MOB Dress Preview

I'm home again, and between dashes up the stairs to the laundry room (college boy had LOTS of dirty laundry), I've been sewing. The MOB dress is definitely progressing and I thought y'all might like a preview.

As you can see, shoulder seams, hemming, and the zipper are the main things left to do, plus all the handsewing of the lining once the zipper is in. And a wee bit of decorating. I bought some beaded flower embellishments from my friend, Fen, of Bead Flora Jewels on Etsy. This morning I tried various placements, and I'm strongly leaning toward only on the skirt. The options are pretty open, but here are a few I like:

Of course, they'll look different with the skirt hanging as it will with the folds, so I'll take that into consideration, and while I didn't like them all the way across the midriff area, I wouldn't object to 1 or 2 there. What do you think? Do you like the swoop, randomly placed, or off to one side? Or something else entirely?

I'm working on it... I promise!

It's always like this when you have a big project, isn't it? Progress, then waiting. So, what's been happening on the MOB dress? Did I mention that I entered Pattern Review's Formalwear contest, so that's a motivation in addition to, well, hellooooo, the wedding! Since the muslin was finished, I moved on to the next step, which included ordering silk organza from Silk Fabric on Etsy. I plan to underline the skirt, and also use the organza as the interfacing on the midriff pieces. Next I ordered the lining from Gorgeous Fabrics (same place I got the silk shantung from... and, well, couldn't JUST order lining).

When I starting laying the pattern pieces, I had my first Oh %$@# moment. The skirt is a full, flared skirt, which means the pieces are like giant pie pieces. Butterick, in their infinite pattern drafting wisdom, has you cut it out on the cross grain. Whoa! Shantung has slubs running across it, and that means you really have to cut it out on the lengthwise grain. Which also is much more natural feeling besides. But the pieces are too wide at the hem. Only solution was to slash and slice my pie into smaller pieces, ending up with a 6-gore skirt.

Historically, I haven't been brave enough to just slash away, but I'm taking my scissors to a new level! I did make use of my red felt tip, so I don't forget any of my changes. Redrew the grainline, and made sure to make note of the need to add a seam allowance where I cut the piece in two.

And that's about it. The lining arrived tonight, so I'll cut it tomorrow, along with the dress I'm making for the rehearsal dinner. It seems that I can't wear the bright green silk frock to all the events.

First Look -- Butterick 5176

I guess technically this is the 2nd look, but I feel like now it fits and it's ready to go. I've made the 2nd muslin, and really didn't have to do too much. I had to add 2 inches to the waist band and achieve that by slashing the midriff band (what Butterick calls this piece) basically in 4 places almost to the top of the piece and spreading it 1/4" for each slash. Oh, and I did that to both the front and back piece. This accomplished exactly what I wanted it to do.

So, with any V-neck, you run the risk of gaping, and this was no different. On the right side, I pulled down the center part and took out the gap. I didn't do it on the left, and it doesn't gap, but I might go ahead and do the same thing. The 2 sides kind of don't match. I'm also a little concerned that there will be too much cleavage but it is a garden wedding, and I've commissioned a fabulous necklace that will fill in that space, so I think it will be alright.

This picture shows how I pulled in the right side. I had to sew that side first, and then did the left side, which is a little different than the instructions.

Progress (and a Decision)

I got my wedding invitation in the mail yesterday (for Daughter Laura's wedding). We're tempted to mail the RSVP card with our regrets, but, naaaaahhh, we'll be there, with bell's on. (OK, maybe not bells.) SOOOO, what am I going to wear? Some of my non-sewing friends were wondering about the muslins, so here are the rejects:

On the dress form, the white one doesn't actually look so bad, but trust me, it just isn't right. Sunflower there, well, you can see the gobs of fabric involved in the halter. It's crazy. Here's the one I'm going with, Butterick 5176:

It has the V-neck I love, a full (but not gathered) skirt, and the midriff area that is just waiting for some embellishment. The fit still needs a bit of tweaking, and I haven't decided if I'm going to add the ties. Your thoughts? I'm just not sure I need a big bow which I would definitely tie in back if I use it.

I've also started serious work on the flower girl dresses. These organza tiers are giving me fits. One dress has four tiers and the other has three and post it notes are hopefully going to keep them all organized for me.

Tomorrow, how I'm hemming these babies. Hint: it's not by hand!

MOB Frustration

You've seen my fabric, and now you want some progress? Me, too! I've been making muslins all weekend, which is pretty unusual for me, as I'm not one of the "you must make a muslin for every project kind of girl." I've totally embraced tissue fitting.

But that's a lot of silk and I want my MOB dress to be perfect (well, not as perfect as the wedding gown, but you know what I mean). I'm also angsting over my curves in places where I'd rather not have them, so there's that, too.

And the results, please. Well, no pictures here of the said (and sad) muslins, but here are the rejected patterns:

Butterick 4919. Rejected because I didn't like the center seam (fixable), the "halter" straps are too fabric-y (also fixable), and I didn't like the wrap effect (not so fixable). Not 100% rejected, but at least for now. Oh, and it also looks a bit boring on.

Vogue 2962. Rejected because it is a halter, so there's a lot of back showing (not a total deal breaker), and those real halter straps have way too much fabric. There's not so much of a V-neck effect, as masses of fabric bunched up over the girls on it's way to strangling me. Really. I'm not exaggerating. Possibly fixable, but there's a pattern #3 waiting in the wings. Oh, and that gathered skirt. Not even an option. I would definitely use the skirt from the B4919 which appears in the drawing to be gathered, but really is a full, non gathered skirt.

Stay tuned.

Lusciousness

The fabric arrived today for my MOB dress! It's a gorgeous silk shantung from Gorgeous Fabrics in Bright Green. I love it, and love the way it feels and swishes, and drapes. I'm headed to Hancocks tomorrow to get the pattern (Buttericks are 99 cents... what could be better?).

I'm pretty sure that the picture doesn't do it justice. Do you want to know which pattern I've chosen? Or should it be a surprise? Not sure I can keep this a secret!

Fitting a Vintage Pattern

Really, any pattern, but I'm trying to fit a vintage one. I recently purchased the book Fit for Real People (I can't remember the authors right off hand, will edit later when the book is on the same floor that I am... sorry, I'm just being lazy.) Anyway, I think it will solve many of my problems. I've made the "muslin" of that vintage pattern I mentioned in the last post, and I think I'm going to love this dress. The only problem is the fit. The waist, that I knew should be altered, fits great. The rest, not so much. In fact, I can't really even show you on my body without assistance because a) it buttons in the back and there are no buttons, and nobody home to pin it on me, and b) it fits that bad.

Now, seeing this, you might think, "hmmm, it looks pretty good on the dressform." And it does sort of. Except that the dressform isn't my size. Not sure why I bought an adjustable dressform where the smallest bust is bigger than mine (wishful thinking?), but there you go. I did. And it's even pinned tighter on it.

The problems. 1. Too wide on the shoulders. I love the nearly off the shoulder look, but on me, they are simply not even close. 2. Too wide through the bust area. The darts are in the right place, but there is too much fabric going around the sides and to the back.

Those are the main problems that I have figured out so far. For adjustments, I'm going to try to tissue fit first and then see what to do about them. My tissue is the stuff I traced on, and will be more durable than actual tissue. First I'm going to do some reading though.

By the way, I've actually read the first couple of chapters of Fit for Real People, and it's quite interesting. I think that's a first for sewing reference books and me, because I usually just skip to the parts I need. I have a lot to learn here though, and I'm going to try to do it right.

Also, does anyone know how to figure yardage for fabric wider than 39"? That's all the envelope uses, and while I'm quite comfortable making up my own layouts, a handy translating formula would be useful.

Really? You sew?

I'm confessing right up front to another non-sewing post. Well, it's kind of related to sewing, but not. It's about the dreaded mother of the bride dress. I bought one last week at Saks. On sale. If I hadn't bought it, and decided that I had to have it, well, it would have been gone, snapped up by some other bargain hunter.

But I didn't love it. Didn't even take it out of the bag to try on for the father of the bride.

This week was a special trip with my mom and sister to celebrate two of us now having ages ending in a zero. And what do 3 women of a certain age, who need dresses for a very special wedding do? We went shopping. I've tried on more dresses in the last 7 days than I think I did in all of last year. And I bought 2 more. Dress #2 is decidedly not a MOB dress, but rather a sale too good to pass up and it fit great. Just needs a little bling to make it less plain, so I'll conjure up some crafty skill and tackle that later.

Dress #3 is the 2nd MOB dress, and will become #1. I love it way more than the first (which wasn't really "party" enough) especially when mom and sis saw the first one and said, "oooh, take it back!"

It's a little tight, but there's plenty of time. I could zip it, but breathing was a tad difficult. And it's way too long, even with heels. What do you think?

 

Oh, and it was a GREAT deal!

Grown Up Pursuits

After yesterday's post you may think I'm just a little nuts. Well, I just might be, but I really do like to sew for grown ups, too! So, in December I stumbled on a couple of wonderful sewing blogs, that had lists of more wonderful sewing blogs, and ... well, you get the picture. That led to a "slap the forehead" moment for me. I mean, I sew, and make lots of stuff for my Etsy shop, but why don't I sew for myself.

Oops, this is sounding like my welcome post, but here's the point I'm getting to now. Have you ever shopped for a Mother of the Bride dress? It's not pretty out there, and since I'm an up and coming MOB (what they call the mother of the bride on the zillions of wedding blogs my To Be Wed in June daughter reads) I started looking around. And the thought came to me, that while I was offering to make bridesmaids dresses (won't have to do that one, whew!), and the flower girl dress (I've bought the fabric and the pattern), I totally forgot (forgot?) that I could make myself a dress.

Keep reading... it gets better... pictures of vintage patterns coming up!