Hayley’s Mini Heyday Dungarees

With the cotton from July’s Mini box, Hayley made a pair of Waves and Wild Heyday Dungarees for her 3 year old daughter.

Well hello there! It’s been a while since I’ve actually had the pleasure of writing about making something myself, but as Esther has been unwell this month I stepped in to create something out of this month’s Mini Box fabric and I’m quite excited to tell you all about it.

I didn’t have a huge amount of time to spare and with only 1m to use I decided to whip up something for my 3 year old daughter, Mia. She absolutely loves the beach and would happily kick off her shoes and socks and roll up her trousers for a paddle at any time of the year so this fabric was perfect for her. Not only that cotton poplin is lovely and durable for playing and getting messy in… more about that later! 

I had recently made myself a pair of the Waves and Wild (formally known as Made By Jack’s Mum) Heyday dungarees which I love and wear all the time so when I spotted they did a mini version for kiddos I knew it would be perfect for Mia. 

The pattern spans from 0-3months to Age 12 with the option of a snap crotch which is perfect for nappy access if needed. Mia is coming up to 3.5 years old but I think she is quite tall for her age so I cut a size 4 and used a 1.5cm (⅝”) seam allowance rather than the 1cm (⅜”) recommended which turned out to be just right for her. In fact there isn’t a huge amount of extra growing room, especially around the tummy, so if I make it again – which I intend to – I would probably just sew the straight size 4. 

This pattern came together really quickly, it probably took me about 4.5 hours in total which included the cutting out which was a real novelty for me! There are a couple of fiddly stages though.

First there’s a lot of steps to complete before actually starting on the construction of the dungarees themselves as there are 5 pockets to prepare as well 2 straps and 2 loops which need topstitching. Once those are done and sewn onto the trouser legs you can then start on the construction which is always the best bit for me. I always get frustrated when I have to sew a bunch of things (like darts and staystitching) before I can start putting the garment together!

The other tricky bit is pressing the bib curves twice, like a hem, and then topstitching. As it is a curve the fabric needs a bit of coaxing to do what you want it to and I have to say I wasn’t super obsessive about it being exact as long as it curved nicely and the raw edges were all concealed. The rest of the seams were finished with the overlocker.

Mia can be a little hit and miss when it comes to new clothes, she’ll decide pretty quickly if she doesn’t like something and won’t give it another look for a good few weeks, there’s never any knowing which way she’ll go! Luckily she wanted these on straight away and we headed off to the beach to get some lovely photos. 

I’ll be honest, I knew how this was inevitably going to go down so I packed spare clothes and shoes and set to taking photos the instant we got there. The tide was out so as we walked down exploring rock pools Mia ran through what she thought was a puddle but turned out to be a little bog. Her foot sank right down and she face planted the muddy sand losing her shoe in the process! As I said, this fabric is very durable and washed up nice and clean without any problems, ready to face another day!