Maybe Lil Sebastian got upset because he tried to share his true feelings with someone and they didn’t reciprocate!

Happy Spring everyone! Wait, did no one tell the weather?

The daffodils are out and the sun is shining but it’s still very cold. How unfair.

I decided to make a sundress for my May MBN make even if the weather isn’t quite up to it yet and picked this fun striped poly-cotton from Minerva.

This post could also be called “The Hazel dress that wasn’t”. Let’s just say I’m not sure I’ll try a Colette pattern again as I can’t take the emotional roller coaster of trying to fit them.

This dress pattern is instead Butterick 5351. It really is an easy dress pattern to make up; I’d definitely recommend this for a beginner looking to try something a little more involved – lots of darts and a zipper basically.

This is actually the first dress pattern I EVER TRIED!

“Hey, Amy from 2010, good choice.”

I used vertical stripes on the bodice and skirt, and horizontal stripes for the straps. I really like how the darts make arrows pointing to my waist. I added a row of topstitched bias-binding around the bottom of the skirt to bring in another horizontal line (as with the straps) to balance the dress out.

If you compare to the line art you’ll see I removed the top band and added a gathered skirt.

The dress doesn’t have a drafted lining but we know that’s simply a matter of making a duplicate of the dress in lining fabric and sewing the two together along the neckline. The cotton is stiff enough to not need interfacing along the top edge.

I’m on a real invisible/concealed zipper kick right now. I love fully enclosing an invisible zip in the lining as it gives a professional finish inside. This anti-static lining gives a nice crisp finish inside that won’t get caught in the zipper teeth either. My invisible zipper foot has definitely paid for itself ten times over and it was only a £1.50 plastic one from eBay.

All this stripe fun and my original plan for a Hazel was to make a candy cane interpretation of Roisin’s green striped Hazel. But after three practice bodices to correct the fit I realised I didn’t even like how the v shaped seams looked on me! Sorry Roisin this is as close as I get.

I have one more Sew Dolly Clackett dress to share that I’ve entered. I’m excited to see who wins as there were some seriously great entries! Very inspiring!

I get a bit teary thinking about how amazing this contest is. Roisin is wonderful. I adore how she embraces colour and joy in her sewing. She really makes you feel welcome and interesting when you meet or talk to her. She’s so unaffected and honest too. I think she knows how much I love hanging out with her so I won’t make a fuss. I’ll just raise a fancy gin cocktail to her. Cheers!