Bubble Skirt T-Shirt Dress

My daughter got invited to the Daddy-Daughter Princess dance at church.
The invitation mentioned that each Princess-King combo should come dressed in their royal attire ready for pictures, food and fun.



Since my 9 year old doesn't have a huge supply of princess dresses anymore,
I decided to make her one with a good twirling skirt.
It worked up really quick and looks great on.





WHAT YOU'LL NEED:
1 T-Shirt That Fits
Fabric For The Skirt
Fabric For The Lining
Measuring Tape
Needle & Thread
Scissors
Sewing Machine

First you'll need to get some measurements:


1: With the shirt on, wrap your measuring tape around 1 inch bellow the base of the sternum. Mark in a few places, then once its off draw a straight line & cut.


2: Measure around the base of the shirt and multiply by 2. This is the width of the skirt and lining. It is important to measure around the shirt and not the chest because you want some stretch when putting the dress on.


3: Measure from the same point at the base of the sternum to the knee. Add 4 inches. This is the length of the SKIRT only. Don't worry it will still fall at the knee.


4: Take the measurement from the knee and subtract 3 inches. This is the measurement for the length of the LINING only.



OK now that everything is measured and cut, get it sewn together.
With right sides facing, sew the lining and skirt fabric together along the long sides to form a tube. Turn right side out so that the seams are inside and adjust so that the skirt fabric wraps around the top and bottom, so that no lining is showing.

Fold the tube over on itself with right sides facing, put the machine back to
normal stitching and sew it together. Surge to finish off so it wont fall apart in the washing machine. If you don't have a serger, I've heard that you can use a zigzag stitch, but I've never done that so I can't advise you there. I got mine off craiglist for $90!! It had been used less than 5 times by a woman who had a 5 thread one, so this 4 thread one was 'useless to her.' I looked it up online when I got home and the exact model of it was $1000 brand new, so I recommend checking there first!



Now, adjust your machine so you can do a basting stitch all the way across
the top seam about 1 inch from the top. Make sure if your fabric has a direction
that its facing the right direction. Leave plenty of thread at the beginning and end so
it doesn't pull out as you gather the tube. It should look like this after gathering is done.
Leave the skirt inside out for the next step.

So after you sew the tube shut and have it gathered, then bast, the next part can get
a little tricky. Lay the shirt on the table. Fold it in half so that the back of the shirt
is showing. This point is where you will pin the middle of the skirt to.
The skirt should still be inside out and upside down to the shirt,
just like if you had a dress that was half way inside out. Make sure that there
is about 1/2 inch seam allowance as you pin all the way around.
Before you sew, hang it up from some where that you can get a clear
look at it to make sure that everything is level and pull out the basting thread.
Once everything is in place, sew the skirt to the shirt, then serge the raw edges.

Last you'll want to turn the dress right side out and check that everything is level.
If not just pin in place while hanging and hand stitch from the inside so that its level.
You can leave the skirt with the ruffle along the waist if you are using a cotton material,
but since I was using a satiny shiny material I wanted a cleaner look.
I used a blind stitch along the waist band with matching thread to sew
the skirt all the way to the shirt. It gave it a nice little band around the waist.
I also hand stitched the seam inside the skirt to itself at the bottom so it would lay
flatter at the hem.

Finish off the dress with some sort of embellishment.
I used this flower combination for her pin on her dress,
her corsage and for my husband's boutonniere.
For the tutorial on the flowers used click here.

They looked so good that night! I also made my husband's tie,

which I'll be posting a how to for that soon. :)