Sunday, February 26, 2012

Color Blocked Dress

The red and black color blocked dress is complete.  I just finished hemming it this afternoon.  If I should ever make this dress again, I will do several things differently.

My inner voice was telling me to attach the various front and back pieces together much differently.  Yet I decided to follow the pattern instructions.  This created a lot of ripping seams apart, taking up seams, re-sewing the various parts again.

If you sew the front pieces together, then sew back pieces a lot of fitting issues can be taken care of in the side seams without having to disturb other garment pieces.  I did not do that with this dress and it became annoying and frustrating to me.  My choice nonetheless.

The front and back waist inserts created fitting issues, at least for me, and I think because of how they are drafted.  One final fitting thing I did in addition to taking deeper side seam was to sew a tuck in the front waist insert aligning the tucks with the front seams.  This gave a much better fit through that area on me. 

Honestly, I did this also because I did not want to take out the side zipper and do more fittings.  I had already removed the zipper and re-inserted.  When doing that I caused a hole in the seam allowance but very close to the exposed side.  Fusible black interfacing fixed this little hole,  In the end, I am pleased with the final fit.

I did not like the waist insert facings. They were cumbersome to attach because all seams are sewn.  They would have you slipstitch them in place.  I do not like doing so much hand sewing. I ending up attaching them quite differently using my sewing machine as much as possible.

I will try to take some photos of the inside of the dress to give you an idea about the facings.  I am glad that this project is complete; it seemed to go on and on.

Onto the next project, which may or may not be the other Butterick dress I had originally plan to sew.  Updates later, off to see the Red Carpet showing prior to watching the Oscars.

Friday, February 24, 2012

B5673 in progress



As mentioned in an earlier post, I was making some final tweaks. I had an opportunity to try on dress after work earlier this week and shot these photos with my iPhone. I still need to take up the waist area, but I need it more in the front and back and not so much on the side. I am going to baste in tucks to line up with the front and back center seams to see how that looks. I am ready to move on to something else and will be glad to get this finished.
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Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Tweaks needed

The red and black dress is about complete.  I have to make some tweaks to the waist line area.  I wish I had attached the front and back pieces differently.

I have learned from reading articles and from practice that if you have several front and back pieces, like this dress, that if you sew all the front pieces together then the back pieces together, fitting issues can be easily fixed with the side seams.  I did not do that with this dress and have had to rip seams in several places, make fit adjustments and then realign everything to fit.

This has slowed down the completion of this dress.  Once I make a final tweak (I hope) within the waist line area, I only need to attach the waist insert facing and hem the dress.

If only I felt like sewing after work, I probably could do this in two evenings.  I am just drained of late.  I need to get my sewing mojo pumped up also; that is an issue now as well.  I think it is the seasonal transition.

Photos later.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Sewing some but not enough

Work last week was all consuming and bled over into personal time.  Some weeks are just like that.
I finally spent some time sewing yesterday.  The Butterick dress is almost complete, really only have about four steps to complete, one of those being inserting an invisible zipper in the side seam.

I love invisible zippers and pride myself on being able to insert them in back or side seams of skirts as well as dresses and on occasion a few tops.  There will be some maneuvering for this side seam.  I am confident it will be easy enough it is just that it will be time consuming.  I have one more sleeve to insert, then zipper, next is the waistband facing  and then the hemming of the sleeves and skirt portion of dress.

Not only has work interfered with sewing, but I am ready to move on to spring sewing.  Of course, the weather man is calling for 6 to 8 inches of snow today!!  I think they have been watching a weather forecast from a movie somewhere.  It was 61 degrees yesterday, the ground is not cold enough for it to stick.  This is my forecast, snow and then rain.  The weatherman and I can be both wrong.

I am just not feeling the desire to sew what I had previously planned.  I am going to make the other Butterick dress.  I never visioned that one to be a winter dress anyway.  But there are other patterns that are calling my name and they say spring time.  It  is just around the corner and time to get ahead of the curve.

So I am off to sew now. More later.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Burda 2_2012 _117A

Burda 2_2012 _117A by Danvillegirl
Burda 2_2012 _117A, a photo by Danvillegirl on Flickr.
This photo is from the Burda Style Feb 2012 issue. It is very similar to a Victoria Beckham dress selling for over $1000

I have not been able to see the back view of the Beckham dress. Curious to know if the zip is like the Burda Style dress.

Audrey of Sew Tawdry blog at  was one of the first that I saw to make this Burda Style dress.  Excellent color combo.  I am thinking I want to make a single color.  I have several color blocked dresses at this time and want to do something else.

WIP Photos






As promised work in progress photos. Since these were shot, I have basted the front and back midriff pieces to bodice. Ready to try on for fitting purposes. More later
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Saturday, February 11, 2012

It's beginning to look like a dress

Spent time this AM working on the red and black dress.  I skipped Curves; it was so cold this AM that I just could not get my mind set around going out in cold cold weather.  I admit that this has been the better winter in a long time because of no snow, no ice and not weeks of extremely cold weather.  We even had snow showers off and on today.   It is now evening and we are under a wind advisory and the temps will be in the teens.

But I digress.  This morning I serge finished all edges of the skirt portion of the dress and then sewed the front and back side panels to the center front and center back.  By then DH was up and wanting some breakfast as did I.  Then showered and went to buy a few household necessities.  I then went to JoAnn's to get some needles and zippers; spent some time looking around and walked out of the store with no fabric or patterns.  It wasn't hard to walk out of the store with no fabric.  This JoAnn's is truly lacking in garment fabrics.  I have purchased some on occasion but to day the pickings were just horrible.

Returning home, I then completed the sewing of the neckbands and facings to the bodice front and back. I totally ignored the pattern instructions for doing this.  I write about my method later.  I just basted the shower seams and now I am hungry.  Off to fix oyster stew, perfect for a cold winter evening.

More info and some photos later.

Sunday, February 05, 2012

Making progress

Red double knit washed and currently being dried.  Pattern pieces for black double knit have been cut out and ready to go.  Read through the instructions again briefly.  Dress calls for side zipper.

I have that but not sure it will be necessary as when I look at the pattern as it is on the model, it seems there would be enough room to pull over the head.  The pattern is described as close fitting, so that may make the zipper necessary.  Who knows, we will find out as we begin the journey of sewing this dress.

Next steps are to thread sewing machine and serger.  I have black and red thread so good to go.

As to the pattern adjusting for the other Butterick dress pattern, not done.  My intent was to have two projects ready to sew.  Yet I am feeling the need to actually sew something, so fitting for the other is on back burner.

Saturday, February 04, 2012

Sewing update

This past work week was a busy one and at times stressful.  Sometimes when it is stressful spending time in my sewing room is just the thing to do.  Other times, like this week, I am just too tired to do much of anything that requires creative thinking.

I just spent two hours in my sewing room following a great dinner with DH.  I completed the fitting of the Butterick 5673 dress that I started on last week.  I screwed up the center back piece so badly that I purchased another pattern so I could fix my error.  Now that all pieces are fitted I decided to make another fabric change.  Instead of using the black/white geometric print fabric with the solid black, I am going to use red and black. 

The red fabric needs to be machine washed and dried before cutting it out.  Right now the washing machine is in use by DH so later tonight or first thing in AM it will get washed and dried. More later.

August Sewing Simplicity 7295

 I am not doing well as a blogger. I have been working on this project since July 30. Today, I finally finished it. It has been a stop-and-g...