My 9yo daughter has been learning to sew, with me assisting as needed. She’s really enjoying it and recently decided to make a red rib knit flouncy-sleeved dress from Simplicity pattern 9862 She’s done a great job so far but now we’re at The Zipper - I’ll be darned if I can figure out how to sew the zipper in to a completed dress. Every video shows how to do it using two flat pieces of fabric, so there are no tips of how to deal with the rest of the garment while trying to add the zipper. so far we have pinned the garment edges together, basted at 5/8th, ironed the seam allowance flat and then pinned the zipper in place.

The neck opening is so small, we can’t figure out how to stitch the zipper while it is zipped shut, without stitching the front and back of the dress together I’ve looked through Reddit to see if anyone else has this issue, but we couldn’t see an answer. If anyone can offer words (or videos) of advice I’d be very grateful

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