dress shirt revamp

I saw this tutorial over the weekend, and knew I had to try it out:
And so I did.
I've been buying a ton of dress shirts from Goodwill for a quilt I've been working on, and decided to sacrifice one of the shirts for a cute dress (click to enlarge). I followed the instructions exactly as to how to deconstruct the shirt (a size large), but then amended the directions as follows:
Since I'm smaller than the tutorial's creator (5'2", size 0) I was able to get away with using both sleeves as the entire bodice without the complicated insertion instructions. I left the hem on the skirt as-is, hemmed like the bottom of the shirt it previously was. I also used my machine for the ruffles, using 2 long basting stitches on each.
The bodice on mine is a lot longer than the original posting, but I'm actually really happy about that: with the elastic at the waist, I can pull it up to make it shorter or pull it down to make it longer. I'm totally wearing it to work tomorrow with a cardigan.
Total cost: $2.00 at Goodwill, as I already had the elastic and thread at home. I could make this a million more times, and probably will!

Isabelle

I've decided to name my quilts after their inspiration-- the future owner. This first one is for a baby born to a college friend of mine. I haven't seen this friend in a long time, but figured that any baby born in January in the upper midwest could use a quilt. The binding is Alexander Henry's "Apples + Pears", a favorite of mine. The yellow is striped, the pink is polka dotted, and it's a pretty, preppy quilt. Here's the back:
I love a pieced back. The blue is oxford shirting, and the yellow and pink are extras from the front. The wee bit of stripe in the corner has the label.