Kitty dress for Hazel

About 6 months ago Hazel and I bought some lovely knit with polka dots and cats, and she faithfully promised to wear a dress if I made her one from it. I finally got around to making a dress up using Burda 9627, a nice simple A-line pattern designed for knits. It came together so beautifully I was incredibly pleased with myself! Knits have been such a challenge for me as I've always considered them too hard and I lack the techniques and understanding of how they work which makes me nervous. But I'm gradually gaining confidence, although I have yet to figure out how to do a hem that won't break if it gets stretched out. I've tried zig-zag stitching on a previous effort which snapped (still need to blog that!) so I used a twin needle on this one which seemed ideal, but Hazel broke the thread on her first public outing so obviously I need to go back to the drawing board. :-/ Any suggestions gratefully accepted!

I tried to get some photos of her the other day with limited success, but hopefully they'll give you an idea.

The fabric has cat silhouettes in the yellow and grey circles. It's not really a little girl fabric but she seems to like it a lot - if you poke her on one of the cat spots she'll meow for you :D

The neckline has a wee keyhole detail in the middle, and is finished with binding that extends into two ties. That's the only part of the pattern I don't like so much, that the binding is put on with zigzag stitch, I think it detracts from the simplicity of the pattern. Next time I'll put it on differently. Having said that, the pattern is marketed as 'easy' and yes it was super-easy to put the binding on that way so it's very effective from that point-of-view!

Hazel had her face painted at creche that day, funnily enough there was a navy blue moon on one cheek and a yellow flower on the other which matched the colours in the dress perfectly, though by the time I took the photo those had been largely rubbed off. In this photo she's eating some of the peas she had just picked out in the garden.

There's quite a lot of the fabric left over so I think I should probably make myself a tshirt or something like that from it. I just need to draft a pattern for myself from Cal Patches book!