The 30-minute, no pattern, easy upcycle dress

Today, I whipped up a cute dress in less than a half an hour, without a pattern! I have become slightly enamored of the idea of upcycling clothing, taking something you might now use and making another thing about of it you will use. Lilblueboo, on Etsy, is one dress maker I follow. Her dresses are cute and popular and she also sells patterns so you can make them on their own. Well, no offense to Ashley but I figured I could try to make on myself, without a pattern. So, here is what I did today!

First, I found a cute top at a consignment store. Lilblueboo does some very cute screen prints, including a crown. I lucked out and found this Carter's top with a crown design in raised metallic sequins.

Then, I let my two year old help me pick from my stash of Chez Ami knits. She chose this cotton lycra striped in pink and red to be the skirt.

Here are my tools for this

adventure.

I have been playing with my new Janome Serger for several days and have figured out the correct settings for serging the edge of this fabric with four threads and then making a rolled hem with three threads.

I serged the side seams with a regular 4-thread edge.

For the skirt, I used the pattern for the dress I made last week, Ottobre Spring 2007, #11. It is twice the width of the dress. I figured this would be a good first trial skirt size.

Time to size up the top! Where to put the waist of the dress? How about right above the toddler belly button!

Cutting off the bottom. I will save this piece of pink for a future project, perhaps a tiered skirt!

Time to pin the right sides together so I can baste them on the sewing machine.

After basting the skirt to the top, I unpinned it and serged the inside with a four-thread edge. I then took out the left thread and changed settings to a rolled hem for the bottom of the dress.

Voila! Cute and simple and best of, my daughter says it is very comfy and she wants to wear it. All in all, this dress took 30 minutes to make and I figure it cost me $7 or less in materials. A perfect play dress for spring!

Next up: I plan to work on the waistline for the next dress and this one is a bit bunchy and not as full as I had hoped. I would also like to taper the sides of a top and make a drop-waist dress with a ruffled skirt. I think that would be darling.