I used a blue fabric that felt a lot like a men's dress shirt. It has a very small white vertical stripe in it. I think it looks like the perfect Easter/Navy send off dress.
The dress was easy to make. I did make a small alteration by adding sleeves. I wanted them to have some ruffles on them like the waist and shoulders of the dress.- I cut out a long strip of fabric, sewed in some long basting stitches on the top and bottom of the strip, then sewed the ends together.
- I matched the seem in the sleeve with the side seem of the dress and sewed the bottom half of the sleeve to the arm hole in the dress.
- I pulled my basting stitches to ruffle the top of the sleeve to fit into the dress and pinned it in place, and finished sewing the arm hole.
- Then I measured my arm to see how large the bottom of the sleeve needed to be. I pulled the basting stitch and arranged the ruffles until it was the right size and the ruffles looked even.
- I cut a long skinny strip of fabric to finish off the bottom of the sleeve. Cut it and fold it to be the size of a bias strip. (If you want to follow the lines in the fabric that will be okay, it does not actually need to be on the bias.) Make it the length of the bottom of the sleeve plus a seem allowance. Sew the ends together, then use it to finish off the sleeve like you would normally sew in a bias strip.
I liked it A LOT, but I think I made the opening of the sleeve a little too big and I might try to go back and shrink that up a bit. Especially because it the rest of the dress is a little snug on my now, so when the the dress fits me better, the sleeves will look supper big.
If I ever feel like I need another formal, I might try to make my own and use this pattern if I can find a good way to make a formal sleeve to match the rest of the pattern.
Um, wow. I can only hope to be as good at sewing as you one day!
ReplyDelete