Thursday, September 21, 2017

Minnie Mouse Princess Dress

My Granddaughter loves to dress up. She is two and a half and loves frilly skirts, Mommy's shoes, jewelry, and purses. So, instead of buying a $30 Disney Princess dress that she will grow out of in a month, I decided to make her some play princess dresses. This was my first attempt.

I bought some clearance t-shirts from Target, Kohls and Walmart for $5 or less that I am using for the top of the dress.

I think this shirt was $4.50 on clearance and is now going to be the top of my Princess dress.
I went to JoAnn Fabric, went to the clearance bolts of fabric, and bought tulle, satin, silky, and fancy fabrics to use as the skirt part of the gown. I buy the fabric when it is on sale, clearance, or when I have a coupon. Because I only need a half of a yard of the fabric for the skirt I could buy the fabric for a few dollars.

This tulle was on clearance, and a half of a yard only cost me $2.50.
For the Minnie Mouse t-shirt's skirt I decided to use a white satin material I had left over from my daughter's wedding. I used the satin for the skirt and bow. I then use the white tulle (above) with silver sparkle dots on it to be the top layer of the skirt.

This is the satin material from my daughter's wedding. It is a light cream color, but this picture makes it look a bit darker.
I ran a basting stitch about 1/2 inch from the edge across the top width of the satin and the tulle, and then pulled the top thread to gather the two layers. They needed to be at least 19 inched in width to fit around my granddaughters waist. I made it a bit bigger and then pinned the two layers of the skirt, satin and tulle, together. I also sewed the back of each layer of the skirt together in a back seam to close the skirt.

For the basting stitch I used the widest stitch on the machine.

Then, you pull the top thread end and gather the fabric as much as you need.

I pinned the satin and tulle gathered pieces together, and then sewed them together with a 5/8 inch seam.
Next, I pinned the skirt to the waist of the t-shirt and sewed the skirt to the t-shirt. I bought some Rose ribbon and sewed it over the raw edges of the top of the skirt. Then I cut a long 4 inch wide strip of the satin fabric, folded it in half, sewed it across one end, down the open side, and then turned it right side out. I then sewed the open end closed, pressed it, tied it into a bow and tacked it to the back of the waist of the gown. My first attempt was to make a sash around the waist, but it kept falling down and showing the raw edges of the top of the skirt, so I went for the ribbon and bow instead.

The skirt sewn to the t-shirt.


Turning the sash right side out.


To dress up the t-shirt a bit, I took some kite string and strung some pearl beads on it. When I had about 20 beads on the string I tied a knot on each end to hold the beads on the string. Now, I had to hide the string knots, so I took a needle and thread and starting at the middle of the string of beads and the middle of the t-shirt neck, I started sewing the pearls to the neck of the dress. When I got to the end where the knot was, I pulled the thread up through the neck and into the knot and then through one extra pearl and back down into the neck. Then knotted the thread off into the shirt. I then went back to the middle and went up the opposite side, adding a pearl at that end. Then I took a piece of ribbon and tied it into a bow around the strings knot on each end.

The bows are covering the knots on each end of the strung pearls. The pearl on the end is just sewn in place.

The front view before the new rose ribbon waistband and before it was hemmed.

The back view before the rose ribbon/bow and before it was hemmed.
Last I needed to hem the skirt. I did make the mistake of hemming it too short, but made a pretty thick hem, so I could let it out if needed. I needed to.

My sweet granddaughter on her first fitting, lol
Princess gowns look better with a blankie and Meemaw's hat.


Turned out so cute on my sweet princess!


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