Today I've got an easy way to add some cap sleeves to a sleeveless child's dress. (Note: You could do the same thing with an adolescent or adult dress as well if you can find lace trim wide enough).I bought this lovely purple dress (pictured to the left, sans the sleeves) on Walmart.com for $5.
Alas, there were no sleeves, but I bought it knowing that I am capable of making sleeves if I put aside my laziness. Still, I really wanted to do this the easiest way possible (read: laziest way possible - I mean, the dress has been hanging in the closet unaltered and unworn for a month).
So to minimize effort, I thought that if I could match the lace trim around the neckline with some trim I have in my lace hoard I wouldn't have to 'make' my own sleeves - I could just sew the lace in place and voilà!
And this is what I found in my lace box, right on top:
I thought it was pretty much perfect and I only had to spend a total of two minutes in what I have endearingly christened 'the Pit of Hell' - our storage unit - finding it.
Double win.
I took a few minutes to position it the way I wanted it (you can gather it if you want - I didn't on this one. You can see in the picture that this particular lace already has gathering stitches in it - a lazy sewers dream). I just laid it in there straight and tapered the ends in at the underarms so there wouldn't be chafing.
Tapering under the arms:
I actually sewed it to the little lip on the innermost edge of the hem fold, if that makes sense. It only gave me about 1/8 of an inch worth of fabric to work with so it was pretty tight. But you can't see the stitching from the outside, which is exactly what I wanted!
Serger-like stitch on hem fold:
Front:
Back:
Sweet and perfect. My girl just looks radiant in purple.
