DIY Paint Smock From Thrift Store Clothes

Claire has discovered (a.k.a is obsessed with) the joy of painting.  I gave her some washable paints a couple months ago, and now she wanders around the house all day saying "Paibt, paibt."  And then I bought her some washable markers to color with, so now she wanders around saying "Cow-woo, cow-woo."

Well, I found out that washable paint/marker doesn't always mean washable.  Even after rinsing and soaking and spraying with OxyClean, some of her shirts still have marks on them.  So, I wanted to get her some kind of paint smock.  They don't really make paint smocks for tiny 1.5 year-olds, so I went to our new Goodwill to see if I could find a large long-sleeved shirt. 

I ended up finding a long-sleeved, button-down shirt in size 3T.  It was big enough to fit over whatever clothes she has on, but not long enough to cover her legs (she also likes drawing on her pants.)  Then I spotted a sundress, also size 3T, so I got that to cover her legs.  Bonus -- they were both brown, so stains will not show as much!

This is what the dress looked like.  Originally, I thought I would just cut off the top of the dress and have her wear it as a skirt, and then just put the shirt on.  But, I really need to practice sewing, so I decided to try to put the two together to make a full-length smock.

It killed me to cut this dress up, by the way.  It was so cute!  But it was too perfect for what I needed, so now Claire just has a super-cute paint smock.

I cut the top off of the dress and then cut the skirt part all the way up the back.  I also cut off the ties so that I could re-position them.

I hemmed the cut edges on the skirt part.

This picture is out of order, but it shows how I fit the top and the bottom together.  I turned the shirt around backwards so the smock could be put on like an apron.  (You are looking at the back here.)

I just centered the shirt (backwards) on the skirt and sewed all the way across the top of the skirt.  The shirt is wider than the skirt.

I hemmed the cut end of the ties and re-attached them by sewing them to the skirt and to the part of the shirt that was wider than the skirt.  I had to remove one of the buttons to get it out of the way.

And this is how Claire kept herself busy while I was sewing.  (Yes, that is underwear on her head.  My underwear from when I was little.)

I cut the tags off on the inside and managed to put a little hole in the shirt.  *sigh*  I still had the top part of the dress left over with some pretty embroidery on it, so I cut a piece out and zig-zag stitched it on to cover the hole.  The final thing I needed was more ties for the neck, so I raided my fabric stash and made a couple.

Here's a view from the back.

I think it's going to be a while before she grows out of it, what do you think?  No chance of writing on those pants now!