I had a few requests to share how I made the sleeves on Delilah's Snow White Dress. I'm happy to try and oblige! I used the Oliver and S Puppet Show Dress pattern. My method for the pleated sleeves could be used for really any pattern with a similiar sleeve.
Before we get started, here's a few more pics of my little girl wearing her dress. Here she is, SO happy giving Princess Ariel a hug.
And here's one of Delilah and I posing in front of Cinderella's castle.
Ok! Off with the tutorial!
I started off with strips of fabric in blue and red. The red strips were 2' wide, and the blue strips were 3' wide. I sewed them together. I eyeballed the pattern piece and made the strips several inches longer just to give myself some play room.
I used 3 red strips for each sleeve, with two blue strips. I then added wider blue strips to the outer edges. The center red strip will become the center pleat on the sleeve.
Each seam was ironed flat, then I folded the red fabric over itself to form pleats. So the inside of each pleat is all red. the blue all remains on the outside. They didn't meet exactly in the middle, I wanted the red to peek out a bit even when folded flat. I pinned it and ironed it flat.
The next step was to lay the pattern piece down on the pleated fabric. The center line of the sleeve piece was aligned to the center of the pleated fabric. I drew around the pattern with a fabric marker.
The next step was to sew a stay stitch line, just inside the fabric marker line, to keep the sleeve piece stable for cutting and to make it easier to work with.
From here I just followed the pattern directions. I cut out the sleeve, and inserted it in the dress. The pleats were perfect!
Thanks for stopping by and checking out this tutorial.
Cheers,
Janimal
