Well I just "finished" one of those projects. I don't normally name my dresses but this dress seems to beg for a name. All I can think of is "the failure dress". That doesn't seem very original though.
It might not look terrible in this picture but just wait.
Let me begin by telling you how this dress fought me in every step of it's creation.
I started out by drafting my own pattern. This normally goes quite well for me. I've got the process down pretty well so I don't think that is where I messed up here. I wanted to create an enclosed, lined bodice with sleeves and I think that is where the trouble started. I've never done this before and I winged it rather than researching it. First I started by adding a straight stitch to the sleeves so I could gather them and set them in. Then I realized I did this on the wrong side of the sleeve. My gathering stitch was on the hem instead of the shoulder. So I just went with it. I figured "that sucks but no big deal. Now they just look like flutter sleeves.". So onward I pressed. I sewed the neck pieces and the sleeves into the arms and left the two back parts open since I was planning to add a zipper. This would have worked fine except that when I went to flip it I realized I had one sleeve pattern up and one sleeve pattern down. I was annoyed and often at this point I would start a new project and stuff this in a bag or a box somewhere too patronize me the next time I stumbled across the failed garment. This time however for some reason I pressed through and unpicked the seam. This was no easy feat as the dress was the exact same color white as the dress and I think the exact same composition and the fabric is very soft.
Ugg, can you see where this is going?
Ok so, I get all of that unpicked and get it restitched. Then I stitch my skirt to my bodice. Let me tell you if you do it this way then stitch it to the INSIDE piece not the outside bodice first. I made that mistake. So then when I went back to stitch the back to it closed I was top stitching from the inside of the dress. BIG MISTAKE! I realized it was a problem as soon as I realized I would have to stitch from the inside. However I thought maybe I could just be careful and it would be ok. Somehow I managed to get all sorts of horrible bubbles and lumps and puckers and clumps sewn all out of wack. It was worse then I could ever have imagined. I would have had to unpick it regardless of if it was inside or outside but if it were inside then my picks wouldn't have shown up front and center on the dress. There was so over hang between the outside bodice and the lining because of the clumping so I trimmed this off.
I was mad at this point and I'd already invested so much of my time with the whole sleeve thing that I wanted to just finish it. I couldn't leave it now!
So I picked and restitched. Somehow my stitches ended up short. I'm not sure if that is the right term or not but essentially all of the stitches pulled the fabric up together in spots. There was nothing I could do to fix this despite how I tried. So I just stitched over it and figured I could put a cute little bow over it in that spot and no one would ever know.
So onward I pressed......
The bottom ruffle was just annoying because this fabric frays like crazy! Trying to ruffle just shredded this stuff. So when I got done with my not so even ruffle I surged it. Still thinking that this dress might be wearable when I got done........
At this point all that was left to do was add the zipper. So I tried something new. I hate sewing the sides together and then sewing the zipper in and then picking all those stitches. I'd had my fill of picking on this dress already. So I thought maybe I could get away with stitching about an inch over where the zipper would be and then the rest of the way down where I would need an actual seam. This might have worked if executed better but I managed to flip my fabric around oddly and stitch it in like an invisible zipper on one side and made it look top stitched on the other. This wasn't to big a deal. I just top stitched the other side. The real problem here is that somehow the waist where the back bodice meets the skirt is nearly an inch higher on one side then it is on the other. I have no idea how this happened. Maybe where I trimmed the over hang due to the clumping issue? I dunno.
Blah!
Ok so if you made it this far then please share with me any insight you have or any project failure vents you might have of your own.
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