sewloud

I was supposed to finish a new dress today for tall ships tomorrow...my brain had other ideas and shut down with a vomit inducing migraine. But I see to have perked up..so now I'm trying to make this dress:



Not look so damn stupid. I'm not sure what possessed me to put trim just around the bib like that...it's abrupt and looks stupid as the bib is slightly gathered...so HEEEELLLLPPP...ideas?

If I take it off is the dress horribly boring? a sash? diagonal stripes of the same ribbon? can't find any reference for that kind of trim on a bib anyway. 

In the end the red fabric won, it turned out to be gabardine (well I had crepe AND gabardine apparently, yay people showering me with wool! I have great friends). And I liked the idea of red trimmed with white.

I spent most of the weekend catching up on homework, working a few hours at Joann's, and picking up a bit in here (not as much as I SHOULD have mind you). But today I did some dress work. I got the dress cut out sans sleeves and collar as I haven't figured them out quite yet. Then I got a bee in my bonnet to do a scalloped, piped hem trim. I wasn't sure if this would be a TOTAL pita or just fiddly. So I made a test!




I think I want the scallops to be wider so I'll use something other than my drinking glass to trace, but otherwise, piped scallops is so a go. 

But I actually blogged...
Click on the picture if you'd like to hear about my adventures dressing my life-sized-Ken-doll husband.

I was all chugging along on my stupidly easy bodice. It's two pieces of the same white muslin! How ridiculously easy and impossible to mess up right?....you don't know me well...

My pattern is a back piece and a front piece, I sewed the side back seams (yay princess seams) and figured once I cruised past the easing part I was golden. I sewed the shoulder seams, easy peasy. I ironed up the seam allowance along the neckline edge and put the two pieces wrong sides together and neatly hand hemmed around the edge. I was quite chuffed with how it looked. I was blissfully pondering my skirt construction method...

Today I really took a hard look at my measurements and the measurements of the stays in Hunnisett and I'm pleased that they're not suuuuper far off. Of course I had to add some girth *sigh* but anyway I think I've gotten the pattern enlarged. So here are a few things I'm mulling over and would love feedback on.

1. By hand or by machine. I do really have time to do them by hand and I feel a serious itch to do so..but even if I make a muslin it's so hard to know if stays will work till they're...what 90% done?!? And when I lay these out with the last pair they look pretty damn similar so I'm not sure WHY the last ones were so epically bad and will this not help either. I don't know maybe the boning will make the difference?

2. Cording or not cording? It calls for horizontal cording under the bust, is this functional or decorative? I've certainly seen lots of stays without it but will it help avoid another stay melt down? I thought about emailing jennylafleur and asking but I'm pretty sure she's sewing up a storm and I don't want to interrupt.

Any wise tips for me?

All that's left is putting elastic in the sleeves (it's the only way I could figure out to get the look of my original don't judge m mandie_rw), hemming and sewing the trim around the hem. 

Personally I think it's hideous, but mamadamekat oesn't think it's that bad. She's obviously nuts. This fabric fought me tooth and nail the entire time. It was a race against the clock every time I cut something to get it sewn in and finished before it frayed everywhere. I had planned to french seam things instead of serging but the were so many fraying edges it was a nightmare and just serged my seams. 



ETA: Alice wanted a side by side. There you go. 

[Poll #1893937][Poll #1893937]

Well I got my dress cut out. I pulled out the fabric and when I really looked at it it was seriously suspiciously shiny...so I burned some...Sad to report it is definitely 100% dead dino. *sigh* This dress just doesn't want to get made! Anyway that made me kinda feel more reckless abandon towards it so I just started going CUT CUT CUT without all the normal care charmeuse takes. I didn't even manage to melt it while ironing. So now it's all cut out...with a possible train as I wildly recut the skirt back just straight onto the fabric with no markings or anything. I am a REBEL. 

but I've hit a snag...no thread even close...so my question to all of you is this. On a scale of 1 to ren faire just how unperiod is contrasting top stitching? I know I know I could go buy thread but for a fabric I'm not in love with, on a rainy night when I just want to keep moving...someone talk sense into me! 

Also I'm super sad tha madamekat on't be able to make the card party, but I'm really glad she suggested we facetime! What a great way to have her with us! I have demanded she wear a tiara for the occasion. I was planing to bring Monty the half dog with me for photos but now I'm wondering if I should leave him with Kat to keep her company. ;-) 

I got my stays to the point of trying them on and I have to say it's...an odd look. Yeah my boobs are flying northward so I'm guessing that's all good. But it feels like it pushes my stomach pooch forward instead of backwards. and they wrinkle like the devil due to the lack of solid boning. I know all wrinkles are period but it's weird.

I just need to make the straps about 6" longer (apparently going over my boobs takes more inches than I took into account) and then bind them and they're done.

Good thing too cause if I don't start this dress ASAP I'll be making someone else sew in the car (or drive and I sew). 

I have a stays mock-up! I started wit koshka_the_cat's lovely pattern on her website and enlarged it to make it more rotund girl sized. Then I had to move around my bust gores as my first eyeballing made them too wide...and they're only about 1" wide but that still looks TOO big up top. I do so hate making stays because it's hard to have a good idea what they're REALLY going to behave like with with stiff fabric and a busk etc etc. And it's practically impossible to fit them on me so I have to do it on my dressform which has boobs in a totally different place...so while it gapes like the dickens now perhaps I'll NEED more than 1" in gores later. 

*sigh* I don't mind sewing when it's things that don't have to fit. But dammit I hate fitting! 

This week has gone Quiz, Midterm, Exam, Quiz and one more Quiz tomorrow. I've gotten two disappointing grades in a row and I'm questioning my academic make up. 

Currently I'm studied up for tomorrow, my nutrition assignments due at midnight are sent and I've got an hour before bed. So I'm looking around at patterns for my regency plaid obnoxiousness...

I see the ones in PoF anyone used either? is there a pattern out there worth using? I have the simplicity one and I thought about using the fitted lining just as the pattern. But I was contemplating an apron front. Any thoughts on how it should close? I suppose I could do buttons up the back but that's really hard to dress oneself. and in terms of fitting it's annoying.