• The Caramel Apple Dress •

This post could also be entitled "The Dress of Doom" or "An Unhappy Ending."

I know. It sounds dramatic, and for good reason! It all started a few months ago when I got the notion to make a dress out of this little 3 1/2 yard piece of fabric. I have always had a tremendous desire to make Simplicity 1777, and this seemed to be just the time to make it.

I made a mockup long ago, and it just did not look good. After making my gumdrop dress, I got the idea of gathering this bodice rather than pleating it. It ended up looking much better than the pleats.

I started cutting out the bodice and sleeves, and then went to measure another '40s dress to see how much I needed to lengthen this skirt. The dress that I happened to be measuring was Simplicity 1587, which has a skirt yoke. 

You can guess what comes next; I measured the length from the bottom of the yoke seam, rather than the waist seam. What. a. genius. That resulted in a skirt that was absolutely, positively too short! My only comfort was that I remembered there being a little more of this fabric at the store. We went there the following week, and it was still there! There were only about 1 3/4 yards left, however, and when I laid the skirt pieces out, that was not enough to lengthen them sufficiently. I wasn't extremely jubilant at that point, but through some helpful suggestions from my mom, I decided to try laying out the Simplicity 1587 skirt. It fit onto the fabric. I had a notion to make the skirt a little different, so I narrowed it down in order to omit the gathering in the center front. 

I sewed up the dress and tried it on before installing the zipper, and it seemed to look great! But the next time I tried it on after the zipper was in, it looked shockingly bad. The combination of the bodice seam angles and skirt seams made for an absolutely dreadful dress. The skirt hung limply and had no shape whatsoever. I gave up on it at that point. There was no hope for the awful thing, and there was no way I would ever try to remake it!!

 Last week, however, I finally worked up the ambition to try tweaking it so that it would hang properly. I ended up sewing the waist seam differently here and there, which made it palatable in the end. It's still not my favorite dress, at all, but at least it is wearable.

The conclusion which I have come to is that I no longer have an insatiable desire to make Simplicity 1777. At all.

Aside from the doom and gloom, there are some parts of the dress that I do like. The elasticized ruching on the sleeves is quite fun!

My most marvelous ungathered skirt and yoke. I do like the design, but this experience hasn't exactly boosted my confidence to make it again any time soon.

I also really like this hat. My mom finds the most amazing hats ever. 

These buttons are another highly redeeming aspect of this dress. Don't they just look like butterscotch candies? For some reason this fabric just looked "caramel apple-y" to all of us, hence the slightly fall-like name.

I was glad to see that my lovely beaded purse matched this outfit as well. I just love it!

I am glad, at least, that I finished the dress. It's always a good feeling when you complete a UFO!

My current project is a 1930s dress, and I'm so excited! The bonus (on top of the fact that it will be my first really 1930s-style dress) is that it has a keyhole opening, perfect for photographing for my tutorial! That will be up within the next couple of weeks.

• Photography by my mom •

Excerpts From the Past • 1911 Women's Home Companion • Vol II

Hurrah!! I'm finally sharing Vol. II of the much-loved Woman's Home Companion!!

Today we have some lovely needlecraft pages, plus lots of lovely dresses!!

First off is a page showing all sorts of lovely hand-stitches. There is just nothing like embroidery to make something so special!!

Just think, ladies used to embroider even their curtains! How beautiful that would be! 

The suits in this ad are so beautiful! They remind me slightly of Butterick 6093 with those big, detailed lapels. The price seems quite high, however; $55 for a suit in 1911? Wow!

I just had to include this. Apparently what I look like after a failed pincurling would have been immensely stylish in 1911. Hmmm...

Now for the really good stuff!! ;)

There are so many beautiful dresses, it's very hard to pick out a favorite. I really love No. 1774-75. The way the neck closes and drapes is so dainty and pretty!

More beautiful "frocks." 

This page is amazing; it's an actual tutorial for several different dresses! If only there were pattern pieces included.

(Don't you just love the thread-entangled kitty in the corner? I think they used to make thread stronger back then...)

These parasols and fans are so delightful. Such refinement! And the blouses from Bellas Hess & Co. are just beautiful as well!

The very last page in the magazine is this page of jokes called "The Postscript." I started reading and was shocked to see the little sketch at the top about "Veterans of the War of 1961." It is amazing to think how closely they imagined the "little submarine" and "dropping bombs into the city of 'Tokio'." Can you believe how close these little jokes are to what actually happened? I think it's amazing! They were just a little off on the date and the tiny monoplane!

The little sentence on the left is quite cute as well - "A bird in a pot-pie is worth two on a spring bonnet." I'm almost inclined to agree with that! ;)

Which dresses are your favorites?

Tutorial • Making Belts

In view of the fact that I really don't like indoor photo shoots, and the weather outside has been nasty, I decided to post a little tutorial today in lieu of dress photos.

1 2 3 4

5 6 7 8

Back when I posted my Redo Dress, Sarah A. and Irene asked about my method of sewing keyhole openings and making belts. My mom happened to be making a belt the other day, so it was the perfect opportunity to photograph our method. The keyhole tutorial will be up in a week or two!

First of all, you will need to cut 2 strips of fabric, each one being twice the inside width of your belt, plus 3/8". For this belt, the inside width of the buckle was 7/8", so she cut each strip of fabric 2 1/8" wide.

You also need to cut two strips of interfacing; we use a heavyweight type that is actually for home decor. Be sure to choose a thick enough interfacing, otherwise your belt will tend to fold as you wear it. Cut each strip the actual width of the inside of your belt buckle.

You can also use belting instead of interfacing as I did for my pleated 1950s dress. (See * below second picture).

Fuse the interfacing onto the wrong side of your fabric, making sure that the interfacing is centered on the fabric strip, and that you have at least 1/8" on the end to fold over later.

Once you have fused each strip of interfacing, it is time to form the point of your belt! Mark the center of your interfacing on the point end. Then iron over the end of the strip, as in the picture below. Once the end is folded over, fold each side of the strip over into a point, lining up the edges with your center mark. Press.

*If you are using belting, simply cut your piece of belting the desired length, cutting one end into a point or angle, and follow the directions below for folding the fabric around it. You will then remove the belting from the piece you just ironed and repeat the same techniques with the other half. Then sew it together following these same instructions.

Next, fold over and press the fabric edges. The interfacing edge makes it very easy to fold the fabric over evenly!

Repeat with the other side of the belt.

Once you have pressed both sides of each belt strip, you are ready to sew!

Using a hand sewing needle and thread, blind stitch the point end of the belt together so that it stays perfectly aligned.

Now it's time to sew the belt together! I prefer to use my regular presser foot, but my mom likes to use the zipper foot. Try each one out to see which way is easier for you!

Start sewing at the point of the belt, just 1/8" from the edge. Sew to the end of the belt and repeat with the other edge.

Now that your belt is sewn together, it's time to add the finishing touches! If your buckle has a prong, as this one does, sew (or install) eyelets in the appropriate places, and sew the belt to the buckle. You can also add a belt loop as my mom did.

If you have an ordinary slide buckle, you can either permanently sew the belt to the buckle or use our nifty little buckle-sharing method;

The buckle is slid onto the point end of your belt.

A hook is then sewn onto the point end of the belt, with a corresponding eye (or eyes) on the other end of the belt in the desired places;

Since pretty vintage buckles are rather scarce, this method seems quite sensible as it allows you to share buckles between many different dresses.

The end result!

I apologize for being so long-winded, but with tutorials it is hard to be otherwise! If you have any questions, please let me know!

And as if there aren't already enough photos in this post, here's a couple of sneak peeks of my current projects. :)

I'll be back on Friday with Vol. II of Woman's Home Companion!

• Special thanks to my mom for letting me distract her sewing with my photography! ;) •

Stashbusting • 1940s Belted Blouse

Volume II of the Woman's Home Companion will be up next Friday, but today I needed to post my Historical Sew Monthly project! The challenge for this month is stashbusting, but unfortunately, my stash is not very prolific since I haven't been sewing for years on end! While others have bins full of stashed fabric, I seem to sew almost as much as I buy. I suppose that could be looked at as a good thing to the un-knowing soul, but to a seamstress it is rather unfortunate. I have a feeling the stash will grow to a more wholesome size as the months go by, so I can take comfort in that thought! ;)

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we found some vintage patterns at a recent trek to the antique shop. I just loved the style of this blouse, and was so excited to make it! The pattern is a cinch to make, and the style looks great in these fabrics. There's just one problem; it looks terrible on me.

There is a silver lining to this cloud, however, because it happens to look beautiful on my mom! I was a little disappointed about it at first, but I really don't mind. I've never been able to pull of the belted-blouse look, so it wasn't a great shock. And now, my mom has a new blouse! Yay! :)

I have had both of these fabrics for ages; I bought the blue for a dress, originally, but it was back in the days of my sewing ignorance, so it never came into being. 

Instead, I made a regency apron (which also fits my mom better than me....what's up with that?), a housecleaning/nursery apron, and still had enough leftover to make the accents on this blouse. I love the two fabrics together, and the contrast is just perfect on the blouse.

The pattern features a yoke that is topstitched onto the front and back bodice. I am becoming quite a fan of that method of sewing seams. It's rather nifty, in my opinion!

The back bodice has slight gathers at the shoulders on each side, and the front bodice has a dart extending down from the shoulder. It's a very comfortable, well-fitting design (if it's your style).

As for the skirt; it is a variation of McCall 6993, with a waistband instead of the detailed yoke. Unfortunately, it doesn't fit either. I was still learning about making skirts when I made it last year, so I made it with a couple of inches of ease at the waist. Not a very good idea. At all. If I was diligent and industrious, I would remake it. Ahem.

Apparently I should have titled this post "The Outfit That Doesn't Fit Me"! ;) 

The Challenge: Stashbusting

Fabric: Two coordinating cottons, purchased at JoAnn

Pattern: Vintage Hollywood Pattern 926

Year: 1941-5

Notions: Thread, buttons

How historically accurate is it? Perfectly, aside from the serging on seams

Hours to complete: 5-6

First worn: Around the house last week! 

Total cost: $20