The Dress is Complete!

I am so pleased with the dress! Sewing on good fabric (vs. the fabric from the muslin) made all the difference in the world! It looks better on me than the dress form, but of course, I refuse to model the dress in public until the wedding!

I ended up taking it in on the sides (hurray for Weight Watchers!) and it is very slimming. The soft pleats drape beautifully. For some reason, they droop on the dress form. I guess the girls are perkier than the form!!!

The coat is complete except for pressing. Here's a picture prior to hemming and sewing on the button.

As soon as I can, I'll press the coat and post more pictures.

For the coat, I lowered the bodice seam. It seemed to hit in the middle of my bust line, so I lowered it about 2 inches. Because of the neckline of the dress, I also redrew the front, lowering the V of the jacket so that the dress peaked underneath.

The only sewing project left for the wedding is a formal for the cruise. Stay tuned.

A Reason for Sewing

There are times when I go into auto pilot while sewing. I don't often need to read the instructions clearly, and I sew without thinking. Then there are times that stretch my mind and all of my abilities. That is when I am reminded why I love to sew. After years of developing skills, techniques, and knowledge, I can use them to accomplish something I have never tried before. This is one of those times.

This pattern calls for precision in sewing, marking every seam, pinning carefully, using your instincts, and saying little prayers along the way. And when it works, the outcome is great! After inserting the side pieces to the front and back bodice, and matching them to the darts, I was very pleased with my work. Here are the results of the back bodice prior to rinsing out the markings. It was particularly challenging matching the dart to the corner of the bodice and side back. However, the key is marking and pinning carefully.

Since I began posting this, I came down with the flu and have been off from work all week. The upside is that I actually finished the dress. I'll be cutting out the coat this weekend if all goes well. The dress turned out great. I may want to take it up in the side seams some, but will wait until closer to the wedding to make further alterations.