Hi all my sewing friends. I'm hoping someone can give me some advice.
My daughter is taking fashion studies again this year, she's in 9th grade. They each got to pick the next project they're doing, and she chose to make a dress.
It's a fairly simply pattern, and I know she'll do a great job, the problem we're having is determining her size.
She's very petite, in most clothing she takes a small. In clothing that is numbered she's normally a size 6 because of her height, but a 6 is usually a bit large on her.
So, when we bought the pattern and the material to go with it, we bought a pattern that goes from size 6-14, and bought enough material to do a size 8, which I was thinking wold be too large, but just to be safe we got extra.
Well, the back of the pattern, which we read when we got home, tells you which size to choose based on bust, waist and hip size, and according to that, she's a size 12-14. No way!
She would drown in size 12-14 clothing off the rack.
So I'm asking, is the sizing for patterns the same as regular sizing when you buy off the rack? If so, they're way off, and how the hell do people choose pattern sizing if they're that far off regular sizing?
Should she cut it to the size 8, or go to the size 12 which I think would be way too large on her?
Also, if we go to the size 12, we don't have enough material, since we bought the recommended amount for size 8.
So confusing.
Any advice? She wants to cut the pattern and the cloth tonight so she can start sewing in class tomorrow. Only problem is, we have no idea what size to cut.