Artist Profile: Candy Joyce and How to Sew a Cute, Breezy Jumper.

Candy Joyce is a designer and illustrator from the United Kingdom. She is one of my colleagues at Spoonflower and also has a shop of home goods at Envelope.  Her work has a graphic sensibility and she is inspired by mathematical sequences, such as Fibonacci. 
Candy Joyce enjoys a good zombie and that has inspired her to design zombie dolls.  You can see a sample of the reversible dolls found at her website on this video.  Evil clowns are a natural subject for a zombie doll.

I entered a contest sponsored by Candy Joyce and won one free yard of fabric.  My daughter and I looked through her portfolio on Spoonflower and selected Spring Stitch Flowers.
My daughter's jumper was super easy to make.  You will want to measure the length of the jumper from shoulder to waist and waist to ankle (or desired length of pant leg.)  The pant legs should be about 2x leg width tapering to a loose waist. The leg holes are elasticized but only loosely.  I have tabs at the waist for alignment but it would also be a great place to add an elasticized waist.  Top should be a little wide.  The shoulders are sew 2 inches on each side, allowing the front neck to drape.  This drape also allows the child to put on the jumper without need of zippers or buttons.  The waist tie is optional.
If you like Candy Joyce's fabric or would like to get another (such as one of mine,) Spoonflower has free Worldwide shipping for 24 hours beginning 9am EST, Monday, November 30.

Island Jewel: Sewing a Harem Style Jumper

 Almost a year ago I purchased some pretty jewel tone prints with the plan on making something for my daughter.  At the time she would not wear any color other than pink.   Finally, she ready for other colors (although I did have to promise to sew her a pink dress as well.) 
The Process
The Aladdin Pants on the Blooms N Bugs blog were inspirational, however, I used my own process. While in the United States this summer, I purchased a tank top that coordinated with my fabric.  Using a pair of her pants I traced a template for the inseam of the pants but left the outer edge open--about 18 inches out.  I sewed the pants along the template I created so far.  The next step was to pin and baste box pleats around the waist with the exception in the center front, center back and about 4 inches on the sides.  I did not pleat the center front and back to avoid weird pulling in the crotch.  The sides were unpleated so I could adjust the last pleats to the diameter of the waist.  I sewed the sides up and then created the final box pleats on the sides. I trimmed about 4 inches from the bottom of the tank and then sewed the pants on to the bottom edge of the tank. The next step was to gather the bottom edges of each leg and fit them into the homemade binding tape cuff from contrasting fabric. The gathers should be lighter on the inside of the leg and fuller on the toward the outside.  Lastly, I added the contrasting belt. 
My girl seems to be enjoying her new jumper.