Oliver+S Ice Cream Dress Sew-A-Long: Day 1

So, who's with me? I hope I have some sewing buddies sewing with me this week!

Now, before we begin, I've had a busy few days. I burned the midnight oil to make sure I had a post up for everyone today. It's going to show in the pictures, I apologize! I promise to try to get some of this sew-a-long completed during daylight hours this week so you have some enjoyable photos to look at!

That said, I've spent a lot of cuddle time with my new baby nephew, and in turn spent a lot of cuddle time with a very jealous 2yr old of my own. :) My two year old has told me that his name is officially my nephew's name. It's a good thing that it wasn't me that brought home a new baby. If this baby didn't go home at the end of the day I don't think Little Dude would be able to deal. Poor kid.

Now as I got my supplies ready last night and cracked open my pattern for the first time (do you have faith in me?), this was my dilemma...

Super cute Japanese Dolls in Paris fabric, with pink dots on brown (I swear that fabric is brown), or...

Robert Kaufman Toyland fabric with white dots on pink?

Decisions, decisions. Maybe I'll make two. My 6r old already doesn't like the cutesy prints so I need to get my cute fix on with my 5yr old while I still can!

I'm going with the first.
Ice Cream Dress again with the 2nd, or something else?

For this sew-a-long I'm going to make View A of the dress. You can join along with me, or do view B or C. All of the major parts are the same so I'm sure whatever you choose you will be able to follow along more or less! :)

For View A you need to choose two fabrics. We will call the main body of our dress our main fabric and the top/bottom our contrasting fabric.
Let's get to it!
The first thing we need to do is cut our fabric.

Now, I've marked my photo but now that I've uploaded these photos I see that the writing is hard to read.
On your pattern sheet, each pattern piece is numbered. For View A of the dress, you need to trace and cut the following.
Main Fabric
#3 Piece: Dress Top Panel- Cut 2
#5 Piece: Pocket- Cut 2

Contrasting Fabric
#2 Piece: Yolk- Cut 2
#6 Piece: Pocket Yoke- Cut 4
#4 Piece: Dress Bottom Panel- Cut 4

Also cut a small piece on the bias that is 1 inch X 3 inches.

Once you have your pieces cut it is a good idea to transfer the markings/notches from the pattern pieces to your fabric pieces. There are so many ways to do this, so I will tell you this. I rarely buy any fancy sewing tools. I'm not a professional seamstress, I'm a mom that likes to sew. When a pattern piece has a notch I usually just make a little snip with my scissors, or take a fabric pen (or one of my kids' washable markers) and make a little mark on my fabric.

As far as the "V's" on your pocket yokes and on your yoke piece. I'll show you an easy way to transfer those markings here in a bit....


Let's open our pattern and begin!

Grab that little bit of fabric you cut on the bias. This is going to be your loop that goes over your button eventually.
There are two ways in the pattern to sew this piece. What I'm showing you is the easiest of the two for me.
begin by ironing the piece in half lengthwise. Unfold and then press in each side to your crease line.

Fold in half lengthwise again enclosing your raw edges and press really well.

Sew shut close to the open edge. Your machine may want to eat this as it is so itty bitty. What I do to prevent this is to hold the tail of my thread and give it a little pull as I'm feeding the button loop through the machine. This will prevent it from being eaten by the feed dogs. Set aside somewhere where you aren't going to misplace it!

Now, we are going to start our pockets. What you are seeing in this photo is my pocket yoke pattern piece on top of the wrong side of one of my pocket yoke pieces. As you can see I traced the "V" onto my paper when tracing my pattern pieces (FTR no fancy tracing paper- this is my kids' easel paper and I hang the pattern in my sliding glass window for light). I have used the tip of my scissors to make small holes where the dots are.
With your pattern piece laid on top, with holes punched where the dots are, use a fabric pen to color inside the dots so they will appear when you remove the pattern piece.

All 4 pocket yolk pieces with the markings transferred on.

Sew a basting stitch 1/2 inch in from the outside of your pockets, not including the top edge.

This photo shows two steps. First, on the left, take one of your pocket yolk pieces and right sides together sew along the top edge. Make sure the point of you "V" is facing up as shown.

Then, on the right, press the yoke up making sure you are pressing your seam upwards. Do this with both pockets.

With your two remaining pocket yoke pieces, press one edge up 3/8 inch. Do this on the side that has the point of the "V".

Place one of the yoke pieces that you just pressed on top of one of your pocket pieces. Right sides together and the raw edge of the yoke piece lined up with the raw edge of the yoke piece that is attached to your pocket.

Beginning at the bottom of your yoke piece sew up, along the top, down into the V, along the other side. You are only going to be sewing on your contrasting fabric, not on your pocket!

When you get into the tip of the V don't just pivot into the V shape. make one stitch across at the tip of the V, this will make it easier to turn into a point. If you look closely at my photo you will see one flat stitch at the bottom of the V.

Clip the corners of your pocket, and trim seam allowance all the way around to 1/4 inch. make sure you snip as close as possible to the stitching in the deep part of the V. This will create a nice crisp V when turned.

Turn the yoke right side out. Use something sharp to push out the corners. I use the tip of my scissors. If you are going to do that be very careful not to cut through your fabric! Maybe use a pencil, it is safer! I tend to walk on the wild side.

Yeah, right!

Give your yolk a really good press and also press in the edges of your pocket to the wrong side using your basting stitches as a guide. Press the fabric in so the basting stitches just sit on the wrong side.

This is what the wrong side will look like. make sure you do both pockets.

Ok, so guess what?

This is where we're stopping for today. So much for me to do, so little time!

See you tomorrow for some more! :)