It's Flannel Time
Woohoo!
The cold has moved into my neck of the Midwestern woods and I'm waging war against flimsy summer bedtime attire with cozy long-sleeved nightgowns. Mmmmm Mmmm, flannel!
Before I continue talking about these nightgowns I need to tell you that I'm never buying white flannel again. All you have to do is look at it and it becomes dingy and gross. So much so that you'll be tempted to sanitize every picture you take.
That being said, here come the color pictures.
Now lets talk shop.
I'm very careful these days about getting in over my head (time-wise), therefore I wanted a nightgown pattern without any buttons or zippers. I knew an elastic peasant-style neckline was my best bet and I found this pattern:
(source)
It had me at "fast" and "easy." Unfortunately I couldn't get my hands on it locally and was forced to pull out this pattern which was not quite as fast or as easy.
One of these days I need to use it to make the clothing pictured, huh?
Pleasantly, I was surprised to find that the sash is superficial to the design. All I had to do was lengthen the pattern pieces at the hem and get rid of the sash and pockets.
I made my older daughter's nightgown first.
Seasonal clothing confusion Exhibit A. Bathing suits not appropriate.
There was a problem with it. The neckline was too bulky. Not only did it have separate elastic casings, but there was too much excess fabric in the design.
This picture doesn't do it much justice. The second neckline looks and feels more proportional. The only problem, which I anticipated but decided to go ahead anyway, was that the difference in circumferences when I folded over the neckline was such that I had to fudge it a bit, like this:
No worries. The gathering hid the tucks and pulls as I hoped it would. FYI, the larger nightgown has 1/2 inch elastic and the smaller one has 3/8 inch elastic.
Awww, I remember pulling my legs into my homemade flannel nightgowns when I was a kid!
When I went to the fabric store originally, I planned to make one nightgown until there was a remnant at the end of the bolt. You know I can't resist a 7/8 yard at an additional 50% off! There was a tiny pile of scraps by the time both nightgowns were squeaked out of less than 2.5 yards. I had to piece the sleeves on the smaller nightgown.
Shhhhhhh. The sideways kitties will be our little secret.
All in all, I spent $7.11 on two nightgowns tailor-made for my little ladies.
Sewing. Is. Awesome.
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Oh, and before I forget, a ribbon is a good way to mark the back of an item when you don't have a tag. If you have a colorfast pen, you can mark the size.
Now, go forth and sew!
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