Sundresses

I just finished making three sundresses using the Heather Ross free Mendocino Sundress pattern. The plan was for each daughter to cut out and sew her own dress except for the shirring on the top part, which I would do. Well, that plan was quickly scrapped. Daughter number one decided that sewing was just not for her, and quit on me after cutting out the pockets. Teenagers! Daughter number two, although also a teenager, did a little better. She cut out the pockets and sewed the basic dress together, and I did the rest. The pattern was fairly simple. The thing that took the most time was the shirring, which is done with a regular machine stitch with elastic thread in the bobbin. The bobbin has to be wound by hand. The directions say not to stretch it out when winding it, but this did not work for me. When I did this, it didn't stitch tight enough, so I tried again winding it tightly and that worked much better. The shirring is done by stitching rows and rows right next to each other in one spiral line of stitching. I thought it would never end. I was also afraid the shirring wasn't going to be tight enough, but I followed the directions and dampened it a little after I was finished sewing, and it worked great. I'm very pleased with the results! Here's the link to the free pattern download if you want to try it yourself: http://http://heatherross.squarespace.com/download-mendocino-sundress-pa/