Free pattern: Sundress for the Dolly Donation girl doll

**The PDF file has been fixed and should print correctly.  Now that it’s sized correctly, turn OFF page scaling.  The dress skirt should be 5 inches wide when printed correctly.**

My pledge for the Craft Gossip Dolly Donation Challenge was to create 5 dollies for Dolly Donations, along with a pattern to create an extra clothing item for the boy and girl dolls.  The boy dolls got some Superhero Gear as their extra.  And now it’s the girls’ turn!

The pattern for the girl dolls is for this sundress.  I liked the look of a sundress that goes over the sewn-in shirt, kind of like a jumper.  With a Velcro closure in the back, it’s easy for small hands to take off and put back on.  If you keep it simple, it will be a quick sew.  On the other hand, the plain sundress is a blank canvas for any kind of embellishing you’d want to do.

This dress is sized to fit the “advanced” Dolly Donation doll.  You can get the doll pattern from the Dolly Donations site.

Find out more about the Craft Gossip Dolly Donation Challenge here.

**Once again we have a faceless dolly modeling the dress.  Don’t worry – she’ll have a face before she is sent off!**

So, are you ready to make a dress for your Dolly Donations doll?

Here’s what you need:

— roughly 2″ of Velcro
— cotton fabric 9″ tall x 20″ wide.
— erasable marker or chalk
—sundress pattern (PDF)

Here’s how to make it:

1.  Cut out all of your pattern pieces.  Mark the dots on the wrong sides of the bodice front and bodice back with erasable marker or chalk.

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2.  With right sides together, stitch the side seams of the bodice from the top edge down to the top dot.  Backstitch at the dot to lock the stitching.  (The space between the dots will be the armholes, so we want to be sure the seam doesn’t pull out.)

3.  Stitch the side seams fo the bodice from the bottom edge up to the bottom dot.  Backstitch at the dot to lock the stitching.

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4.  Press the seam allowances open.  Stitch down the seam allowances roughly 1/8″ from the seams.  Yay!  The armholes are complete.

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5.  Turn under approximately 1/4″ on the neck edge.  Stitch down.  Yay!! The bodice is complete.

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6.   Now for the skirt.  Fold up 1/4″ along the bottom edge of the skirt and press in place.  Fold over again and stitch hem in place.

7.  Stitch two lines of basting along the top edge of the skirt – 1/4″ and 3/8″ from the edge.  Pull basting threads to create gathers.  It will take some fiddling to get the gathers distributed evenly.  This is when your OCD tendencies come in handy.

8.  With right sides together, sew the gathered skirt to the bottom of the bodice.  I find that I get fuller ruffles when I stitch with the gathered piece on top and follow the bottom basting exactly. (I have a little groove on my presser foot that indicates the center needle position.)

9.  After you’ve attached the skirt, press the seam allowance toward the bodice and topstitch on the bodice 1/8″ from the seam.

10.  We’re almost done!  All we need to do now is sew up the back of the dress and add the Velcro.  With right sides together, start at the bottom of the dress and stitch a seam roughly 2″.  Use a 1/4″ seam allowance, and backstitch to lock the seam.

11.  Turn the dress right side out.  Cut a piece of Velcro that’s 2 to 2.5″ long.  Lay the fuzzy side of the Velcro over the right side of the dress opening so that it’s aligned at the top of the dress and overlapping the raw edge of the opening by 1/4″.  Let the rest of the Velcro stick out into the opening of the dress.   (There will be gap at the bottom between where the Velcro ends and where the back seam of the dress begins.)  Clear as mud?  Hopefully the picture will help illustrate.  Stitch the Velcro in place.

12. Now for the other side.  Turn the dress inside out again.  Fold the raw edge of the right side of the dress opening over 1/4″ and press in place.  Lay the prickly piece of the Velcro so that the left side of the Velcro is aligned with the edge of the opening.  This piece of Velcro will NOT stick out into the dress opening, as the other piece did.  Stitch in place.

13.  Turn the dress back right side out.  Your Dolly Donations sundress is done! 

[tags]sewing, tutorial, pattern, dolly, doll, dress, sundress, dolly donation[/tags]