Day 2.... sorta

So, here it is, over a week later. I say Day 2 because well, it's the second day of working on the dress LOL. Well actually, I should have posted this yesterday because now it's day 3. Yesterday I got the top underlay portion of the dress done. Pictures to come, I promise. It was definately an adventure. Someone far more seasoned than me could have done this in probably about an hour. I took my time to ensure that I thought out what would happen if I did a and b. That way I was pretty sure all would work out correctly. This is why it's tough doing this without a pattern.

Patterns are nice, they give you directions, even if you cannot understand them because you don't speak sewing-ese. This actually required thought. The previous night had been a long one. Ebbie has an ear infection and sinus infection. She was sent home from school 3 school days in a row. She went to the dr. The dr said she couldn't believe that Ebbie could even hear, she had so much fluid behind her ear drums that for the air pressure test, her ear drums didn't move. So she's on antibiotics and a nasal spray. Nice. I stayed up way too late that night due to some anger issues I had with a forum. Well not really WITH the forum, they just kinda encouraged those issued to appear. For the last couple of weeks I've had alot on my mind, alot actually happening and not much of it is good. Either way, it's better now. So yesterday morning at 6 am I decided since kids were still asleep and dh was gone to work, I would start trying to tackle this top while I had peace and quiet. My first adventure was the zipper.

The zipper. My friend the zipper. When i made the original pattern, I did not consider a zipper into it. Probably a mistake. Once I figured out I would need one to get this poor dainty top over Ebbie's giant daddy dome (genetics suck), I realized I was going to have to cut down the middle of the back of the dress. I got the shortest zipper wal mart had, which was 7 1/4 inches. I sat and began to contemplate how to do this. I could cut the entire back piece in half to create a seam at the bottom and bring the edges closer to the center of the zipper, or I could just cut the length of the actual zipper from the hemline and hope to make it work. Whats the worst that could happen right? I pull the stitching out and have to continue to cut down the full back anyway? So I make my markings, I cut, then I cut about a 1/4" on each side of the zipper created cut at the bottom so I will have room to fold it over to create a clean sewing line. This took me about a half hour to do just this much. I could hear the kids stirring, I had to hurry up. So I pinned the zipper on. Here's where I started to worry. The zipper is about an inch wide. After folding over the hem part next to the zipper (feel free to jump in anytime with what these things are really called in sewing-ese cause I haven't a clue lol), I realized the opening was more than an inch wide...... or well it looked like it. I somehow managed to sew the side hems onto the zipper at the VERY edge of the zipper without stitching off of the zipper cloth at all. At this point I am SO thankful that zippers come with that melted edge to avoid fraying. That will keep that stitching from slipping off. YAY ME! Then there were kids, one of which asking me "Oh mommy, is that my beautiful dress?"....... yes honey, that's your white trash princess dress.
Later on, once the baby and Ebbie had been fed, I went back to work. Here's where I made my first mistake. I sewed all the attaching parts of the front and back together. NOT COOL. I mean, well they all lined up and all was perfect... until I realized that it was gonna be a real bitch to do the edging seams in the arm holes and the neckline. *Sigh* I started pinning the seams. Realizing that I had to cut the fabric if I wanted the seams to curve without bunching or pulling. I'm actually pretty sure I may have learned that in sewing class 20 years ago..... how I remember that I have no clue, or maybe I saw someone do it on DIY lol. After much fidgeting, sewing VERY slowly on my psycho super fast sewing machine, I got all the seams done. I got them done without having to redo them. I got them done and everything came together nicely and evenly.... well mostly lol. You can tell I'm no master by looking at this. Really you can. You can see that I didn't turn the seam in just right here and there, and the front of the neckline puckered a bit anyway but who cares??? I made the top of this dress! And what's great ??? My neighbors. They are a really good ego boost lol. The guy next door laughed when I told them my plans for this dress and that I had never sewn anything but patches on clothes and curtains. I showed them the finished top and he looked shocked. He said "Wow, that looks really good"...... and MEANT IT. I grinned, got giddy. You know, all the things us SAHM's feel when we get complemented on learning a new homemaker style task that make us feel more like June Cleaver :)
So for the pictures. This is fun. I'm not even gonna describe them this time, just look and gawk, laugh, point, stare........ whatever :)