Toddler Dress from Two Sweaters

I bought a sweater last fall from Forever 21 , just a nice orange casual sweater. I didn't even realize it was made with wool (who would have thought), normally wool makes be itch but this sweater didn't. I wore it and then it went into the wash. It made it through the washing (I wash everything in cold) but when it came to the dryer? well? mmmmm...Not so good.
Of course it shrunk and it shrunk quite a bit. So I thought ...Okay.. I can make something out of this, I love shrunken wool .

I found another sweater in my studio one of my hubby's sweaters ( believe me when I say I have tons of things that I don't throw out). This sweater was a nice charcoal colour and it went beautifully with the orange.
Now to find some fabric to make pockets on the front. Should they match? Should they compliment each other? I found in my trusty dusty designer fabric books some lovely orange patterned pieces. Quite small but perfect for pockets.

Here is the dress laid out to see what it would look like. My first draft.

My thinking was to make the top part of the dress from the orange sweater and the bottom part with the lower half of the charcoal sweater. In my mind it seemed quite simple its not until you attempt to do it that it becomes a little more difficult.

The above fabrics were my first choice for pockets but not what I ended up using.

I cut the bottom part of the charcoal sweater to the size that I thought might work for a size 4-5 for a little girl.

I sewed up the sides of the skirt but my thoughts were that the ribbing at the bottom had to go, too tight. I cut the orange sweater up , a front , a back, and two sleeves. I wanted the sleeves to be 3/4 length , I cut a slit in the front piece in the centre so it would be a little more loose. I found a great piece of fabric and cut a 2 1/2 inch square that I then frayed and sewed to the bottom of the slit I had just cut. I ended up sewing it on a little crooked so trimmed it to make it look more even.

The next step was to sew up the sides and the shoulders and sew along the slit edge at the neck (leaving it slightly raw) just to stop from fraying. The sleeves were added next. My cutting was spot on because the sleeve fit the armhole perfectly.

Now to sew the bottom and top together. My machine stopped working so I had to dig out my Mom's 75 year old Singer. STILL SEWS LIKE A CHARM!

I also trimmed off the ribbing on the bottom and hemmed up about a half inch by machine.

Buttons were found in my button box and a small organza flower that I made was used at the top.

SO VOILA!!! Here it is the finished product. I'm pretty happy with it. I hope you are inspired to dig out those old sweaters and come up with a design of your own. Happy sewing!