So little to do but even less time? How’d that one work out!

Well I seem to have so little time to blog, tweet and facebook at the moment yet I don’t seem to be getting a whole load of stuff done if that makes sense! Although I have been making the most of the weather whilst its been sunny but the good old UK as usual has given into rain this weekend.

I had some left over material from my Simplicity 2883 dress that was purchased at Lili Fabric's & thought well the sun is due and apart from my Colette Meringue I actually have no skirts but I also have no skirt patterns so I thought it cant be that hard to make a skirt with no pattern can it??….. Did I mention I’m really not keen on working with this material!

Anyway….I sat there with the lump of material I had and started to pleat it hand basting as well as pinning it as I went. I then remembered the material is lovely and stretchy but once sewn and be tricky to manoeuvre (but this is probably but my lack of experience talking). I decided rather than winding myself up and spending hours researching the net to just bang in a zip and button on the already pre planned elastic waistband (big smiles when I thought of this as I am yet to make any type of waistband lol).

Here is what I ended up with.
       
The pleats came out all the same size. I was happy with the elastic waist & I even put in an invisible zip and button.

I wore it for my mums birthday visit but it made me feel a bit old and frumpy (still trying to find “my” style):


So I decided despite being constantly told wear waist clinchers, hide your hips, cover your upper arms and so on and so forth…… to do this (please excuse the blurred photo I really need to get a wireless remote all this running backwards and forward on self timer is not doing it for me or my pictures lol)!


From the side empire line clothes tend to have the “is she pregnant or just a bit overweight” effect on me but straight on I find them quite flattering and I think this style of dress (if it was a dress lol)  is “in” at the moment. I can change up the top using different colours and styles and pair with belts worn under the bust (sounds silly I know but I’ve done it twice and it looked surprisingly good)!

I have already worn this out a few time and got a couple of compliments so I am more than pleased.

Yay Yay Yay Jersey Dress Finished

**DISCLAIMER** The following pictures were taken with the aid of my 4yr old daughter so please excuse the poor focus in some and I also HATE having my picture taken :o)

 

This dress has been in my to do pile since I brought the fabric back in February and I am so please its finished.

The fabric itself is a very very stretchy jersey fabric. I had to use a pattern specifically for knits/jerseys as I have never sewn with it before and was unsure. I did run into a few problems but needless to say it turned out ok in the end.

I used Project Runway 2883 and after reading the reviews and doing a bit of research I decided to modify the pattern by adding 2.5 inches to the bodice and shortening the skirt so the gathering was on my waist not under my bust (it really would have looked like a maternity dress on me).

   I paid less than £1.60 for this little beauty on eBay!

My biggest problem was gathering the fabric. I don't have a gathering foot yet so I done it using two lines of long stitching. This part was fine but trying to stitch the gathers in place was near on impossible for me and bloody well frustrating. I ended up going round the skirt/bodice join and tried to manually gather as i stitched which got most of the gathering secured. Then I tried the dress on and realised that the stitching would not hold with the stretch of the fabric…I wanted to cry by this point!

so I decided to use elastic….

I dont know what made me think of it but I thought it would be more secure, give the waist line more definition and help with the gathering issue. It did thankfully (I would not have want to unpick all that zigzag stitching lol)

  This is the view from the front so I was relatively pleased with the outcome.

The seams were nice and easy. I just used a basic fold over hem on the neck, arms  and hem  being careful not to stretch the material and the great thing is you can hardly see the stitching.

Below is the front and back as the dress is un-accessorised.

 

And me being silly because my four yr old was getting the hump with pressing the shutter button lol!