Hi-Low Polka Dot Dress || Summer Collection

 Penny was in need of some dresses. I used one of my favorite go-to patterns the Every Little Thing Dress. It’s such a great pattern because it’s super basic and easy to tweak a little for a huge difference. Like I did here for Miss Penny.

 You see she is a baby still. ( I will call her that until she is 20) By baby I mean she still likes to crawl around from time to time, she is constantly falling or tripping and getting back up again, and so on… So what happens all the time? She trips over the front of her dress while trying to get back up. I think this is why baby dresses are often very short, which is fine but I hate when they bend over and their bum shows. So I took the “high low” hem and I made it higher and lower.

The result is a bit of a mullet dress, but it’s cool. There is a curve the slopes from front to back so it’s not like it just drops off, but I love the coverage in the back and the ease of wear in the front.

So changes I made to the ELT Dress pattern.

• I swapped the front for the back so the buttons were down the front. 
• I curved out the back more so it had a slight racer back.
• I made the skirt more full by adding inches to the width since my fabric was very lightweight.
• I made the back longer and the front shorter curving between the two. 

Here is how I did it:

 I traced the pattern so that I could re-draw the back line. I followed along the “front” fold line since I made the front the back. You want the new curve line to start at the underarm and curve up to meet the shoulder. For the small sizes they are already quite narrow so you don’t want to make it smaller.

 Then for the bottom. I added several inches to the width of the pattern since the silk cotton I was using was a sheer super light weight fabric I wanted the extra fullness so it would be less sheer.  Then I cut the front following the length of the of the pattern ( minus the band along the bottom) Then I made the bottom back piece several inches longer (5 I think) and I curved the back up to the same length as the front.

I assembled the bodice the same way as the pattern only when I was done I had a slight racer back design.
For the rest of the dress I made it following the pattern only I hemmed the bottom since I skipped the band along the bottom.

 Then this sweet little doll. Had a soft dreamy and cool new dress. One that she can really boogie in. The girl loves to dance.

Pattern || Every Little Thing Dress || Shwin Designs
Fabric || Black and White polka dot Silk Cotton || Britex Fabrics San Francisco
Shoes || Zara Baby