What's on for today at Dress A Girl Australia

Dress A Girl Australia Schedule for Today and the next 5 days :

Today, I will finish the 'almost completed' dress I started yesterday, then cut fabrics and prepare other materials needed for 5 dresses which I plan to sew next week. This will be like making a 'dress a girl' kit and see if I could make 5 dresses out of the 5 kits and be able to write instructions on how to make the dress. Similar to the 'Dummies' books you see in bookshops,  I think I will write a 'Sew a Dress for Dress A Girl Australia for dummies'.  :-) This will be for my friends, friends of friends and everyone who has never sewed a dress in their life (like me!)

Then... I can concentrate on figuring out what my 'BemyGreen' project would be to celebrate 'BeGreen' day on Friday, 3rd of June. A lot of people dont know (maybe everyone) that I created a 'Save our Planet'  2x2ft quilt panel as my contribution to the International Fiber Collaborative Dream Rocket project "Dare to Dream". I still have to finish off the panel with a backing so I could post it to the Dream Rocket project.  The Dream Rocket project is a large scale collaborative fiber wrap. Up to 8,000 fiber panels will be created by individuals around the world and will be combined to wrap the Saturn V Moon Rocket in Huntsville, Alabama.  If you are interested on this project and need more information, please visit the Dream Rocket website.

Here is the panel I have created and trying to finish. And I figure that for my 'BemyGreen' contribution at work on Friday, I will select the 'plant a tree' and 'recycling' images below, print them on paper and create 'BemyGreen' buttons, pin them on my staff ID ribbon necklace and wear them on Friday.

And on top of all these activities, I still will be responding to all your enquiries via email about the Dress A Girl Australia project....so keep those emails coming....and then dresses....!

More dresses Less Fabrics with mix 'n'match

The fabrics I use to make dresses is from my collection. I used to make memory pillows (and still do from time to time if someone makes an order) that is why a lot of my fabrics look like the fabrics from readymade pillowcases you can purchase from the shops. For every metre of fabric I can actually make 2 dresses of the same kind if I mix 'n' match it with a plain fabric as you can see from the completed dresses. This way I am able to maximize the use of the fabric. I have 2 dresses of the stripes and 2 of the pink/white stripes. And if I end up with scraps, I keep them just in case I would need them to make buttons.

The next time I go fabric-shopping for my handmade treasures, I will be on the lookout for organic 'beige' fabrics. Find fabric types with the least environmental impact, fabrics made of recycled materials which usually ends up more expensive than the normal fabrics but who knows they might be cheaper.  This way you have made a girl happy for owning a dress and at the same time help save our planet.

More dresses for Dress A Girl Australia

A good time to make a dress if you want to avoid the chilly weather outside. With the official winter season coming up in 4 days, more girls around the world will be dressed. This is the dress I did today and another one half-complete. If I had a bias tape ready, I probably could have made 3. My bias tape supply will not be available until perhaps late next week as I just remembered to order them from a wholesaler late yesterday afternoon as I was busy at work in the morning.

I guess I will just have to continue on making dresses with the time I can spare while waiting for other groups to submit the dresses they promised to send. I hope to make about 25 dresses by the end of June and at the rate am going I think I will make the 25 using the extra fabrics from my collection. Of course I have not forgotten that I still have lots of email addresses to contact for the Dress A Girl Australia project.

Another girl will get a dress

Can't wait for the weekend for a bias tape so I made my own bias tape again and another dress was completed. Another girl will own her own dress.

The other night I was making some calculations about how many dresses I can make in a year if I was able to make 5 dresses a week. At the rate am going, I think I indeed will be able to make 240 dresses in a year. And that is making 240 little girls around the world happy they own at least one dress.

Wouldnt you like to make that dream come true even for just one girl? Come on, join in the fun! Imagine a world where every girl owns at least one dress and what if that dress were made by you. If I can do it, you can do it, we all can do it!

Doing the maths

After dinner, preparing my lunch food for work and what to wear tomorrow I then spent about an hour cutting and sewing for another dress. As usual no bias tape or elastic and I wasnt too keen on creating my own bias tape this time so I stopped sewing  I dont think I will be able to buy these 2 items until the weekend. This is what I ended up with my attempt to make another dress and I think I would end up with semi-complete dresses like this until I get the chance to buy bias tapes and elastics.

Then I did some calculations. If I were to spend at least an hour everyday after work making a dress, in a week I could probably make about 5 or 6 dresses. Let's just say 6 dresses a week (perhaps more if I have nothing else to do on a weekend)  that would mean in a month I could make about 24 dresses multiply that by 12 months and that is 288 dresses in one year or maybe 300 max. That means I could put a smile to at least 300 girls around the world for giving each of these 300 girls a dress or making each one of them own at least one dress. And if I can convince at least a 100 people to join in on this campaign can you imagine how many dresses we can make in a year? 28,800 dresses (if my calculations are correct)

If I can do it, am sure everyone else can do it. Am glad that I found this endeavour and can use my creativity and a hobby to make little girls happy. I never thought I could make a dress or end up making a dress in my spare time...and now am counting...3 dresses....

A Dress with Limited Supplies

I found this fabric in one of my plastic containers which holds most of my fabric collections that are bigger than a fat quarter about 2 weeks ago. It looks like only a part of it was used probably for a quilt which only required several blocks of this fabric or for a fabric book cover. (I always buy more than what I need just in case I decide to use more). Last night I thought I would make one dress and this fabric came to mind. I was about to start to sew when I saw that I only had a white thread (it wasnt even white it was ecru). I decided that the thread color wasnt a problem because using white may even be better because of the background color of the fabric which was dark blue but I didnt have the rest of the stuff that I will need to complete the dress like bias tape, garter etc.

Wearing Soft Treasures' creativity hat, I decided to make my own bias tape and instead of using elastic to gather the fabric in the front and back I used the same bias tape I created to gather the fabric. Then I decided to create a pocket in the shape of a heart. I found several wooden flower buttons in my button box (I think these are used for embellishing scrapbook pages as they really are very light) and placed one button on each corner where the fabric is gathered and another button in the pocket and see the dress I made for Dress A Girl Australia with just a fabric, a thread and a pair of scissors in hand.

And if you want to see where I placed the buttons -

Instructions on how I completed this dress with limited supplies will be posted on this site very soon. At the end of the day, with just the fabric, thread and pair of scissors, it is still a dress and truly handmade with love.

Stripey fabrics for DAG Australia

It will be stripey fabrics for DAG Australia this time and I hope to be able to make at least 6 dresses with these bunch of stripeys especially if I mix and match it with coloured plain fabrics.

Dresses that make a difference - Daily Inter Lake: Local/Montana

Dresses that make a difference - Daily Inter Lake: Local/Montana: "Hearing the hum of sewing machines in Dianne Gronley’s classroom
is normal at this time of year. Students in her Textile Designs
class start w…"

Hot New Trend: Sewing Cafes

Hot New Trend: Sewing Cafes

This is a terrific idea for those who want to learn how to sew but dont want to buy a sewing machine or just wants to fix a hemline as they are too expensive to bring to shops for them to do it or if you already have a sewing machine but for sewing socializing. A good idea for Dress A Girl projects.

Dress A Girl

This is the reason why I always look forward from Monday to Friday to going home early from work...to be able to do the things I love to do before the day ends...and here is one of them.

Imagine a world where every little girl owns at least one dress and what if that dress were made by you.

Nothing is impossible if you just start doing it. Who would have thought that a person who spends most of the day working in front/staring at a PC ends the day trying to make a dress. So.. if I can do it...you can do it....we all can do it !

DAG Australia - Latest Numbers

This is 'Dress A Girl Australia's Latest Numbers as of 20th of May, 2011 -
           Sewn Dresses = 12 
           Donated Pillowcases = 5
           Humanitarian Dolls = 0
           Donated Fabrics - 14M  

I need 48 more dresses to meet my end of June objective of 60 and am pretty sure this will happen. Quite slow but surely.

Back to my Dress A Girl Australia Project (D-A-G-A)

After a couple of an unusual 'high activity' weeks mainly at work and culminating with having to attend a system training the whole week of this week, am back again on the 'Dress A Girl Australia' project and hoping to spend most of whatever spare time I can find this time on making dresses. I want to create my own 'dress a girl dress' design so I know that the dress I am making is for the project. I have now come up with the pattern and have cut my fabrics. All it needs is a time for me to sit down on my sewing machine and start pressing my foot on the pedal.

Enquiries about this project have started to come in and I hope to finish sending off my emails by the end of this month so I could start making follow-ups in early June. I thought putting email addresses at the top of the new mail screen was an easy task but now I realize it is easy but takes time especially if you want to make sure you have the right addresses otherwise you will end up with lots of emails bouncing back in your inbox due to incorrect email addresses.

Happy Mother's Day!

...to the world you might just be one person...but to one person you might just be the world! Dont forget Grandma as she is a mother too. She mothered our mother! Sunday, May 8.