The Making of the Granddaughter Ball Gowns

I've been so involved in making the dresses for the granddaughters that the dresses' construction has consumed the last 10 days of my life!  

First fitting of the dresses

There will be separate posts for both dresses, detailing all of the sewing information, after the event.  But five days in one dress done and one almost completed and I decided that I needed to do a Intro Post because there is sooooooo much information regarding the construction of both dresses.

Here are a few pictures that I shared on Instagram of the dresses construction.

Samantha's ~

Aleena's ~

I finished Aleena's late yesterday evening.  During the day, I hand stitched the zipper in, added the hook and eye to Sammy's, so they're both hanging & ready to be picked up. 

One quick note ~ this is an easy pattern to sew. As usual I complicated the dresses by my fabric choices and choosing to use the best sewing techniques I know. I wanted the girls dresses to not look homemade and thrown together. I wanted them to be as special as the event calls for.

I will have a lot more to say about each dress in the next couple of posts...as well as my own dress...which I've finally decided upon AND decided that I need another trip to the garment district for fabric. The drama never ends! *LOL*

...as always more later!

Catching Up...

I know it's been quiet here on the blog but I have been sewing. The latest Dover Jacket is finished but no pictures have been taken yet...maybe this weekend. Just haven't been in the mood.

First ~
I was honored when Elizabeth from Elizabeth Made This asked me for a few words to share with Beginner Sewists. So head on over to the blog to read all the wonderful sewing advice shared by some amazing sewists like Sandra Betzina, Joi Mahon and some well-known sewing bloggers.

Second ~
I started working on out-of-print (OOP) Vogue 8208. I made this jacket before ~ years ago. I'm using a blue linen I got from Fabric Mart's brick 'n mortar store during Sew Camp with some blue/white gingham scraps.

This is where I was last weekend...but I've since removed one breast pocket. They just weren't laying right. I did the same thing when I made the jacket the first time so maybe these breast pockets don't play well with my body...or I'm just not skilled enough to get two pockets to lay right on a jacket...whatever! Three works, LOL!

Third ~
In my last post I talked about buying all the fabric.  Well I haven't. I've purchased this piece from Harts Fabric. 

I've been wanting to try them out because of their Instagram feed. I thought it would match The Hurrying Spring Along Shirt but the background is slightly tan. It would have been used to make sleeves for the shirt but since they don't match I'm back to thinking about donating the shirt unless I come up with another plan.

Fourth ~
My family is attending a Black Tie Event the first weekend in June and I volunteered to make the granddaughters dresses. I wanted them to have something spectacular so this is the fabric I bought this week from Chic Fabrics to make their dresses.

My vacation starts this Thursday (Memorial Day weekend) and I have a week to make their dresses and my own. 10 days should be enough time to get everything done.

Fifth ~
I know there is a contingency of sewists that hate Hobby Lobby and what they stand for and I respect their opinions. However, since I've been out and out discriminated against in JoAnn's because of my skin color and when I wrote to their corporate offices they did nothing...so no shopping there for me. This puts me between a rock and a hard place to buy patterns. Especially since Simplicity's website SUCKS! So Hobby Lobby for cheap patterns. These are the Simplicity ones I bought in the recent sale...

Now if you're still here and didn't pull out after Hobby Lobby let me say that while I'm a Christian, I'm totally horrified by the Heartbeat Abortion laws that some of the southern states are passing. I honestly believe that Roe v. Wade is going to go away because of that "Making America Great Again" contingency presently running things in America. 

Also, I'm absolutely sure that Affirmative Action is next on the agenda because keeping down women, minorities and poor people is what the 50s in America was all about. Don't at me. This is a conversation I just don't want to have because we've long passed the ability to have civil discourse in this country. I WILL remove comments that are derogatory, negative or come for me. My blog, my thoughts.

Oh one more thing, I know people are having troubles leaving comments here if you don't have a google account. Hey, I can't even leave a comment from my iPad anymore. So I changed the settings to let anyone leave a comment but the amount of Anonymous comments in my moderated section, made me change the settings back. I've looked into Disqus as a comment moderation but when I tried to install it, it didn't work, so know I'm trying to work something out. Cause if you're still following along and want to leave a comment, I'd love to hear from you.

That's it for today. If I get pictures taken of the Dover Jacket this weekend, there will be one more blog post. If I don't, there probably won't be anymore until after the black tie event.

...as always more later!

Do you shop around?

Hey everyone!  I'm in the mood to fabric shop and it's all due to the fact that my birthday is this month and all of the birthday discounts are falling into my mailbox. Let me stop here and say I don't usually make a big deal about my birthday online. My family and friends know when it is and celebrate me and that's enough. All that to say, I'm not telling when it is so don't ask! *LOL*

Back to the point of this post - I'm looking at a variety of online fabric shops scoping out what I want to use my discount(s) and birthday money on. I was looking at a new to me online site and realized they were selling one of my favorite fabric brands ~ Telio. While the price they're charging per yard isn't exorbitant, I thought I wonder what sewandsew is selling it for. So I moseyed on over and found it's a few dollars cheaper on their website. 

I'm deliberately leaving names off because this post isn't to shame or disparage any online fabric stores. The point of this post is to ask if you shop around online and compare prices? I do this constantly...but then I love to shop for fabric online and I know a bunch of sewists don't. I'm always amazed at sewists who only have "the fleece craft store" near them that don't shop online. Yes, I've heard all the arguments about the need to touch it. I just think you're limiting yourself by not being willing to see what the interwebs hold for you.

Aside from that, the Question of the Day is, "Do you shop around for fabrics" and one more "Do you comparison shop for sewing tools and sewing machines online, too?" I'm really curious so leave a comment below whether you do or don't.

BTW, I am buying fabric from both places...just one is getting a larger order because their price per yard is quite a bit cheaper!

...and here is my latest Dover Jacket so far...

...as always more later!