Christening Gown and Accessories

A friend of mine asked me a couple months ago if I would make a Christening gown for her daughter's baptism this coming Saturday. She wanted it made out of her wedding dress. No hesitation on my part, it was a definite yes!! I love creating!! This set was to her specifications, but I had the opportunity to create it. It was fun thinking about the possibilities and then figuring out how to put it together. When she brought her wedding dress I was a little nervous at first. The thought of cutting into somebodies wedding dress is a little scary! I first sent her some links to some patterns and she responded with what she liked and didn't like. I then looked through my patterns to see if anything I had in my stash of a million patterns would get me started. I started off with the top from one pattern, lengthened the skirt and then took the sleeves from another pattern. I did a test run on the bonnet, shoes and gown for her to try on her daughter. They live 2 hours away and I haven't even seen her daughter in person, so hopefully with the test run and alterations everything will fit just right!!

The test run had binding around the neck, but we both liked the way I ended up doing it much better (the idea at the time, since she hasn't seen the pictures or seen it in person yet). I added little tucks around the sleeves (around the shoulders and the bottom of the sleeves). She wanted the band around the bottom of her wedding dress on the bottom of the gown as well as incorporated into the top of the dress. I couldn't figure out a way to cut out the skirt pieces with the band on the bottom, so I had to take off the band (and then reattached it later). I couldn't use the entire band around the waist because it was too wide and couldn't figure out how to sew it into the waist and have it looking right, so I made a separate sash to tie around the waist. What do you think? I LOVE the way the sash looks around the waist and it really added to the look of the gown.

A drawstring bag to hold the gown and accessories.

Gown with sash.

The buttons on the back of the dress are from her wedding dress. I also added a button to the strap of each shoe, but I don't have a good picture of the shoes. Hopefully my friend will send me a picture of the the shoes on her daughter's little feet (I'm sure they will look much cuter on her feet).

Without the sash around the waist.

The bonnet made from another pattern (an actual Christening gown pattern). It's simple, but beautiful!!