Sewing Projects In February

I wanted to use this flower print for my daughter's newest dress. I left my fingers in the picture for scale.

I didn't have enough yardage to cut the entire dress. I decided to use this blue material for part of the skirt and make a tiered skirt.

After cutting out the pieces I marked the seam allowance in pencil. Since this is a hand sewing project I need the seam allowances marked.

I stitched most of the seams with a back stitch instead of a running stitch. I learned my lesson on using a running stitch on the pinafore last month. I had stitched all the seams with a running stitch on the pink pinafore. My daughter was wearing the pinafore not more than a couple hours before someone pulled on her skirt and burst the side seam. What a pain! (I fixed it straight away, but come on! Really?)

A running stitch might not be solely to blame. The thread that I used was some old mercerized cotton thread so it is not as strong as modern polyester thread.

Anyway, on this latest dress I used a polyester all purpose thread AND a backstitch. 

I finished most of the seams with a self enclosed seam.

Right about this stage in the dress project my son's coat zipper broke. So, I had to switch gears and replace a coat zipper. Sometimes it would not be worth my time to replace a zipper, but this is a nice coat and I happened to have the right size separating zipper. I also had a black or gray separating zipper that were long enough but I decided to use the red one because I thought neutral colors might be more likely to come in handy later.

First, I had to rip the old zipper out.

I basted and stitched the new zipper in place. This job was not fun and I was really happy when I finally finished. It took me 9 days.

I also took care of this little tear while I was at it 

While I was on the mindset to fix coats I repaired this hole.

My three year old has been begging me to fix this hole in the hood of his coat for a month. 

He had been standing in the vicinity a brush fire when a hot ember must have landed on his hood melting this hole.

Now he his happy!

Back to sewing on the dress.

I have finished the sleeves and the base of the bodice. I am working on the skirt now. Hopefully, in March I can finish the skirt, install the zipper, add the collar, and do the hem. Check back in March to see far I get!