Finished!

I finished and delivered the dress on Thursday night (August 13).

I ended up doing a bagged lining, which is tricky and, quite honestly, hard to explain (I'll try later, if only to have it make sense to me), but I did it Wednesday night and it turned out beautifully. I almost cried. Except that I realized on Thursday that the lining was sagging after I'd hand-sewn the lining to the zipper. I had to make an 8" slit in the back seam, pull the hem of the dress through, unpick it all, and then cut the lining shorter by about 1/5". Totally nuts. The dress looked like a big tangled mess while I had it all up on the counter, but I managed to tuck everything back in and when I shook it out, it was the right length and the lining was laying quite nicely. I quickly pressed it (one of the advantages of underlining is that your fashion fabric doesn't wrinkle nearly as easily as it could have), sewed a hook and eye at the top of the zipper, and prayed that it would fit.

Emily tried it on for me and JulieG and it DID fit. She looks so pretty in it! We were so excited that it looked that good that I think we were almost crying. :) Emily's getting married!

I'll post pictures soon--I have to sync my phone and find them--but my sister just graduated with her MA in Humanities and my grandma and other sister are in town. Grandma is leaving for home (Seattle) in a few hours and I really need to spend time with her; she's the only grandma I have left. :)

Toodles for now!

August 8, 2009

I'm stalling.

I had a weird night, totally unrelated to sewing or creativity at all, but it's still getting to me.

Wedding dress goals for the day:

1. Finish the underlining (two skirt panels to go, but they DO have to be pinned and smoothed out before I sew, so it takes a bit longer).
2. Mark the darts, either by thread tracing or soapstone. Probably both, just in case.
   
3. Don't be intimidated by that tricky bodice--I've done it before, I'll do it again, and it's not hard. I'm just worried about having to unpick anything because I'm afraid the needle marks will show. I'll just have to take it slow so I can
   
4. Finish the basic construction and
5. Cut out the lining.

Goals for me:

1. Eat.
2. Quit at 6 so I can run some errands (new ironing board cover...?) before seeing a play at 8.
3. Get to sleep before midnight so I can
4. Wake up early tomorrow and sew.

Should be an interesting day!