A new dress (the best one yet!!)

Okay, I think I'm finally starting to get this sewing thing figured out.

I just finished making a dress from a modification of Butterick 5216, using Simplicity 2579 for the skirt portion.

I made option C, but just lengthened the bottom and made it into an A-line skirt using the skirt portion of the Simplicity pattern. 

The bottom portion of the Butterick pattern had a line across the waistline that said if you wanted to lengthen or shorten the bottom, to cut there. So I did, then placed it on top of the Simplicity pattern.

Here's a closer picture of what it looked liked with the Butterick portion cut in two. I had to fold over the edge of the Simplicity pattern, it was a little too wide.



Once I got the dress made and tried it on, it was a little too gappy in the front (is gappy a word?). Since I didn't want my entire bra hanging out, I decided to close the gap.

I tried on the dress, then pinned where I wanted the top to come together.

I then sewed a gathering stitch up both sides from the pin down, and pulled on the stitches to gather them.



Then I pinned the two sides together, making sure they overlapped.

Then I basted, and stitched, making sure there weren't any gaps left between the two sides.

Once I got the neckline finished, it was perfect!!

 I love the A-line shape of the dress, it's so comfortable to wear. And the silk feels really nice.

 I was a little worried about working with silk again (after the frustrations I had making this skirt), but it wasn't too bad. The hemming around the neck and arms was somewhat frustrating, but all-in-all, it turned out pretty good, and I'm very happy with it. And an added bonus, I got the fabric on clearance at Joann's, 2 yards of 60 inch (instead of the normal 45) for $5!! Now let's hope the weather gets nice enough to be able to wear it in the near future!!

Wrap Dress from Two T-Shirts

Yes, you read the title right.

I went from this...

to this!!!

I followed this tutorial for the main idea, but changed a couple things. I bought two XL navy blue T-Shirts from Walgreens out of their mistake shirt bin. They were only $2 a shirt (yes, that's $4 total for the dress!!).

I used an existing dress I had that fit well to figure out the approximate shape and size of how I wanted the dress to turn out.

I added a waistband and ties to the dress instead of just sewing the top half to the bottom half like the tutorial suggested.

The coolest thing about this tutorial? No hemming!! You get to use the existing hem for the bottom of the dress (as seen above) as well as the sleeves. The tutorial instructed you to hem the neckline, but since t-shirt material doesn't shred when you wash it, and it rolled nicely, I didn't feel I needed to.

I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. I tried it on for my husband and he was impressed ("What? You made that from t-shirts?"). I'm going to embellish it a little, add some fabric flowers to it somehow, but I haven't done it yet. That might be another post :)