Portland

The cutest double brushed poly just stocked at Amelia Lane Designs and it’s name is Portland!

I wanted to wear as much of it as I could because it’s just so darned cute. So I made myself a maxi length Virginia Dress from 5oo4 Patterns.

I tested the Virginia back when it was released and made a bunch of tops/skirts/dresses! See that post here (Virginia blog)

You should never experiment with a strike, but I really just can’t seem to follow the rules lately. My stubborn streak is really showing itself so far in 2019!

So I went ahead and folded the skirt pattern piece to make it straight instead of flared. I wanted more of a romper look and I like how it turned out.

Then I added a nursing access layer. I also doubled the waistband so it had twice the thickness to support the weight of the skirt.

This nursing access method would work for any pattern with a waist seam, by the way!

For the nursing layer, I just traced the bodice pattern piece (love that the full bust adjustment is built in as an option!) to make a copy, then lowered the neckline significantly.

Then I hemmed the neckline of the under piece, all the way up to the shoulder, so that it would make the shoulder narrower and keep it out of the neckband.

Then when attaching the shoulders, put the under piece behind the front piece, right side of the under piece to wrong side of the front piece and sew all three shoulders together. all three armcyes should match up.

I cut an extra waistband and added that to the bottom of the outer front piece.

Then I recommend attaching the front skirt to the front under piece, the back skirt to the back piece and doing the side seams all together. That way you catch the sides of the front band in the side seam and they lay down. If you attach in the round the sides of the band will be raw (I didn’t take my own advice unfortunately – I didn’t realize until it was too late)

Bam! Nursing access! You may want to put elastic in the hem of the neckline of the under piece depending on the recovery of your fabric. I did not.

By the way, I had a 3 yard cut of the fabric and I used it for all pieces (including the ones you don’t see, like the lining on the waistband) and I have about 2/3 of a yard left.

This fabric is so cute! I want to make 7 more dresses out of it! What other patterns should I do?

Link disclosure:  This post may contain affiliate links. Clicking the link doesn’t change the product or price you’re shown, but I might get a small percentage towards materials for my next project.  If you found this post helpful and are planning to purchase the pattern anyway, I’d really love for you to use my link.

Pattern: Virginia by 5oo4