Housewarming Dress

My first smocked dress! I wrote about the making of it here, and now I present to you the final photos!

The finished dress!

Laid flat. This shows the color a bit better.

Close up of the smocking.

Back view.

Totally cute buttons and hand-sewn button loops.

Inside view. I just pinked the seams- next time I'll probably do
French seams for a more refined finish.

Neck binding, hand sewn to the
inside. Look at all those pleats!

Sleeve bindings were also
hand sewn to the inside.

Placket. This was all machine sewn.
Next time I might slip stitch the inside. 

Blind hem, done by hand. Can you find the stitches?

And now, of course, a few photos of my Fluffernutter modeling her lovely new dress. My heart just about burst when I first put it on~ after such a rollercoaster ride making it, it was thrilling to see how perfectly cute it looked on her!

My sweetie pie!

So precious!

I love this kid!

So there you have it! I'll update again soon with my upcoming projects. Thanks for reading!

Trying Something New

What? Another post already? Yes, indeed! Because I did a new project recently, and actually took progress shots the whole way through! Also, I revamped my blog a bit, so let me know what you think of the new look. Anyway, on to the project!

When the Goofer Bean was a baby, I made her three special dresses for her first year of life-- a Christmas dress, a birthday dress, and another holiday dress (for her it was Thanksgiving)-- and I wanted to do the same for Fluffernutter. I made her a Christmas dress right away, then planned to make her next dress for Easter. Handsomeface and I closed on our house in February, though, and had to be out of our apartment by the end of March, and so, with much sorrow and a few tears, I had to change plans. Michael suggested that we have a housewarming party once we got moved in, and maybe that could be a good occasion for a special dress. He was totally right, so I started looking on Pinterest for inspiration.

I've been interested in getting into hand embroidery for quite a while, and several months ago, I did a little internet research into smocking. I thought this might be a good time to look into it again. It seemed complex and and time consuming, but simple enough to be a good way to start into embroidery. I chose a couple of patterns, then picked fabric and thread. I did a little more research, watched some great tutorials by a lady named Laurie Anderson, and got started.

Pattern by Creations by Michie, smocking plates by Cross Eyed Cricket
and Ellen McCarn, and fabric by Gretchen (Gertie) Hirsch

The fabric, cut out and ready to go!

The first task was to stitch the shoulder seams, which was easy enough. Then I needed to pleat the fabric. Smocking requires smooth, even pleats, so I started with guidelines, as suggested by the pattern. I checked and double checked the measurements the pattern gave, then used a water soluble pen, ruler, and seam gauge to draw a hundred jillion lines. It took hours, but hey, I needed to get this done right, right?

This took soooo long.

Next, I used those guidelines to make eleven rows of 1/16" stitches, all by hand. Most people use a pleater, but those cost hundreds of dollars, and I don't spend hundreds of dollars on first attempts. It took at least a week. 

So many stitches...

The next task was to gather up the pleats and starch and steam the neckline into shape, also known as blocking. It was 11 PM a week before our housewarming party and was feeling proud and optimistic... until I tried to gather up the pleats. I rinsed out my guidelines so as to avoid setting the ink when I steamed the dress, then started pulling up the pleats. Instead of folding neatly, though, they bunched and clumped and poofed. According to all the photos and tutorials I'd looked throughout the project, it was wrong. All wrong. I searched and searched the internet (there's not a lot of info on hand-pleating for smocking, surprisingly enough), and finally came to the conclusion that my pattern was wrong. The vertical guidelines that it told me to draw 1/8 of an inch apart should have been drawn 1/4 of an inch apart. Oh, it was bad. It was so bad. I couldn't see how I'd ever get the house clean, get all the food ready, and redo hours of work to catch up the progress I'd lost on the dress, much less finish it, all in less than a week. I cried, I swore, I threw the dress on the dirty kitchen floor, and then I stalked up the stairs and crawled into bed.

Back to the drawing board.

After talking to Michael (and crying so much more), I felt a little bit better. I simplified my plans for party food, and alternated cleaning chores with redrawing guidelines and re-stitching pleats. The upside was that, since there were half as many pleats to be done, it took half the time, but I still didn't plan to finish in time for the party. That ship had sailed, or so I thought.

Guidelines 2.0

Pleating stitches finished, for real this time

Finally I was ready to block the dress, for real this time. The new pleats pulled up beautifully. I found it a little tricky to get them all evenly arranged and pinned, but it was fun to spray starch the whole thing solid! And I was so pleased to finally be actually doing it!

All lined up and ready to go!

Once the spray starch dried, I was finally ready for the fun part- the actual embroidery. I still thought it would take much more time than I had, but I'd chosen this because it looked fun, so at this point I was planning to have that fun and finish when I finished. I got started and found it to be easier than I'd expected, which was a pleasant surprise.

Ready to embroider!

The first few rows.

By now, it was Friday, two days before the party. I'd asked my mom to come watch my kids while I bought the food I needed, and she also offered to help me finish cleaning the house (she likes to clean, and boy, is she good at it. I was planning to clean along with her, but she'd seen my despondent Facebook post about the whole pleating mess earlier, and she let me sit and embroider when I wasn't off shopping. I started feeling weirdly optimistic again. She came again the next day, and I managed to finish the embroidery by that evening! It was actually looking like I'd get to finish the dress in time after all!

Making progress, row by row.

All the embroidery, finished!

That night, I stayed up a little later than I'd planned (and by that I mean I was up till 2 AM) finishing the last machine sewing-- sewing the side and back seams, attaching a back placket and sewing on neck and sleeve bindings, though I'd have to finish those bindings by hand. I also removed the pleating threads, found the cutest little buttons for the back, and packed everything up to finish the next day.

The next day was the day of the party. I took the dress with me to church and managed to finish the neck binding and one of the sleeves. At home I finished the other sleeve and blind-hemmed the skirt. The last step was to make button loops and sew on the buttons. When those were done, I threw it (well, very gently placed it, actually) in the washing machine to get the last of my guidelines out. A few guests arrived before it was done in the dryer, but not too long after the party started, Fluffernutter was in her dress, and looking cuter than ever, and I even had time to bake a fancy cheesecake besides! What a triumph! I'll devote my next post to the photos of the finished dress, so keep an eye out for that. Thanks for reading!

Christmas in... September?

 Hey, folks! I know what you're thinking... a blog post in the middle of the year? The world must be coming to an end! But I wanted to post about all my Christmas projects from last year, but I had a newborn to take care of and a house to move into, so I kind of just never did. Anyway, here we go!

First, I made a to-do list! I thought I'd get maybe 4 or 5 of these things done, especially since I didn't start until the beginning of December due to having a baby the month before. But I'm an overachiever so I put ALL THE THINGS on the list anyway.

What a to-do...

First thing I did was my Festive Australian Wildlife Christmas Tree Skirt! Back in October of last year, I was the recipient of a random act of kindness that led to this project. Here's the story.
I'm part of a sewing group on Facebook, and sometime last fall a fellow member posted a picture of these amazingly cute and quirky fabrics- Christmas platypuses, and Christmas koalas. I fell in love. I asked her where it came from, and if they had a website where I could order some, but alas, it was from a shop in Australia, and while they had a website, they did not do international shipping.

When I posted that I'd answered my own question, this kind lady asked how much I would buy if I had the chance. I figured she was gearing up to buy some and ship it to me, and I would pay her back, as people in the group often did for each other. Sadly, we'd just dropped a kajillion dollars on car repairs, so I told her it wasn't in the budget, but maybe could I contact her about it later? To borrow a clickbait phrase, what she did next astounded me!

I soon received a private message from my fellow seamstress, saying someone had recently done something really nice for her, and she wanted to pay it forward by sending me some of the fabric free of charge. How much of each would I like? I responded, saying probably a yard of each and thank you SO MUCH! A few weeks later, not only did she send me the two fabrics she'd posted pictures of, but the third fabric in the set (Christmas echidnas!), a festive Austrailian wildlife Christmas bunting fabric project piece (the kind where all the pattern pieces are printed on the fabric just the way you need them), a calendar of Australian scenery, and a Christmas card! Happy tears were shed.

Christmas in October!

Fast forward to December, and I'd finally decided what to make: a tree skirt. My family had never used one when I was growing up, but I wanted to make something I'd get to see every year and remember how much this lady's generosity had warmed my heart. That kind of giving is the point of Christmas, after all! So I found a tutorial, bought some fancy ribbon, whipped up the pattern, and made my tree skirt like two weeks before Christmas. It turned out really well! Now my continuing mission is to find a way to pay it forward to keep the giving going.

I really like the way the buttons turned out!

And here's how it looked on the tree!

After that I got to work on ornaments. Instead of buying ornaments for the girls each year, we make them! The big project this year was, of course, Fluffernutter's baby's first Christmas ornament. I'd made one for Goofer Bean, and decided to continue the trend for Fluffernutter. We also made a set of ornaments to send to the girls' grandparents, but I didn't get a picture of those this year.

Unicorn!

Side View

After the ornaments, I got to work on Aurora's stocking. By now it was three days before Christmas, but my baby needed a stocking, and it felt unfair to buy one when I'd made Goofer Bean's so I did it anyway. I also fixed Goofer Bean's, which was a little wonky. It was a quick and fun project, and I think it looks sooo pretty!

Lacy lacy goodness! I love white and red for Christmas!

Then, despite the fact that I needed to complete the whole project in two days, I started Fluffernutter's Christmas dress. Michael took care of the kids for the most part while I stitched and stitched away. At around two in the morning on Christmas eve, I almost gave up, but thought to myself, "This baby's only got one First Christmas, and I'm so close! I'm doing this!" and I worked for another hour or two, went to sleep, woke up early, and finished the dress just in time for Fluffernutter to wear it to church!

The dress

Bodice Detail

Back View

As is tradition in our family, the girls got to open their stockings on Christmas Eve, because they were super good in church, which gave me an opportunity to snag a cute photo showing off how the stocking matched the dress, and how cute my little Punkin is!

Isn't she a doll?

 And, just in case that wasn't enough, I went ahead and stayed up late on Christmas Eve to finish the blanket I started knitting for Fluffernutter that summer. At about two in the morning on Christmas, I checked off the last item on my to-do list! I discovered a few days later that I'd actually done it wrong-- it should form a flat circle all laid out, but I did my increases every row instead of every other, so it's super duper ruffly. I just decided to call it a Lettuce Blanket cause it looks like green leaf lettuce when it's all folded up, and not worry about it because, I mean, it still works, it's still pretty, and doggone if I'm going to unravel a whole blanket and start from scratch! And Fluffernutter loved it. She snuggled right down when I wrapped her up in it. So it's definitely a success.

Ruffly Fluffly Lettuce Blanket

My Fluffernutter enjoying her present.

And that's it! That was my whirlwind December. I have a lot less planned for this year, but still... I can't wait to get started! Merry Very Belated Christmas, everyone, and a happy New Fall!

All the Things!

Merry Christmas, from us.