Remember the gym dress?

For those of you from the S&S site who have seen my sewing for Olivia, remember this gymdress? I made this for her in Jan. of '08.





Darling Olivia keep growing and her once lovely, well fitting gymdress now looks like this:



It's gotten shorter and she now has holes in the knees. Look how short those pant legs are? It's time for a new gymdress. This gymdress served her very well for her sports classes. She will be in sports again, in the fall, so now I have to think of another gym outfit for her. She's so skinny that nothing stays up on her waist. This dress was perfect for her....so maybe I will just do another one. Oh, and remember her swimdress?





It's a very good thing I made that large tuck on the inside of the bodice. It has now been let out, giving her more room in the trunk, but the legs and skirt are just starting to get short. I am hoping I can use it in the fall, when she goes back into classes. If not, I will need to make a new swimdress for her. My outdoor fabric place shut up shop this year, I will have to keep my eyes open for good swimming fabric, elsewhere.

24 Years And Counting

I had hoped to do this post, earlier in the week, but we lost our wedding album. With all our renovations over the past few years, we keep moving things and losing them. The lost album in now found, so I thought I would share one of my sewing projects with all of you, from 24 years ago.

Long before I knew of sergers, I was finishing my seams with pinking shears and zig zag stitches. This dress was made using that finishing technique. It was really fun to pull out my dress, this week. Merissa was looking for some ideas for a project she was working on, so she dug out the box with my wedding clothes in it. When we unzipped the bag, holding the dress, I could *smell* the smells that reminded me of 24 years ago. :) Looking back over my sewing work has been fun. The dress was constructed very well, BUT the fitting on me, was less than perfect. Now when I see my wedding pictures, I just cringe as I see the one major area that needed attention, oh well. Twenty-four years later, I now know what to do. Too bad I can't go back and fix it up. I just have to humbly remember I did the best I could at the time. We had just finished Bible school and were on a small budget. While I usually enjoy lace and frills, for my dresses, I wanted elegant and simple. No lace, no ruffles, just simple satin that draped oh so beautifully. We had a wonderful day, even though it was very full. I'll save the story for next year, provided the Lord gives us another year.

Here are some pictures of the dress. There is the one in there of my father. I miss him very much. July marks 7 years since his passing, it's so hard to believe that time has marched on so quickly. I hope you enjoy the pictures and can laugh a bit with me, as you see my little fitting issues.

The dress



The Bride and Groom


Back of dress



My Dad


The dress, today, after coming out of the bag and box.




Just for fun, here is the engagement photo that was part of our wedding invitation, the napkin and the program.

I hope you have fun looking.

Just a note. If you click on the photos, you will see the full picture. I haven't figured out all the photo details for blogger. :)

A give away offer

Over at Tomato Soup Cake, Diane is having a lovely give away. Vintage sewing goodies, how delightful! Go check it out and put your name in for the draw.

See the lovely pattern she is putting in there? What a fun pattern. Enjoy!

WIFD Day 7

I know it's past day 7, but we did manage to take some pictures. We had lots of garden work to get done, so I am hear wearing one of my tiered skirts, made from embroidered, cotton/linen fabric. I have a tank with a sweater over top, and I have my well worn out apron, from the Daisy Kingdom pattern. Sorry for the picture, I know it's not very good. Olivia is wearing one of the circle skirts that Merissa made for her, last year.

We did manage to plant our fruit trees and fruit bushes, which was very nice.

I have included a picture of our Sunday outfit, too, just so you can see Olivia's new wrap dress that somewhat matches mummy's. Her dress is made from the same fabrics as mine.

More about Olivia's dress to come in the furture.

WIFD Day 6 It's A Wrap Take 2

Picnic, anyone? Another sunny day expected for today. To coordinate in my wardrobe, I made another wrap dress using the same pattern as, yesterday, only this time I made it from a cotton gingham, the same gingham I used to trim the other dress. With this dress, I trimmed it using the cotton sateen from the previous dress. Blue, red and white are colours I have been adding to my wardrobe for the past year, along with my staple browns, greens and other earth tones. With my red hair turning more gray all the time, I find I am able to wear colours I never thought I could. It's been fun playing with my colours.

I have really been enjoying seeing the WIFD posts this time around. Lots of lovely outfits and all the hair pictures have been very inspiring. It's hard to believe the week is nearly finished.

After the week is up, I will post some pictures of the dresses on the dress form, for those wanting a closer look at details.

WIFD Day 5 It's a Wrap

Sunshine!!! We finally have some lovely sunshine, and I am grateful! For today, I am wearing one of my new wrap dresses. Like many women out there who enjoy sewing, I have a fascination for wrap clothing, but in particular, wrap dresses. I have quite the collection of vintage patterns, for wrap dresses, that continues to grow. I seem to find a new treasure, all the time. One of those special wrap dresses that I didn't even know existed. It was about a year ago, perhaps a little more than a year ago, I came across a new treasure. It is from 1954, Simplicity 4682, and it's not a tiny size, so I didn't have to scale the pattern up, YIPPEE!!!

I did have to make a few adjustments, but not too bad. I did have to modify the bustpoint, to drop it, but only a little bit. With that, I made the front bodice into a princess seam, rather than the two darts they have. The princess seam gives me a much better fit. With the shoulder straps, I reversed the way they have them. I put the bodice top portion, over the back, rather than the other way around. I like the look much better. For the bodice skirt back, I used buttonhole elastic to keep a smooth closure for underneath the front of the dress. For the ties, I made narrower ties, as I don't like the really big puffy ties. I was able to squeeze the pattern onto the fabric, so I left off the front and back seam, which always makes me happy.

The fabric that I used for this dress is a brand new, lovely, lovely cotton sateen sheet. It truly feels like butter, it's so soft. I was looking for a fitted sheet for our bed, when I saw this lovely sale of sheets that was going on at Home Outfitters. I think they were clearing out this brand, so they had all these sheets on for 60% off. So with one, twin sized sheet, costing just over $5.00 in Canadian funds, I put together this wrap dress. I had the cotton gingham in my collection, but I figured with the amount of gingham I used, it cost me about $4.00 or just under. So the dress, altogether, was under $10.00. :) I went back to the store and purchased several more sheets. One twin sheet gives me about 2.6 meters, once the fabric has been washed and it's 1.75 meters wide, EXCELLENT for the projects that need more width. I have never seen this lovely of cotton sateen before, so this was a treat for me.

I will attempt to take more pictures of the dress, on the dress form, later tonight. That way, you can see more of the details. For now, I am just enjoying wearing this fun dress. I have plans to make a linen slip that will go with this dress, and a few other 50's styles that I am planning.

Now, off to enjoy that sunshine.......

WIFD Day 4

Unfortunately, today was another cold day. With that in mind, I dressed for warmth, again! I put on my microfiber tights, faux suede skirt that I made years ago, along with a cotton tank and cotton sweater by Christopher Banks. It's really hard to see in these pictures, but those black things that look like x's, are golf clubs along with tees and golf balls. For my hair, I parted it down the back and then twisted the pieces, separately, then I combine them together for another bit of twisting. Then I used one of those 'bird beak' clips to hold it all in place. I like this design as it's a bit different and it only takes a minute or so to put it up.

We were suppose to go outside to play hockey, but it was canceled, due to weather, much to my delight. We had snow and rain, on and off all day. I disliked the idea of standing outside in the cold, knowing I could be home, in a warm house, sewing on my projects. I was able to finish off one of my dresses, so hopefully, if the weather is good, tomorrow, I will share my fun, new project.