Gumnut Dress Pattern Testers Wanted!

My Gumnut dress pattern is finally finished! I'm so pleased with how it's turned out and I really love this Cotton and Steel with stripes combo.  I'm also very happy about how much Ella loves it, the knit top makes it super comfy, it has huge pockets for storing treasures and a skirt that's perfect for twirling!

I've spent the weekend perfecting and testing and now it's your turn!  I need pattern testers for all sizes from 1 to 8 years.  You don't need to be an expert to pattern test, confident beginners should be able to sew this pattern.  There's a pretty short deadline on this one, testers need to have completed that pattern and submitted their feedback by Friday 1st May.  All testers will receive free copies of the finished pattern and my eternal gratitude for their help!

If you're interested and able to meet the deadline then please either email me at willowandstitchdesign@gmail.com or enter your details below.  Be sure to hit 'Submit'

UPDATE:  Applications for pattern testing are now closed.  I'm hoping to release the Gumnut Dress Pattern in the first week of May and I've got a MASSIVE givaway planned so if you'd like to be updated enter your details below:

Kids Clothes Week - Spider Tee for the Boy

I found this amazing spider web fabric at my local fabric clearance store this week and thought it would be just perfect for the Kids Clothes Week Wild Things theme.  The pattern is modified from an Ottobre pattern, I just added a waist band to it to make it more like a sweater than a tee.  The neckline turned out a little wide but it just adds to the slouchy, comfy feel I think. 

Needless to say it was a big hit with Jacob who beamed when he saw it.  It immediately captured his imagination - he instantly turned into Spiderman - climbing, jumping, swinging, shooting webs from his wrists! Look at that happy face!

There were so many more things that wanted to get done during this Kids Clothes Week but as always there simply weren't enough hours in the day and I decided that I really needed to focus on one very special project instead! Details coming right up...

Kids Clothes Week - Woodland Geranium Dress

I made this lovely Geranium dress for Ella as part of Kids Clothes Week.  This beautiful fabric is Timber Valley in Coral from the Brambleberry Ridge collection by Violet Craft.  I love the little deers, foxes and birds and the metallic gold trees, it's just gorgeous.  And I always love sewing geranium dresses.  I haven't made the pleated skirt version before so I thought I'd give that a go this time.  I finished the back with some lovely shell buttons which actually came from an old necklace of mine that broke - love a good upcycle!

I didn't want to waste any of this lovely fabric so I sewed a miniature version for Ella's doll, Molly.  I love this doll - the pattern is the Little Amigo Doll from Meg McElwee's book, Growing Up Sew Liberated.  I didn't know when I made the doll that Ella's hair would end up just as crazy as Molly's - they are like peas in a pod now!

Kids Clothes Week

Well, Kids Clothes Week is over for another couple of months and I have to say that I had fun, although the theme this time (upcycled) rather threw me.  It's a theme that is close to my heart and something that I'm usually very enthusiastic about.  I even have an entire box full of old clothes that no longer fit, no longer get worn, are past mending, or which I bought from charity shops because i just loved the fabric! A box that I keep purely for upcycled sewing projects!  The only problem is that this box currently happens to be in storage - it got packed away a few weeks ago so that we could knock down a third of our house and rebuild it. I can't tell you how many times I've kicked myself for not being more organised and checking the Kids Clothes Week theme more in advance so that I could have kept that box handy!

Ah well.  I may not have been able to full embrace the 'Upcycled' theme, but I did have a lot of fun sewing this week.  I took this opportunity to create a pattern for a dress for Ella that I've had in my head for a long time now.  I'm really happy with how it turned out.  

The dress has a very comfy knit top, a circle skirt that is perfect for twirling and huge drapey pockets for storing treasures.  Ella is VERY pleased with them. (She's particularly pleased that she got 3 new dresses in a week while I was tweaking the pattern!)

I'm working very hard to get this pattern digitised and graded and into a downloadable pdf file.  Bear with me while I try to juggle this with my day job and two often times very demanding children!  If you would like to be notified when the pattern is available then be sure to sign up for my newsletter.

I'm thinking that i will make this dress available in sizes 1-5 to begin with - what do you think?