The fashionable chef

As part of her developing cooking skills, my daughter has discovered that an apron is a very handy thing to have.  I had no idea she thought  this, until we were in a kitchen store and I found her admiring this cute apron.

Together, we decided that I could make her one.  (Follow that logic?)

The next day I was in the quilt shop to pick up my Saturday Sampler block and it was the perfect time to pick out some apron fabric, except that my daughter was not with me. 

However, I had a good idea of what colors she likes, so I took some pictures of fabrics on the bolt and texted them to her.  My goodnatured friend Linda was with me, and the two of us went all around the shop, picking likely fabrics and getting my daughter's opinions via cell phone.  It was quite comical actually.

Eventually, we decided on these two fabrics:

The idea was to use the floral fabric for the apron, and the turquoise fabric for the trim.  In the end, I used an equal amount of both and made a reversible apron.

I didn't have a pattern, so I started with a basic barbeque style apron that we already had at home and drafted a pattern from that.

Then I put the pattern over both fabrics and cut them out at the same time so the pieces would be the exact same size.

Making the ties was easy enough to figure out, but before I could sew it together, I needed to figure out how to make a pocket.  We did not want the one central pocket like the barbeque apron.  We wanted something a little more cute.

It took a bit of trial and error, but in the end I came up with this:

(I plan on posting a tutorial on how I made the pocket, if anyone is interested.)

To make the adjustable neck tie, I used a pair of D-rings from the fabric store.  I also added a bit of batting inside the neck strap.  (Hey, I'm a quilter first, right?)

Here's the finished apron:

The reverse side looks like this:

Happy Cooking!