Dress Rehearsal for Christmas Outfits

First, I'll start out with the necktie. I am beside myself with the fact that I made a necktie. A NECK. TIE. Seriously - who would have thought?!... that a necktie could even be made! I decided to use the red fine-wale corduroy fabric that I used to make SweetPea's Christmas dress so the children would coordinate.

It's almost entirely handsewn, but I promise it's not as intimidating as it sounds. Really - I finished nearly all of it within an evening from cut to finish.

My husband, who is the master at necktie tying (he prefers the Double Windsor actually), gave me the best compliment by asking if I would be making him ties from now on. Hmmmmm, will have to think on that one - especially because I only have a pattern for a Little Boy's Necktie, and besides church, where would he wear it? To the office?! Hubby also said that he does not recommend corduroy fabric in the future because the tie doesn't want to slide easily up and down for adjustment around the neck. As long as it looks good in the end, that's all that matters, right!?

Cowboy was quite proud and asked if I would make him more neckties....
and "could he pick out the fabric?" ("Sure. Just sit still and quit acting goofy, please, so I can take your picture!")

Obviously this is the dress rehearsal for the Christmas outfits - look how much Cowboy has grown out of that shirt!

SweetPea's Christmas Dress is from a vintage Hollywood Pattern and has a Coat Dress style. While I don't think there will be a "next time" for constructing with this particular pattern, I would *highly* recommend a muslin first should the opportunity present itself again. Thankfully, I was very careful with the modifications so the corduroy wale was not affected.

Pattern calls for *optional* shoulder pads which I was not planning on sewing. However, after the first fitting, the dress just did not hang quite right. When I added the shoulder pads the drape was much, much nicer.

Buttons are vintage and the white ones reminded me of little snowflakes.
The white ric rac trim was an afterthought, but proved right away to be just the right touch. The little green button was a loner I had in my stash - a most perfect shade of jade-ite green. Now if I could only convince my son that he needs a vintage jade-ite green button tie tack!

We still need to get Cowboy a white dress shirt and SweetPea some black patent dress shoes, and their hair combed all handsome & pretty, but I couldn't wait to post these pictures because it helps keep me motivated to cross stuff off my Christmas Wish List.