What a Tweet!

This weekend, I took the Husbeast on a little adventure for our anniversary. I combined his love of boats, Toronto, craft beer, and me, and took him on the Indie Boat Hop Craft Beer cruise. We cruised around the Toronto harbour, sampling "beers only available at sea". There wasn't a bad brew on offer. It's such a shame we won't be able to get these one-off beers again.

When planning this little adventure, it occurred to me that I should have a new dress for the occasion. It was for our anniversary after all! So I dove into my stash, and made myself a cute little birdie dress.

This is yet another version of New Look 6557. This pattern is so well used by me (I've made it at least 6 times now) that the tissue is starting to get destroyed! I'll have to do something to preserve the pattern ASAP.

I find I've been wearing way too many circle skirts for the last little while, so it is super nice to wear something that's just a simple flared skirt. Also, let's be honest, it's much less likely that a Marilyn moment will happen on board the ship should a gust of wind blow up off the lake.

Two dresses made by me were on board!

Nothing major to report about the construction. Because I've made it so many times, I could cut and sew this in my sleep. It's super fast and easy. The only thing I changed is I added a lining to the skirt so it won't cling when I wear tights.
We have another cruise coming up in a couple weeks, Tease on the Seas, a burlesque boat cruise with a dress code theme of Naughty Nautical. I'll have to come up with something cute for that soon!

No Pants Summer Has Officialy Begun!

And I nearly forgot about it! Thankfully, Haizle gave me a reminder the day before we started. Otherwise, it would have been pants for a day spent at the park. Instead, I fished this dress out of my closet, gave it a quick hem, and voila! An old dress was given new life :D

I made this dress a few years ago, and always felt it was too long, so it just languished in my closet. I feel like it will end up coming out to play a lot more often now.

I've been busy busy all of May, with 6 day weeks, so I haven't had as much time to make things as I'd like, but I did manage to bang out 3 dresses. I finished 2 more for my etsy shop:

I'm obscenely in love with that crab fabric

And a dress for me!

I used Simplicity 2886 for this dress. This is the third time I've used this pattern, and I gotta say, every time I make this dress, I like it less and less. I changed the neckline to give it a proper scoop, as the pattern is actually a weird almost-scoop-but-almost-v-neckline. It does a weird gape-y thing at the armholes, which would have been a simple fix had I remembered that it does that. Oh well.

I also added a little more flare to the skirt. There's actually nothing wrong with the skirt as it was, I just like really flowy skirts.

All in all, the dress is okay. It's wearable and has pockets, but I'm wishing I had saved this fabric for something else. I had been waiting for the perfect project to use it for, and this just wasn't it. C'est la vie.

maybe I should try to hunt more of this down

Is anyone else out there playing along for NO PANTS SUMMER?

Hooray for free time!

Hello everyone!

I'm on the tail end of a two week break from school, and I've gotta say, as stressed out as I was by the end of the semester, I sure do miss it! BUT, these two weeks have allowed me to be very productive! I have made two dresses, got started on a few knitting projects, and opened up a new etsy shop. That's right! I'm selling dresses now!

So far, there are only three dresses in the shop, but I have three more cut out to be sewn up, as well as a dress for me (selfish sewing rocks).

The two dresses I made over the break (so far anyway) are these pretties:

They're simple sundresses of my own design, that are very much a style that I like to wear myself. In fact, I'll be making myself a couple of these very soon :)

I have a few more ideas that I'm working on right now, so stay tuned for something new within the next few weeks :D

Because I'm a glutton for punishment, I have signed up for a couple of classes over the summer (well, they are only in May and June, so I'll still get a bit of a break before the next semester starts), so I'll have a little less free time as of next week. But that's fine by me, as there will still be time to sew! Which is good, as I have four weddings to attend this year, and I need to get started on dresses to wear!

The first wedding is a more laid back backyard party, but I still want to have something pretty to wear. I've narrowed down my choices to five different fabrics from my stash, but I need your help deciding which one to use. So please, dear readers, help me choose which fabric to use. The pieces I've picked  out are:

Red and Black Poppy type fabric

Roses fabric (pardon the blurriness of the pic)

Skulls and Roses fabric

Black, White, and Blue Hibiscus fabric

Lobster fabric (just for fun)

Please let me know what you think in the poll below. 

I can't wait to see what you choose!

Red, Polka Dots, and Panels

So, this dress was supposed to be finished back in September to wear for Mr. Social's birthday. And, yeah, that didn't happen. But I did get to wear it today!

I've made McCall's M6741 again, this time without pockets, or adding a collar of my own. I kinda love this pattern, and expect I'll end up making it a few more times, as it's a super simple dress that can work in any fabric and for any occasion. The cut is flattering for a number of body types, and the skirt has a perfect amount of flare.

The one thing I will do the next time I make this dress is make it a wee bit longer. I made it the length of View A without the bottom panel, and it's.....really short. I'm a short person and didn't expect it would be that short, but hey, live and learn. It's not so short that I can't wear it, but just short enough that I will never be able to bend over in public while wearing it :P

Until soon! xoxoxo

Elvis and The Polka Dots

Sometimes it seems that I never a chance to get pictures of some of my finished garments, and these 2 dresses are a great example of that. I made these both way back in May and wear the shit out of them, yet I keep forgetting to get proper pics. So apologies for the crappy "quick I need a picture of my dress" pics....but I guess a crappy picture is better than no picture, right?

Anyhoo, the first dress is my Elvis dress, and I love it to bits. I've been hoarding this spectacular Elvis print cotton for a couple years now just waiting for the right dress to come along.

Little did I know, I had the pattern staring me in the face right at home! I've had New Look 6557 forever and ever, and randomly pulled it out of hiding and had a eureka moment. Thus my Elvis dress was born!

When cutting the fabric, I wasn't really paying attention, so I didn't even think to line up the print, but I accidentally almost did at the waist seam anyway. Sweet!

I was so happy with this dress that I decided to make a second one. I used a lovely stretch cotton polka dot fabric for the second version. I also added a little more coverage to the neckline (just a wee little bit as my bra poked out in the Elvis version) and a little more flare to the skirt and ended up with this lovely creation:

Again, in hindsight, I should have made some effort to line up the print at the waist seam, but other than that, I'm super happy with both dresses, which is evidenced by how often I wear them. Love, love, love this pattern! I'll probably end up with a few more of these in my closet :) And hopefully, I will also end up getting some proper pictures of them to show off more detail than random quick shots while waiting in the monorail station in Vegas (just as an example).

xoxoxo