What madness overcomes a seamstress when we blithely say, "I'll do that."? Only later realize the size of the task we've taken on...
That, my sewing friends is SIXTEEN Staple Dresses!
This summer, three girls went to town on their day off and came back with all the fabric from three thrift stores to make matching dresses for all the girls on staff. We accomplished Sixteen.
The Statistics:
- There are 10 Woven Dresses
- 4 from Thrifted Sheets
- 1 from New Fabric
- 5 from Thrifted Fabric
- There are 6 Knit Dresses
- All from thrifted fabric
- There are 6 Hi/Low Hems, 1 Maxi, and 9 Straight Hem Dresses
- I don't remember all the sizes but I made each size offered at least once.
The Details
- I was pleasantly surprised to see that on all the girls I was able to check, the pattern waistline was right on. For the wide range of heights and figures I was very impressed. 10 points to April Rhodes.
- I did not do pockets.
- Assembly line sewing is the way to go!
- Instead of tags marking the back I wrote each girl's name at CB and a verse around the neckline.
- I am now the Shirring Queen! Don't worry how it looks on the machine, a shot of steam will make everything beautiful!
- The heaver the fabric the more rows of shirring needed. Knits shirred wonderfully with only a few rows.
- I did slightly stretch the elastic as I wound it on the bobbin. It seemed to give better results.
 |
| Before & After Steam Psst, Aren't those alligators cute! |
My Thoughts
- If I ever get married, this has cured any lingering ideas of making my own bridesmaid dresses. They can wear whatever they want! I'm not going to have 16 bridesmaids either!
- I feel like I've accomplished a milestone in my sewing. There has to be some award for sewing the same pattern up nineteen times. (counting the three versions I've made myself) I CAN DO BIG PROJECTS
- I don't want to do something this big again even though I LOVED doing this for the amazing ladies I worked with this summer. Each dress reflected their personalities and in the post camp blues it was nice to have a reminder of them.
- This was my biggest January Stashbusting UFO. I had three left to finish when the year turned over and I'm so glad they are all DONE.
 |
| For a couple of the knit dresses I had to improvise. These I did make "tags" for. |
 |
| All packed up and ready to head out to their new homes. |
How about you? What is the biggest sewing project you've ever tackled? How many times have you made up one pattern?
