Thursday 8 October 2015

Breatfeeding Dress DIY

Hello everyone! 

I’m here! I’ve made it back to the blog! Spud has fallen asleep on the sofa, and did not wake up when I moved away from her! It’s a miracle of epic proportions.

Life is very different here, I seem to be feeding almost constantly, did anyone else realise babies feed basically constantly?! I tend to do this lying down, I think I mentioned on instagram recently, this is mostly as I am lazy but also because it seems that Spud feeds better that way. Plus there is always the chance I can creep away from her if she's nodded off and quickly fill the dishwasher, start tea or put a wash on. These are my main life goals at the moment and I’m pretty happy with that. Mr T gave me some time to myself for the first time on Saturday and it was pretty brilliant, I made my adapted Coco pattern in 2 ½ hours! I surprised even myself.

I have decided to start something called #speedysew. This is my programme of sanity building whereby I'll work on my sewing in five minute dashes. This will necessarily mean leaving things out on the sides, but if I get five minutes in which to do anything, sew a single seam, or cut out one pattern piece I will still keep moving forward with my sewing, and watching my fabric pile whilst feeding won’t be quite so painful.

Today I'm going to show you my solution to the breastfeeding issue... how do I get at my boobs? I'm still figuring this out, it's difficult to find things that cover skin but give access to your boob. But when I went to Mamas and Papas to get a car seat for Spud, I found a super amazing black and white dress which had overlapping layers, and a top that folds down over it. Difficult to explain but take my word for it, it's the best. Inspired by this, I've made the following dress!


I decided to take some jersey tops that I no longer wear, and create some dresses with boob access. This is the first of this batch, the hem fabric is a piece that I bought in Abakhan when I used to work there, that's quite a while to stash some fabric! I never knew what to do with it, but having plain black fabric and piecing this together into a border print has made a beautiful fabric in itself. 

In order to do this yourself, I have taken some step by step photos for you. I (again) used the Washi pattern to identify the length of the top half. Apologies that the black doesn't really show up the cut lines that well.


This is the length that I cut it to, it should fall just under your chest.


Trying on the top, I pinned where the cuts will have to go, so that they fall right over your nipple


I then cut these as in the photo below, and then overlapped the two cut layers.


Stitch with a zig zag stitch two inches up from the bottom, and two inchess of the overlap from the top. 



I hope that makes some sense, here is a flash of bra to give you a better idea. Don't say I never treat ya.


I flipping love this dress, it's so comfortable and I feel really glam in it! I'm not having any excuses to be so glam at the mo... plus I look kind of tired in these photos... and my hair is all sorts of mess. 

But I kind of like that. I look how I feel, a bit tired, and not caring about my hair. I have other things going on! I want to be honest in this blog, I don't want people to think I'm breezing through this motherhood thing. I'm having a good time, but it's a tiring watching four hundred episodes of Stargate with a baby attached to you kind of good time.


In that vein, it has taken me three goes at writing this blog post, but I've done it! Niiiiiice. No promises about when I'll be back, but I hope it's soon.



















9 comments:

  1. Great idea, I love the sunflower wrap top & that amazing hem band. Good luck with your speedy sewing!

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  2. Glad to see you back on the blogging saddle :)

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  3. Super adorable, and practical! Definitely a win :D

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  4. You look fab in that dress, breast feeding has never looked so glamorous! The tiredness does get better.

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  5. Lovely dress and great photos. Sewing and blogging already!! Impressive!
    I sort of did the speedy sewing, taking part in the 100 Day Project earlier in the year. It's amazing how much you can achieve 5 minutes at a time, if the 5-minute-sews are fairly regular.

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  6. Well done Debbie, nice to see you making tracks back into your sewing again. Brilliant job with the breast feeding clothing idea. My daughter is due to have a little girl on 31/10 so I will pas your idea on to her. Hope you are soon feeling yourself again soon. I used to do something like your speed sewing 30 odd years ago when my 2 children were under 2. I kept the sewing machine on one of the kitchen worktops so I could get at it easily and it was safe for the children. Regards Ann

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  7. Well done you! I didn't sew till Aali was about 8 or 9 months old! I spent most of the first 8 weeks constantly feeding and crying due to all the hormones and then things settled down enough for me to be able yo knit rather than sew. Hold the speedysew goes well!

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  8. You look amazing, great dress too. Your plan to find five minutes of sewing time here and there is a great one.

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  9. Nice to see you back :) That dress is gorgeous on you, super flattering.

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