Derby Dreams-Children’s Corner Patterns’ Patty and Johnny

Have you ever had something go completely wrong, then turn out better than what was in your head? Maria’s dress was thiiiiiiis close to being abandoned. Fortunately; I pushed through and the result was surprisingly cute!

So here’s the story on Maria’s dress: In my head, it was going to be a Children’s Corner Patty. This pattern is out of print and hard to come by, I lucked out and got it in several sizes a couple of years ago.

I cut out a Patty but I did not end up with a Patty. So; if her dress were truly a Patty, the pleats should have been box pleats. However, I embroidered the derby characters on the dress prior to sewing it and just completely put them in the wrong spot. I planned out every little detail, just incorrectly.

Almost immediately after embroidering the last of the five characters, I realized my mistake. I put the dress down and attempted to convince myself it was going to be okay. I sewed three Johnny’s and pretended the dress wasn’t cut out and wasn’t staring at me. Eventually; my friend texted me a picture of the Denise and I finally decided I was going to continue on with the embroidered fabric.

So; if you look at the images above, you can see that my pleats are “inverted box pleats” as seen in the Denise pattern, not box pleats, as seen on the Patty. Neither of the images seen above are mine, they were both taken from google searches.

Now, here are the details on my “Denise.”

The fabric is a white seersucker from Farmhouse Fabrics, it is so soft and fortunately not too sheer. I used baby interfacing on the collar to give it a bit more weight, but otherwise the fabric is perfect for a flowy or structured dress. I liberally starched this dress during the entire construction to help it maintain crisp pleats.

The embroidery file can be found on Joy Kate Designs. If you are interested in purchasing this file or any file from her you can use the code “jkdaff17” for 15% off your order. I love this particular file because it is a “build your own” file, so you can move each character around as you please.

I did not do the infamous “placket in a box pleat” that is found on the back of the Patty. If you want to do that, there is a video tutorial on how to here. I only had five embroidery characters so I did not need the extra pleat in the center of the back of the dress. I also wanted the button down back so that I could use those beautiful mother of pearl buttons.

I tried something new for the sleeves of the “Denise.” I folded up the serged bottom of the sleeve 1/4 inch. That was top-stitched in place. I then ran one single row of “Shirring” an inch away from the finished bottom of the sleeve. I have an entire post on shirring that you can find here that explains how to do it. I love the look of this and it is SO MUCH cleaner than doing an elastic casing with a zig-zag stitch.

The hem on this dress (and really most A-lined dresses) is pretty tricky. I hem dresses like this by folding up and ironing the raw edge 1/4 inch. I then run a gathering stitch on top of that fold. I gather the fabric a tiny amount and use this to help me ease in the hem as I fold the desired hem length and use my “blind hem stitch” to put the hem in. If this doesn’t make sense, let me know and I’ll do a video blog on how to do that.

Children’s Corner Johnny Details:

Robby’s Outfit is an unmodified (and honestly too big) Children’s Corner Johnny. I made him a size two. He is 18 months old and I am just waiting for a growth spurt. I suspect it will happen next week and this Johnny will fit him perfectly lol.

I used the same embroidery file for him, just picked the more “boy-ish” characters. The fabric for his Johnny is a Fabric Finders khaki chambray.

He is wearing a Peter Pan colored shirt from Primary. I accepted a long time ago that he is a white shirt destroyer. I will not make them for him unless I plan to not really let him wear them. So I purchase his white shirts from Primary. They are fantastic quality and hold up (even when bleached weekly) very well.

Alrighty, I think that is it for the details on this sibling set! Check back on Derby to a see a picture of baby John Luke’s knit nightie match 🙂