The Good Deeds Dress

I've been meaning to start a blog for a long time now. I've always managed to put it off though. It's been one of those irrational fears of mine, kind of like sewing a zipper. I've been sewing since I was 5 years old and yet I was 31 before I finally made myself sew a zipper onto something. Of course I immediately laughed at myself once I'd finally done it. It didn't look perfect but it certainly wasn't as hard as I'd had myself convinced that it would be. I'm really hoping blogging will be the same ;)  

Like most fears people don't tend to face them without some sort of reason, something pressing that forces you to finally suck it up and push past whatever it is that has always stopped you before. So what was my reason? What was it that finally kicked my butt into gear and convinced me to give this whole blogging thing a whirl?  The Good Deeds Dress! What better reason to start a blog than to be able to offer up a free pattern?

You see, a few months ago I discovered this really amazing blog called Hopeful Threads. Every month Kristy organizes a project of some charitable sort. She has an amazing group of followers with generous hearts and mad sewing skills. During the month of April the project was to sew 100 dresses to donate to Dress a Girl Around the World.  Not only did they meet that goal but they more than tripled it! Like I said, an amazing group of women! <3  
A dear friend of mine, Becca from Night Owl's Menagerie is also a fan of Hopeful Threads. Becca is a kind and generous soul with a passion for sewing and a penchant for hoarding fabric so of course she wanted to sew up some dresses for the April project. All she needed was a pattern...  She knew exactly what she wanted in a dress, something simple but versatile and most importantly fast and easy to sew. Now, if you're not familiar with Becca and what she does let me just stop for a second and tell you. Becca draws! She draws with amazing amount of talent and loads of creativity. Everything from cute little peanuts for the allergy warning posters she sells on Zazzle to business logos and even little cartoon girls brushing their hair for my daughters PECS book! In fact you can see the logo she recently made for me right up at the top of this blog <3
So as I was saying... Becca, who draws, of course drew me exactly what she wanted in a dress! I drafted the pattern, graded it and then we appealed to a wonderful group of mutual friends to sew up some tester dresses for their daughters. I have to say, the group of  women who test my patterns are fabulous! They sewed up their dresses quickly, happily and with no compensation other than the smile it put on their faces to help out. The final product is a cute but simple dress. A fast and easy project that will hopefully inspire you and many other seamstresses to sew up a dress or two and donate a bit of handmade goodness to lots of little girls around the world!

As you can see, it is very good for dancing in! 

 You can download the pattern here or if you'd like you can head on over the to Becca's blog to download it and read her side of the story! Also be sure to check back soon as both me and Becca will be working on a few tutorials to show you how to embellish this simple dress. We've come up with a lot of fun and easy ideas to add a little frill here and there and make each dress special! 

 For more great pictures of some of the dresses sewn with this pattern check out my Flickr pool  

Although my usual policy is to welcome individuals to sew and sell garments made from Elysium patterns, this pattern is geared towards charity and goodwill sewing and as such I kindly ask that garments made with this particular pattern not be sold for profit. Feel free to make a dress for your daughter, grandchild or next door neighbor, but please keep this pattern for personal use only. Also, please note that this pattern is the intellectual property of Elysium and sale or reproduction of the pattern itself is prohibited. And last, if you know someone who would like to download the pattern, please be kind send them a link to here or the blog and not a copy of the pattern itself.