Shortskirt

No, it's not a short skirt... it's a shortskirt! Shorts that look like a skirt. Why would anyone make such a thing, you may wonder? Well, for a start, they are cute in a frilly kind of way. And, most importantly, the cunning trick of hiding the shorts under layers of ruffly skirt makes the garment more palatable to my shorts-averse daughter, in much the same way that disguising kale as 'chips' might persuade a child to enjoy their leafy greens (note the word 'might).

 

This is one pair of shorts that R has really taken to. As you can see I've pulled out all the stops with these: pretty, girlish fabric; ruffles; ribbon and bow. Short of encrusting them with sequins, surrounding them with My Little Ponies and having them modelled by Princess Anna of Arendelle, I don't think they could be any more appealing to a girly girl like my daughter.

The pattern is from the fabulous Sweet Clothes for Girls and has the sensible inclusion of an opening in the waistband, enabling late-night sewists to take a stab at the amount of elastic required, knowing it can easily be altered later (or expanded as the child grows older). 

I'll be adding these shorts to Shorts on the Line on Kollabora - assuming I can work out how to :)

(I did work it out! The link is here, in case you want to check it out!)