The Big Day!

 

 

I've been a little stuck with blog writing.  First, because the three weeks leading up to The Big Day were so busy.  Now, because it's over, it feels strange going backwards in chronology to show How I Made The Dress.  And, now that The Big Project is finished, I've been a bit adrift on What to Tackle Next (sewing-wise, at least).  So today, on our eleven-day anniversary (seriously, we've been teasing each other like this for a week now) I decided to just get back into the swing of things.

Since the most important thing is that I Finished The Dress, and I'm very happy with how it looked, I thought I would just post here some of the photos from The Big Day (and the day before).  Our professional photos aren't ready yet, other than a few sneak peeks, so mostly these are snapshots taken by family.

Final Hand-Sewing

 
I love how the blurriness conveys the sense of activity.  But I actually felt calm, I promise!

My Mom crocheted a lace border for the top of the dress

The lace, while subtle, gave The Dress just the perfect final touch!  Thanks Mom!  Your creativity has inspired me since you first taught me to hand-sew, embroider, and knit at age eight.

 

 

On the Way *Almost There*

 

This isn't me, by the way!

 

Helping Little Miss

 

I used an extra bit of ribbon as a stay at the top of the dress, but Little Miss decided it worked better as a halter strap that tied in the back.  I also re-purposed a frilly ribbon for her waist, that I had originally intended as a waistband for a tulle overskirt for my own dress.  My Mom and my sister nixed that idea.

 

Little Miss is Adorable!

 

 

Just About Ready

I decided to make a veil at the last minute (late the night before).  I attached it to two beaded hair combs I had made with gold and white freshwater pearls the week before.  Little Miss also made two hair combs for herself.  I had so much fun, I made extras for my two bridesmaids and my sister in the days before the wedding.

 

 

 The Ceremony Was Beautiful!

My Pilot picked this incredible bouquet from the garden in the morning.  I had just finished wrapping what I thought would be my bouquet when he came in with it.  I gave my roses to Little Miss. 

 

My sister brought the necklace for me; we had fun trying on all the options the day before.  She is so wonderful!

 

Two New Sisters

 



 My Parents

A Moment of Hilarity! (This always happens when I get together with my sister, or with my friends; so here, it was a guaranteed fun fest!)

 

We're Married!

It was an incredible, amazing, blessed day at Brown County State Park, Indiana!

 

 

 

Till Next Time,--Ayana



The Cream Puff Dress--Done!

Hi folks, I'm so excited!



This photo is from the actual wedding day!
The Cream Puff Dress

I finished the Cream Puff Dress, and it looks amazing!  (If I must say so myself.  I suppose I shouldn't toot my own horn, but I just can't contain myself here.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are the steps that went into this project:

1.  Pattern Drafting

2.  Pattern Printing and Assembling

3.  Pattern Testing/Fitting by Making the Bodice Lining

4.  Fabric Cutting

I decided to underline/flat line the dress, for two reasons: 

• I wanted to give the fabric slightly more substance, so the garment wouldn't feel flimsy,
• and I wanted to enhance the creamy ivory color--I wouldn't use the term sheer by any means to describe this fabric, but it seemed like when I put my hand directly underneath it, the color of my skin kind of influenced how I perceived the color of the fabric. 

I cut a very small piece of the silk from the selvedge, and ironed a piece of fusible interlining to it, but didn't like the results.  It was a little too stiff, and a little too "gummy"--maybe I didn't have the right weight of interlining.

I tried the same experiment with a new swatch, using some scraps of cotton batiste I had on hand.  This worked perfectly.

So I cut out each pattern piece in both the silk and the cotton batiste, and sewed them as if they were one layer. 

You're supposed to baste the two fabrics together in a line running up the middle first, but I didn't want to do this, because I've read that needle punctures can destroy silk.  I didn't want to take any chances.  So I simply pinned them together in the seam allowances. 

I had to remove the pins before sewing the seams, though, because of the curved areas; the fabric needed to shift while sewing in order to match the curves, especially when sewing a curved area to a straight area.

5.  Sewing! 

The actual sewing was the easiest part of this project.  One of the benefits of creating your own pattern is that you know exactly how it goes together, and you can control the difficulty level. 

So, my pattern for the Cream Puff Dress involved only five seams, sewing in the bodice lining, inserting the back lacing, and hemming it up.  Easy peasy, more or less!

The hard part is creating the pattern (but even that wasn't so challenging, just exacting), and cutting the fabric.  What's interesting though, is that for the first time ever I figured out how to get into a type of zen mode so that the tasks I would normally consider frustrating were actually enjoyable.  I discovered that if you do it with love, nothing is stressful.

Also, I discovered that pressing is even more fun than the actual sewing machine sewing.  Once you've sewn a seam, every other seam is the same--you're just feeding the fabric through.  But pressing--that's where the garment takes shape.  And, that's where you get to see the beautiful results of all your hard work.

6.  Sewing in the Bodice Lining

This step was fairly easy, too.  I made a fortuitous last-minute decision. 

As I was rummaging through my bag of notions, I came across some white double fold bias tape for seam binding.  Although I had intended to simply sew the lining to the dress the same way you would sew a regular seam, and then turn it right side out, I decided to use the bias tape to enclose the layers at the top. 

Then, when I turned the garment right side out, I flipped the bias tape over and pulled it downwards into the inside of the dress, so that the 1-inch seam measured correctly from the top, but now the lining is lower than the outer fabric.  This way the lining is not visible from the outside.  I pinned the lining down to the seam allowances to keep it from shifting.  I only actually sewed it in at the back seam, but not until after inserting the back laces.

7.  Inserting the Laces

I created two strips of laces for the back closure.  Each strip consists of 2 layers of fusible interfacing and 1 layer of silk,  11 inches by 1 inch.  The silk is underneath, then one layer of fusible with the glue towards the silk, on top of which I pinned 11 one-inch lengths of ribbon spaced 1 inch apart, along the middle of the strip.  On top of this is the second layer of fusible, with the glue towards the ribbon.  I pressed, sealing all the layers together.

I attached each panel of laces to the seam allowance of the back seam.  Keeping the silk layer towards the body, I wrapped the half of the strip around towards the back of the seam allowance, fully encasing it.  To keep it stable, I will stitch down the edge of the seam allowance to the lining layer on the inside, while inserting boning.  This will keep the fabric from bunching up when I tie the laces.

Update:  There was just one problem, which will cause me to take out the lacing panels and re-sew them.  Although I removed an inch from the back closure by folding the seam allowance back a full inch, instead of a half inch, at the top of both sides, then tapered down to the half inch at the top of the back seam, the dress would not lace tightly enough.  This is partly because of how far the ribbon laces protrude from the side. 

I will need to make the gap probably a full two inches at the top, and make the ribbons much tighter against the edge.

Oh well, this is one more evening's worth of work....

Otherwise, it's looking great!

Till next time, --Ayana

Cream Puff Dress, Part 3: Assembling Pattern Pieces, and Lining

Last time, I showed you how I had tile printed the three pattern pieces for the Cream Puff Dress, for Little Miss.  I had 8 sheets of paper for each pattern piece.  I was planning to tape them together.

Using Contact Paper to Assemble PDF Pattern Pieces

 

Then, in my mailbox, what should appear?  A wonderful blog post, that made it all clear. 

At www.beccascreativenotions.com, the author explains how to use contact paper to assemble your tiled pdf pattern pieces.  I decided to try it. 

It was simple, folks!  Assembling the first one took WAY too long; once I got the hang of it, I got MUCH  faster.  It took about two hours to complete the whole process.

1. This part is obvious.  Figure out what length of paper you need, cut it off the roll, and remove the backing.  (Little Miss helped with this.)
2. Organize your tiled printed out pieces in order.  I decided I prefer to start from the top down, and complete the entire left side before completing the right side.  It was easier to keep the alignment correct while working vertically.
3. On each piece of paper, I marked the seam allowance, and the 1/8 of border that needed to be trimmed.  I realized that not every border needs trimming, only half of them do.  It's easiest to match the lines when you place a trimmed border slightly overlapped onto an untrimmed border.  So I only trimmed the upper edges of the pattern pieces on the left side, and the upper and left-hand edges on the right side.  (This way, as you work down the right hand side, you overlap a trimmed border to the lines above, and the lines to the left.)
4. Stick the pieces down!  Once again, I was glad I had used graph paper for the original pattern drafting.  The extra lines made it that much easier to match up the edges!
5. Cut out the pattern along the outer edges of the seam allowance. 

Original 1/4 scaled pattern pieces, with full scaled pieces,
assembled with contact paper





Easy peasy!  A little time consuming, but definitely more precise than taping paper together, and it's also sturdier.  Thank you, www.beccascreativenotions.com!

 








Sewing the Lining!

To test the pattern, I decided to sew the lining of the dress! 



Cream Puff Dress Lining


Only the bodice section is fitted, so I cut my pattern pieces from the top to the waistline seam in cotton batiste.  I sewed up the seams, and held it up to Little Miss--it fits, and the seams match exactly where they should--curved lines in front, side seams at the sides, and back seam in the middle of the back.

 

Cream Puff Dress Lining:  Little Miss is holding the sides, since I haven't put in the back closure yet; but I promise it fits!

 

And, it looks cute, too!

The best part about this design is that it sews up really quickly.  It took a lot of math, pattern drafting, fudging numbers, cutting and stapling paper, printing, and contact paper pattern piece assembling.  All that before I could even cut and sew any fabric.

I'm so pleased with the results so far.

And you were worried that I didn't know what I was doing!

Till next time,--Ayana

Corset Back Idea

I had another brilliant light bulb moment, folks! I decided to add a corset laced back to Little Miss' Creampuff Dress, and to my own Wedding Dress. 

I decided to do this after finding this awesome blog post with detailed instructions on how to do it. 



{Source}

The funny thing is, my original idea for my wedding dress was to start with a pre-existing corset, and add a gathered tulle skirt to it.  That would have worked, and would have been much simpler!

But then, I got bit by the sewing bug, and my imagination started running wild.  Then, I found blog posts that showed you how to draft your own corset pattern, so I experimented with making a corset-shaped top but using a zipper because I didn't want to actually cinch my waist.



{Source}

After experimenting with that for a bit, with some good results, I realized, why use a waist seam?  Just one more thing to sew!  That's how I came up with the five-panel dress that is my final design.  Now, it feels like I'm coming back around, full circle.  Isn't it funny how life works that way?

I think this will add an elegant touch to the dress, and has the additional benefit of making any fitting issues irrelevant.  As long as the style lines are in the right place, now I have a lot more wiggle room for any small errors.  And that makes me very happy right now!



{Source:  This site has a great tutorial also}

Little Miss loves this idea!  (And I love how she pronounces it cor-SET.)

Till next time,--Ayana

Little Miss's Cream Puff Dress

Finding More Beautiful Fabric

I took Little Miss on a special excursion to the fabric shop, so we could pick out matching fabric for our two matching dresses!

Tucked away in an otherwise polyester (not) paradise of "bridal fabrics" that felt like plastic that would smother you and make you sweat, I found ivory silk dupioni!

There was just enough for Little Miss's Cream Puff flower girl dress, and it was on sale!

I asked for 1 1/2 yards (at 54" wide); there was some extra on the bolt, so I got the rest at the "remnant" price of 50% off.  Wow, it was our lucky day!  With a zipper, thread, and two packs of bias tape, I spent a grand whopping total of $34.00.  I'm in shock.

Once I'm confident that the dress will turn out as expected (check out the "rough draft" version, Amanda's Golden Dress), I will order the additional yardage for my own dress!

Drafting the Pattern

When I made Amanda's Golden Dress, I made only one pattern piece, since all measurement points were 1/5 of the circumference--hence, I cut each dress panel five times.

The difference, however, between dolls and women is that women have boobs (duh!).  The seams can't be evenly shaped all around, or the seams might fall in an awkward place.  This isn't an issue obviously with my cute Little Miss flower girl, but I wanted to approximate the changes I would have to make in my pattern drafting to get the same effect I want on my own dress. 

This means that the center panel needs to be specifically placed according to where I want the style lines to fall on the body.  The center panel needs to be 1/3 of the front measurement, except that the top of the panel needs to be 6 inches wide, where each of the side panels needs to be only 3 inches wide.  The waist, hip, and hem points can be equal.  This will give a curved, princess-seam look to the front of the dress.

The two back panels are mirror images of each other, each panel being 1/2 of the back measurement at each point.

This posed some mathematical problems. 

To figure this all out, I started with the hemline, the widest point of each pattern piece--10 inches.  I marked a 10-square line (this is a 1/4 scale experiment) at the bottom of my graph paper, for each of the pieces--1 for the center front, one for each of the two side front pieces, and one for each of the two back pieces.

I then worked my way up, measuring the waistline next.  (The hipline will not be fitted, since the skirt is an A-line shape, so there is no need to measure it.) 

For the waistline, I had two choices:  I could make each pattern piece 1/5 of the total waistline,, making an equal division of the body; or, I could make each of the front pattern pieces 1/6 of the total waistline, and each of the back pattern pieces 1/4 of the total waistline. 

(If you think of the body as an imaginary circle, the front half is divided into three sections, or 1/6, while the back half is divided into two sections, or 1/4). 

Although more complicated, I thought the latter solution would be more likely to have the side seams at the side, and the back seam in the middle of the back.

Moving up to the high waist (which I measured just at the bottom two ribs), I performed the same calculations as for the waist, and drew in the corresponding lines.

Then, I hit a snag.

The problem is, that the top measurements are in a different proportion to each other than the lower measurements.  Here, with the center panel being 6 inches, and each of the side panels being 3, we have a proportion of 1/2 and 1/4. 

This meant that while the center panel had the shape I wanted, for the side panels the top measurement was actually smaller than the high waist and waist measurements, creating an awkward trapezoidal shape.  While the total circumference at each of the points would be correct, I was afraid it would skew the style lines of the dress.  For a corseted/princess seam look, each side of the bodice should look like the opposite sides of a dart, and each should taper roughly the same amount in a mirror image of the other.

(At least, I know it works this way.  I've seen corset patterns where one curved piece is adjoined to a straight piece, but I've never seen anything where one curved piece is joined to another curved piece that follows the same contour instead of the opposite contour.)

So, I tried the alternate method of making each front measurement the same proportion of the top measurement--1/2 and 1/4 of the front total, respectively.  This didn't work either, because as I moved down towards the waist, the differences became too negligible.

So, I had to take an alternate route of problem-solving.

I wrote out each of the measurements in a table.  I started to notice a pattern.  If I took some bits from here and there (namely, the back panels), and added them to the two side front pieces, and then subtracted a bit from here and there (namely, the waist center front) and added this to the back, I was able to get more even numbers that were easier to work with, and which allowed the side front pieces to have an appropriate shape.

Up next, how to figure out whether this will actually have the effect that I want, without cutting into and possibly wasting any fabric.

How do you solve sewing conundrums, dear readers?

Till next time,--Ayana

Finally, Success! A Self-Drafted, Cotton Candy Skirt

Yay, Readers!  I did it!

What did I do?, you might ask.  I made a garment that is not only wearable, but, unlike the first Little Miss skirt, it turned out really great.  And, I drafted the pattern myself.  Now, I'm really on my way!

The Cotton Candy Skirt

So, how did this all come about?

First, I did some more experimenting with old t-shirts for fabric.  I used one old t-shirt to make an ultra-fitted skirt (built to Little Misses's own specifications), to wear to drama camp.  This gave me more experience with stretch knit fabrics. 

I used tissue underneath and on top of the fabric, and pinned my self-drafted pattern (which consisted of her exact measurements from waist to knees, with no wearing ease) carefully on top. 

Before removing the tissue, but after I unpinned the pattern pieces, I zigzag stitched the edges of the fabric all around to prevent the edges from rolling, twisting, and jumping around.  I tore off the tissue when done with this step.  I used tweezers to remove the tissue from under the stitching.

Then, I carefully pinned the front and back pieces together, sewed the side seams, added the elastic to the waist, and hemmed.  Voila, a decent skirt, though obviously homemade.

Then, I experimented with drafting an A-line version, using the instructions from Sew What? Skirts!, by Francesca DenHartog, which I had found in the library and read voraciously.  Other than the new shape, my sewing steps were identical to the previous skirt.

Finally, I decided to stop messing around with torn up old clothes as fabric.  I was going to do it right! 

I found a super sweet, bright pink cotton sateen with a light contrast fleur de lis like pattern at the fabric store. 

As I was walking past the remnants bin, I found a sheer fabric with an embroidered design similar to that on the main fabric!  And, there was just enough. So I snatched it up. 



{I placed some white fabric underneath so you can see the swirl in the sheer fabric}

 
 


I also found a bright pink velveteen ribbon for the waistband, and a matching, narrow, frilly ribbon to trim the hem.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Pattern Manipulation

I took the A-line pattern I had drafted, retraced it, slashed it, and spread it to create a fuller A-line shape. 


I also decided to do all the sewing the right way, no shortcuts! 
I made sure to use the correct grain of the fabric ( I didn't even know what this meant when I first started out). 

Pressing Seams

I pressed to one side, then pressed open, turned under, and sewed my seam allowances.  What a difference this makes!  My seams are so neat and pretty!  It's not just idle work, people. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Topstitching

I topstitched the waistband ribbon, and threaded the elastic through. 

(Previously, I had stitched the elastic to the top of the waistband on the right side, then turned under twice and stitched, with messy but functional results.) 










I basted the curved hem before pressing, turning it up twice and topstitching.  My topstitching is so neat, you can hardly see where it begins and ends! 



I had another sewing revelation--remove the darn arm table for greater control and paradoxically faster stitching.

Instead of hemming the sheer fabric, I finished it with the frilly ribbon, topstitching again.  This lets the sheer fabric hang down a little longer than the main fabric, and lets the frilly ribbon seem to "float" beneath. 





I thought the ribbon would be enough to prevent the sheer fabric from unraveling at the hem, but alas I needed to use some fray check for extra safety.  I then trimmed away any edges not covered by the ribbon.





 Little Miss LOVES this skirt, and so do I! 

Flower Girl Dress Design Inspiration

If only I had made it in cream instead of pink, it could have served as her flower girl skirt for the wedding.  Of course, she wants a dress that matches mine. 

I'll probably use the same skirt pattern, but use tulle as the sheer overlay, insert a zipper instead of the elastic, and trace a bodice from a sleeveless fancy dress she already owns.  Then, I'll add a waist sash in a contrasting color. 

In fact, I might do that before any further work on my own dress, so I can gain some more experience before cutting into my fancy fabric.  I had thought I would save hers for last, since she is growing, but I doubt she would actually outgrow an entire size in the next eight weeks.  Hmmm, let's see....

Readers, how did you reach your sewing Ah-hah moment?  What was your first favorite project?

Till next time,--Ayana