Hanami #2 (We Should Probably Just Start A Running Tally)

You didn't think that I would make just one Raccoon Hanami, did you?  Oh no!  Each girl has to have her own, of course.  So allow me to introduce you to Raccoon Hanami #2 - worn by C at her second birthday party.

In cutting out these two dresses I had a realization as to why I end up making the girls so many matching items - you need much less fabric to make two dresses out of the same fabric than you do out of two different fabrics because if you cut them out at the same time you can squeeze in the little pattern pieces here and there and save a bunch of fabric.  And I'm all for saving a bunch of fabric.

There is a downside to this, however, and that would be that if you don't label your  pieces correctly you could end up cutting out too many size four bodices and not enough size two bodices and then you might end up lining your size two bodice with a size four lining (after all your piping is sewn in and your seam allowances are trimmed) and then you might wonder why your lining isn't fitting properly.  And then, once you figure out what went wrong, you might slap yourself and realize that you're an idiot that apparently can't count correctly.  This is all just hypothetically speaking of course.

So, yes, the front lining of this dress is a bit bumpy and lumpy inside, but you can't tell from the outside so I'm going to pretend that that problem doesn't exist.  Denial, people.  Embrace it.  It's your friend.

So for this version of the Hanami I decided to leave off the optional collar and sleeves and to instead add piping to every seam in sight.  One of the things that I really love about this dress is that it's really easy to add piping to the waist without worrying that it'll interfere with the zipper because of the placement of the zipper.  Unfortunately I still worried about this in adding piping to the neck and because of all my hand wringing I cut one side of my piping too short.  Oops.  We'll just keep C's hair nice and long so nobody sees that mistake.

And I don't know what it is about piping, but it just makes everything better.

Oddly enough, I feel the same way about butter.

And here's one of my favorite things about this version of the dress - the contrast back panels.  I should probably admit that this was born out of necessity since I mixed up how many size four and two pieces I needed out of each fabric and by the time I realized my mistake I had run out of fabric but the contrast back is actually one of my favorite things about this dress.  Well, that and the piping of course, but that's a given, right?

The pattern is one of five patterns (with a bonus 6th pattern if you pay $24 or more) offered as part of the Perfect Pattern Parcel, but don't forget that it's only offered for a limited amount of time so go check it out!