Artbella: Summertime means Swimtime.......

We all know when our kids just stays in the pool and you finally drag them out after dusk those lips are already blue and shaking. Off comes the floatie ( which is almost worse than trying to pull of wet jeans) and the swimsuit and now to get dressed all over again . ( And this all while I am soaking wet and cold ) I wanted to make something for Isabella that we can just pull over a head and she will be fine till we get home to get her dressed for sleeptime - something that doesn't have to be tied or will fall open the whole time. I am planning to make Arthur a robe with a tie but that will be later.

I couldn't find a pattern exactly what I was looking for so I set out

to make one myself. For a first try it didn't turn out too bad but I want to make a few adjustments next time. We swim a lot so it will be handy to have at least two.

Note to self:

1. I didn't like this fabric - Next time I want to use the normal robe fabric. Little miss was with me when we picked out fabric so this is what she wanted. Its kind of a pain to work with especially with the top layer that is lined with t-shirt fabric and it gets very thick with the layers in the middle.

2. The armholes needs to be a lot bigger.

3. a few adjustments to the hood. I want to add and inch to the front and make it deeper at the neckline so it falls softly around her face and not so tight.

4. The dress part needs to be longer.

Here are pictures of the whole process. Next time will be more detailed if I make the adjustments like mentioned above.

I just found a jacket with a hood of hers outlined it and added the seam allowance.

make sure to mark where the shoulder seam is. It makes it easy to allign the hood to the top part.

by making a small diamond cut at the shoulder of the hood you don't have to mark all of the fabric.

These are the parts you are going to need.

2 sets of the hood (2 parts each)
2 sets of the top part (3 pieces each)
and 2 parts of the dress part.

I just used a t- shirt of hers to line the top part. I extended the front so it will overlap in front so that it will be easy to pull over her head.

I completely finished both the top parts separately of the two different fabrics. First the shoulder and side seams and then add the hood. I attached the two parts flipped them inside out and top stitched the hood and v part of the top together as you can see with this image below. At this stage the arm holes are not done yet.

I then added the skirt part. pin the v part of the top so it stays in place. When I cut the pattern I also marked the center front with a diamond cut so that I know how far the pieces should overlap.