(this post was originally published in 8 april, 2006.)
about 18 months ago, i needed a nursing dress to wear to an outdoor wedding, and i didn't have the time or energy to invest in making something from scratch so i converted a little sheath i got at my favorite thrift store for $5.00.
the dress had a sabrina neckline/armscye and was long enough that i could trim some fabric to use for the conversion. basically, i took off the hem and turned it into an empire waist detail that concealed the nursing access.
here is the dress on my mannequin, and the dress with a piece of elastic around it to mark where i would put the access (NOTE: click on any photo to see an enlargement).
i cut a piece of snap tape long enough to go from side to side on the front, and stitched one half of it at the marked line:
then i cut off the hem and sewed a piece of it to the other strip of snap tape:
all i had to do after that was sew the hem strip with snap tape into place above the other snap strip then cut the opening between the strips. cutting the opening AFTER the strips were sewn meant that i could work with the drawn line in place and i didn't have to worry about cut edges stretching out of shape while i worked:
i turned up a new hem and the dress was done! i didn't get a good picture of myself in the dress but i hope this will show it enough to make sense:
i nursed ella in this dress during the wedding and at the reception and even my friends who knew i was a nursing mom didn't know it was a nursing dress until i showed them! i think the whole process took about 45 minutes from putting it on the mannequin to putting it on to go to the wedding (yes, as usual i did this at the last minute--hey, nursing moms live on the edge--you didn't think i'd go out with hair like that on purpose do you???).
