
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For my client I did the following:
1. Use chest size for everything above waist. Extend shoulder height to the trunk size line.
2. Use hip size for everything below waist.
3. Measure height of front pattern piece that corresponds w/ trunk size. Measure height of traced pattern piece. The height difference is your length adjustment for both front and back.
4. Cut waist according to hip size but shape it according to waist size.
Hope that helps!!!
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