Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Let it Sew! Part 1: My adventure in making an ice princess dress

Growing up with a Mom who can sew was awesome. For Halloween I've been a purple unicorn, Princess Leia, at least three Renaissance princesses, and my brothers have been vampires and ninja turtles with real shells made out of felt. I've noticed, with the advent of pop-up Halloween Spirit stores, that homemade costumes are now a thing of the past. People just don't have the time and the skills anymore. So I am keeping the tradition alive, I guess!
This is where this journey began - with McCall's pattern 7000. A very special little girl in my life LOVES Frozen and loves Elsa. She's also going to be turning 5 in December and having a princess themed party, so having a great costume was important for her. And I thought: hey I can totally do this. My mom taught me some mad skills! So what if I've never put in a zipper before! 




This was a big job, and I wanted to get it right. So I opted to make a "test dress," at least for doing some of the more complicated parts like the overlay and yoke. I made the sheer part out of some old curtains and the bodice out of the lining of a bridesmaid's dress. Success: I got my mistakes out of the way!


 I found some material that was PERFECT. Sturdy and slightly sparkly fabric for the top, flowy fabric for the skirt.


 My mom found some star-y sheer fabric for the yoke, sleeves, and overlay. Unfortunately it was super glittery, and got glitter EVERYWHERE! Here is the skirt and bodice sewn together. You can't see it, but I've already (successfully) attached the zipper.




 Here it is with yoke and overlay. Glitter is everywhere. I've tried to contain it to the bedroom, which is where I have my sewing area.



I made the dress too big, so I cut off a good 4 inches. It was also a bit too wide, so my mom had a the great idea of making a sash coming out of the side seams of the dress. So that's what I did - I hemmed up the edges of the 4 inches, cut it in half, carefully opened the side seams and resewed with the ties. It works perfectly, and you can't really tell.



Here is the finished dress!! I will post pictures of what it looks like on her when her Halloween parade happens, which is on Friday. I can't wait!

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