Saturday, June 2, 2007

Wow...my 5th post...and whole milk...

So tonight, instead of drinking tea while I blog like I was...last month? I'm drinking a glass of organic whole chocolate milk...i know...i know..the chocolate bit probably isn't that organic...haha...and the milk was good before I added the Hersey's syrup...but I wanted chocolate milk....
So..I finally finished a dress that I've spent a fair amount of time on...I call it my 50s dress...as well its made from an original 50s pattern....finally after months of not getting to wear this dress because it was about 4 sizes to small....and getting stuck in the top the night I made it...my sewing teacher kindly told me how I could fix it....

so I get to work on fixing it, and it turns out, I ripped the sleeve edges when I was ripping out seams....so I also had to fix that....

So how I fixed it..all thanks to my sewing teacher...

I split the sides of the dress, measured how much extra fabric it needed(about 4 inches total, plus seam allowance, so about 6 inches) Also to make it seem as if the panels were intentional, my teacher suggested that I buy or make bias tape to insert as a cordless piping. So after much measuring and a half hour or more on the floor cutting strips of fabric 1 1/2 wide on the bias...I finally got down to sewing, first I sewed each piece of the bias cut fabric together, I went ahead and cut well several yards extra, as I had an apron I wanted to use the same color bias tape on, then I sat down to the fun stuff....sewing each piece of piping to each panels, two pieces per panel, first was a 1/4 seam, then when I put the panels on I used a 5/8 seam...I know not the most interesting thing to have just read..but I thought it was fun...ha ha

after inserting each panel, and the zipper, fixing the hem(I had to hem the panels) I finally got down to the sleeves, I had messed it up about a 1 in up from where the edge was, so after much thought I just cut it off at that mark and made two cuffs, with "slanted" edges...I LOVE how it turned out, and even though the dress does in my opinion make me look shorter then my 5'2"....I would still wear it...even out and about town.....I LOVE how it turned out!





(*ahem*...don't ask...I'll tell.......dad was playing around pretending to be a fashion photographer "show more leg"...he just wanted to get a look of shock out of me..didn't expect me to follow through...lol)

Also completed this past week was my pincushion for the Mary Jane's Farm pincushion contest.....I designed and created this pin cushion


...spent alot of time working out bugs with her face and arms, but figured out the rest of it really on my first try at it...Yay for me!!!
So now I just need to send her picture off to the farm, and prepare for a "sorry, you didn't win" lol.....
today I pulled a few dead annual wild flowers out of the cottage garden, while mom photographed everything, even making me stop working to pose for about 20 photos...ha ha....
Now I'm going to ends this post, send the photo of my pincushion over to MJF and then log into Second Life to waste a bit of time at the ballroom....oh!...after I tell the farmgirls about my dress of course!...
Cheers,
The Bella Modiste

7 comments:

Tina Leavy said...

I'm proud of ya gal.

Anne@BackyardTreasures said...

You did a superb job on the dress. It looks so nice on you. :-)
Your pincushion is lovely too. They are going to have a hard time judging all the wonderful ones that the farmgirls are submitting.

~~Anne...a fellow farmgirl
www.homesteadblogger.com/BackyardTreasures

auntgeorge said...

You did a fabulous job on your dress and your pincushion!! You look so pretty in your new dress. I am so proud of you too and I'm not your mom!

Great job!!

Nancy Jo said...

That is so cute, I want a dress like that!
NANCY JO

Bee Haven Bev said...

Wow, you did great work on those two projects. And....your aprons are lovely. I know what you mean, I am hopelessly addicted also.

Bella Modiste said...

Thank you ladies!...

Anonymous said...

Naomi,
Love that dress! You did a wonderful job. My dd who is 23 loves to sew too, the retro look dresses among other things but alas now that she is a working girl she no longer has the time or energy. I miss her doing all that.
Keep up the great work your things are beautiful and your mom must be proud!
Denise
(levisgrammy)