The Party Dress

When I was a kid, girls couldn’t wear pants to school. When it was cold, we had to wear pants under our skirts or dresses, and take them off when we got to school. I was in 7th grade when we were finally allowed to wear pants, and even then, we couldn’t wear jeans (that had to wait until high school).

In the early 60’s, I suppose we usually wore pants around the house, but even then sometimes it was dresses. As you can see, wearing a dress was not a deterrent to playing “Cowboys and Indians” with the boy next door. That’s David, my first boyfriend. We were both two in this photo. Notice that we are holding hands.

Sadly, we were torn apart at the tender age of 5 when I moved away. Sigh. But I digress. Except for playing around the house, we wore dresses a lot. Especially for parties or holidays, and all the girls had party dresses. I remember my favorite party dress very well – it was white with red rosebuds. I loved that dress, and wore it at every opportunity. I have quite a few photographs of myself in it at various times. It was a tragedy when I finally outgrew it. Here I am wearing it at my 6th birthday party. I’m the one on the left.

So I’m sure you can imagine my delight when I first saw this Party Dress pattern for Barbie. There was no question about it being my next Barbie doll dress.

Pattern: Summer Party Dress, from “Knits for Barbie Doll”, by Nicky Epstein
Yarn: Garnstudio DROPS Muskat, in off-white and green
Pink flowers embroidered with yarn sent by Cookie.
Needles: 3mm
Ravelry: Project page

Modifications: None, other than yarn. I probably should have used 2.75mm needles, as it’s slightly loose.