Valentine's outfit

About a month ago, I bought some heart-themed Hello Kitty fabric with the idea of making E a special Valentine's outfit.  I had originally planned on a pillowcase dress or the like, but when I saw my friend, Chrystyna of Kenzie Kouture, making these adorable embroidered heart shirts for Valentine's Day, I couldn't resist ordering one for E.  Instead of a dress, I made a tiered ruffle skirt to match.  I absolutely love how this turned out!

This was also a great opportunity to use my new serger! I know, you're thinking "wait a second, didn't you already have a serger?"  Well, long story short, I sold the old serger because I never used it (and it sort of scared the crap out of me).  Then I realized I desperately needed one for the Great Ruffle Project, so I ended up getting a new one.  Thanks to some hand-holding by now I'm totally over my serger fear and LOVING it!

I was especially excited to try out a rolled hem with wooly nylon, although I had a bit of trouble with it and the bottom tier ended up being a bit shorter than I intended, especially on one side.  Oops.  I had originally intended to use the serger to gather the tiers too, but it didn't quite work out the way I wanted, so I ended up using the ruffler foot on my regular sewing machine instead.  I have to say, I absolutely love that thing!  It made sewing this skirt so quick & easy, and I ended up with pretty much perfect gathers for each tier.  I'm definitely going to make more of these in the future.

Here's a shot of just the skirt.

I usually put some kind of ribbon tag in the waistband to distinguish the front from the back. I couldn't resist using some Hello Kitty ribbon that my cousin gave me.

My love for HK has definitely rubbed off on my daughter.  E was very excited to wear this outfit to her school Valentine party today!  She also wore Hello Kitty socks and rain boots - she's very into matching too, haha!

I ended up whipping up another skirt or one of E's little friends too.  I'm thinking that with spring around the corner, snow notwithstanding, I may start selling these!