Ruffle Dress Tutorial

 Another tutorial using Ruffle Fabric - wahoo!  This time, a whole dress.  It takes longer than the 5 minute skirt, but it's definitely doable in a naptime.  And really, blogging this tutorial took longer than actually making the dress. 

I went with light pink because I thought ruffles would be perfect for an Easter Dress.  This tutorial is zipper and button free!  Ruffle fabric is stretchy, so with the V-neck and the stretch in the fabric, no closures are needed. 

This took a lot less fabric than I thought - I was able to get 2 dresses out of 1 1/2 yards of fabric (my girls are 4 and 6).  I bought fabric to line the top as well - I used the swim/dancewear stuff (found it at JoAnn's) since it's really stretchy, just like the ruffle fabric stuff, so it would stretch over their heads.

Here we go - a tutorial on how to make a ruffle dress.  You can do this!

Grab a dress that fits her well - trace around it's bodice:

But instead of making it a scoop neck, draw a diagonal line down:

Cut 2 and over lap them for the front - see:

Trace a piece for the back as well:

Did you notice that the ruffles on the bodice go diagonal?? - love that little touch - see:

To do that, when you cut the fabric, put the diagonal edge on the edge of the fabric - in the picture below, the ruffles are cascading towards the top of the picture:

Cut the back of the bodice:

And cut the same pieces out of lining:

Lay out your 2 front bodice pieces:

And then put your back bodice piece on top of it, face down.  Sew the shoulders - where the white dotted line is - and do the same with the lining pieces.

Now, lay it out flat with the ruffles on top - then lay out your lining.  Pin it together.  Sew where the black dotted lines are as shown below.  Note that on the armholes you stop and start sewing about 1 inch from the edge.

Now, the semi-tricky part.  Mainly tricky to explain.  First flip the whole contraption right-side out by pulling it through the shoulders.  Try to iron where you sewed, but be really careful and use a cool iron.  Then, at the bottom of the armhole, find the 2 edges of the lining and sew them right-sides together.  Then sew that same spot but on the ruffle, right sides together.  After that you'll notice a small hole in the bottom of the armhole - sew that seam.  It'll make sense (I hope) when you see it.

So that's it for the top - not too hard, right?  Grab your girl and have her try on the bodice - overlap the V-neck and pin it to fit (I think I needed my make my 4 year olds a little tighter - but she kept wiggling, so it was hard to tell!).  Then where the 2 pieces overlap, sew them together along the bottom edge.

For the bottom part, cut 2 rectangles and sew up the side seams - I didn't take pictures of that part.  I traced the well-fitting dress again to get the size right.  Flip the skirt inside-out.  Put the bodice, which is right-side out, upside-down inside the skirt.  Pin those edges:

When pinning, I didn't pin the lining, so it just hangs inside the dress.  Oh, and I didn't line the skirt part - you could if you wanted.  Sew it together and you're done!  Great job!

A quick heads up - if you sew a long stitch down the middle of a strip of ruffle fabric, and gather it, you can glue it to a hairclip and it looks great!

More of my models - can you tell it was really cold and windy? ? (that's why there are a few without my 4 year old - she bailed early)  Oh, I forgot to mention I just tied a ribbon around their waist to add a little interest and shape.  Super cute - super easy - what more do you need!

See ya!

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