Summer of the Dress

Alright, I'm calling it quits on the UFOs (unfinished objects for those lucky enough not to have experienced them) because it's just plain and simple draining me. Besides, a new season has rolled in and so it's time for some new creations (and probably a few stuff ups that will lead to more UFOs, but that is another story!).

I’m jumping on the ‘summer of the dress’ bandwagon, kicked off by Erin at Dress a Day with International Wear a Dress Day, taken to extreme by Melynda and her summer of lovely dresses over at Country Girl Couture, and now by Livebird her in Oz has picked up the baton and run with it, coming up with some fab creations over at Sew Retro.

I love all styles of dresses, from fitted shift dresses for work to flowing sun dresses and I certainly have the patterns and fabric to make one for each day of summer if I had the time. But to be realistic, I’m setting a goal of seven dresses – so that I could wear a different one each day for a week if I wanted to.

But to make it a little bit challenging, I’m setting these ground rules for myself:

1. the pattern has to be from the stash but be one I haven’t used before
2. the fabric has to be from the stash (although linings and notions can be bought new)
3. the dress has to be one I’ll wear this summer (ie no evening gowns made for the heck of it, unless I actually do have a black tie event to attend, which is unlikely!)

That last rule I set for myself will be the most challenging I think, given that I’m having a baby in the beginning of summer which means that I won’t have my usual body shape and will have to modify patterns accordingly, and with a new born I’m not sure of where I’ll be swanning off to in lovely dresses – I may be the best dressed (or overdressed) new mum down at the baby health clinic, the library or the shopping centre!

Ok, so the first cab off the rank is a vintage McCalls 3154 pattern, made in the same black and white check fabric I bought a few years ago from Spotlight and used for the BWOF jacket posted about here. Both fabric and pattern are from the stash so rules no. 1 and 2 met, and I will wear this to work shortly when it warms up a bit, so rule no.3 will be met also.

I’m usually wary of using patterns that only have drawings on the front and not a photo of an actual model wearing the garment because you have no way of telling what it will actually turn out like (not that I have a model’s figure and so there is always a degree of this anyway!). This pattern was no exception: it looks fantastic on the pattern drawing, but the dress came out HUGE, and I mean Homer Simpson muu-muu huge that episode when he gained 300 pounds to work from home…. Even my husband asked if this dres was for when I was 'more' pregnant!

So I am in the process of taking in a few inches at the side seams and putting darts in the back to give some shape to it. I know in the past the attitude to pregnant bodies was to hide them in tent like dresses with bows, but fashions have certainly changed and I don’t want to look too frumpy! But since I don't know when the next sunny day will be here in Sydney (the weather has been crazily changeable of late) to take a photo, here is how it is muu muu style:

And now I think I shall call it quits for the evening, I was tracing a BWOF pattern for a friend who is newbie sewist and a BWOF virgin, but I cut my finger so badly earlier this evening it leaked through my bandaid and stained the pattern, and I'm not up to retracing it right now.... Sorry Lisa, I'll get it to you soon I promise!

p.s just for you Veronica Darling: BWOF = Burda World of Fashion magazine. Surely it is only a matter of time before you are obsessed with this magazine too! Check out your local borders or big newsagency to have a nosey in one.