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When you have an owl obsessed child it stands to reason that when you see owl fabric, you have to have it. My youngest was over the moon with the dress I made her, and my eldest was happy to coordinate!
MK*Designs sent me a fat half of both Retro Owl Toss and the coordinating Retro Circles print, both in Cotton Lycra. This Cotton Lycra has a lovely weight and the colors stay vibrant, wash after wash.
For this look, I decided to start with the Boo Designs Sleeved Skater Dress. I wanted flouncy sleeves, and used the circle sleeve option from the Boo Designs Portrait Dress. To break up the prints a bit, i added a waistband to both front and back. This was easy to do — I just cut the bodice pieces shorter, and then made a waistband template (adding the seam allowances too). I also added hem allowances to both the skirt and sleeves, since the original pattern is designed to be unhemmed.
Since the Sunflower Seams Dandelion Shorts were so recently sewn and fresh in my mind, I decided to use that pattern for my eldest daughter’s shorts. This was a really quick sew and she finds them super comfy. I had meant to lengthen them – and I did… lengthen one leg. And failed to lengthen the second leg. Oof.
Of course, my girls both needed bows, so I used the FREE Bluebell Bow pattern from Peony Patterns. It’s designed for woven, but you can easily use it for knits as well. Great scrap buster!
I decided to take a little risk with my daughter’s top, and use a Burda Style pattern (5/2011 #140). Burda’s patterns have notoriously terrible directions, but I thought this one would be straight forward. Mostly it was, but I did have to read the directions for the shoulder casing a few times. It looked quite messy in the end but thankfully the messiness is hidden by the ruching! This pattern is also supposed to have a vent at the hem, and I had intended to include it, but laziness won out in the end and I decided to quickly serge the seams together and call it a day. I made this top with Rayon Lycra that I think I got YEARS ago from So Sew English.
This current round from MK*Designs has lots of great prints! A gorgeous underwater theme, and various fan art designs, including Queen, Disney, and Melted Crayon. These are available in all their bases – Cotton Lycra, Cotton Woven (from MK*Designs), and Minky, Fluff, Swim, Yoga, French Terry, Bamboo Lycra (from MK*Unlimited). Preorder for these designs runs until April 30, and takes about 8-12 weeks to arrive to the shop after that. Join the MK*Designs Facebook group for more inspiration and presale details.
Disclaimer: I received 1 yard total complimentary from MK*Designs for purposes of promotion.
auschick sews 