The Nelson Dress

While we were in Seattle for Thanksgiving, Mrs. Nelson contacted me and told me she wanted me to make her daughter a dress for Christmas. She sent me several photos of a dress she said that her daughter liked. I wasn't too sure (really didn't like the style, and the fabric was very modern). She really wanted, what she said was, "Like Anne of Greene Gables, pioneer, or Civil War." I got the general sense of what she wanted and ended up going with something more Colonial.
I asked for several measurements; waist, back of her neck to the floor, and from her shoulder to her elbow. I wouldn't normally do those things, but she is really tall, and Mom remembered that she had long arms. I had to lengthen the sleeves and skirt quite a bit.
Picking out the fabric was really fun; I first looked for the fabric in the picture she sent me, but I was quite happy when we couldn't find it. So we went with green and pink floral, with a complimenting dark green underskirt.

Mrs. Nelson really wanted me to make it a little big; however, I ran out of fabric for the underskirt. It turned out okay, but it's the perfect length, and she expressed that some day she may want me to lengthen it a little with a ruffle or something.
While doing this dress, I was really methodical with my methods, and it went really quickly without any problems. Finishing the seams with a zig-zag stitch did take a while, but I did it as I went instead of waiting until the end which helped.
Figuring out the drapes took me a minute, because the fabric wasn't wide enough. I had to make then just a tiny bit narrower.
One thing I learned is that broadcloth washes horribly! It wrinkled like no tomorrow, and they wouldn't come out unless with starch. So to all my sewing friends: keep a bottle of starch on hand!
I was really pleased with the outcome, and I was super excited about having someone come to me and ask me to make something for them. It's fun getting paid for something you love!

 I'm so glad it fits her well!

Regency Ball Dress

Finally! My last big sewing project is finished; I will never ever do so many large projects with close deadlines again. I miss my horses. I haven't ridden in two weeks.
Wow. I have planned this dress ever since March. I originally wanted to make a repro of Kiera Knightley's ball dress from Pride and Prejudice; however, as the time came near for me to actually buy the fabric, ideas started pouring from my brain.

This was the dress that I wanted to make:

The first problem I had to overcome was that no one sells a v-neck Regency dress pattern. So, after sharing thoughts with Lizzy, she gave me the brilliant idea to pin my fabric the way I wanted it (taking two pieces of fabric and crossing them the way I would want them to cross), then laying out the pattern piece across it and cutting it out on a sheet. Then you have two mockup pieces.
One thing I don't care for about the dress above is it is not really Regency at all. The waistline is far too low; it should have stopped more up high. 
An idea that I totally loved a long time ago was to put several rows of pleats down the front neckline. So what I did was I took an old sheet and pinned  5 rows of pleats in. Then, in front of a mirror, I draped the fabric in a rough imitation of how I wanted them to cross in the front, then pinned the two pieces together. Keep in mind, it hadn't been cut with the pattern yet. I laid out the pattern piece over it and then cut it out.

I used the pattern on the left

 I basted the pieces together and then tried it on.
I am rather familiar with the pattern and was aware that I would need to lengthen the bodice considerably; I have already made 2 other dress and the same problem came up. So I added 2 inches to the front and back. I also wanted the shoulder seams to come up higher, so I added some more in that area as well.
So then I went to the fabric store (one of the best parts!) and bought the fabric. I had an idea to use really light tan sheer over cream muslin; however, the costume sheer was on sale for $1.50 a yard and the only color that came close was gold. I considered gray, but again, in the costume sheer color was more of a silver.
I ended up buying cream costume sheer and cream muslin. I was really excited about the muslin; it was $10 dollars a yard. That may sound like a lot, but it was high quality and wouldn't need a lining and it was 90'' wide! So I only needed 2 1/2 yards. Altogether, I didn't spend that much money.
I really do not care for the skirt in the pattern, because it is very very straight and does not flow. I really wanted a flowy dress. I already have a dress that I could have worn to the ball; it is plain black with a empire waistline and a nice flowy skirt. So I laid out my fabric and folded the dress's front skirt piece and lined it up with the fold. Making a line with pins, I pinned all the way around the outline of the black skirt and adding seam allowances all the way around. Removing the dress, I cut it out the fabric and thankfully held it up to me before continuing.
I am so thankful I did so, because I realized that I had cut the skirt too narrow at the top to line up at the very side; it came more in front and wasn't wide enough. So I cut the skirt back with an extra several inches so that the side seams were more in front. Miraculously, by the time I was done, it somehow ended up exactly on the side. Don't know how I managed that....
For the bodice, I ripped my sheet mockup apart and used them as pattern pieces, adding where I already mentioned. After basting all the sheer pieces together, I realized that the pleats on the front neckline were terribly annoying to work with. After ironing them like 3 times and it still wouldn't stay (it made good creases!) I finally took a needle and, using threads pulled out of the sheer fabric, tacked down the pleats every so often. It took forever to pull all the sheer threads out, and by the time I was done I realized, too late, that it didn't hold the pleats down when I put it on and unattractive pock marks showed. Uggh. So I ripped the tiny stitches out.
I was now baffled as to how to keep those pleats down. So I ran to Lizzy for help and she gave me several good suggestions, most requiring to re-cut new pieces of fabric. I had plenty of fabric left, but I really did not want to start over. However, she did give me another suggestion as to how to sew the pleats down.
This new method was taking a needle and thread and pushing the needle out the pleat, and then down into the fabric. This took a while too, and I wasn't super pleased with the outcome, but I was stuck and ready to move on.
Gathering the bodice front, I decided I wanted a waistband. Sewing the bodice to the waistband was tricky; I don't know why, but it took forever to line up.
By the time it was all sewn together, I discovered I had made a mistake somehow in that the back pieces did not overlap, but barely touched. Mom had the brilliant idea to sew a placket to the back. Making the placket was easy, but because the back was rather crooked, I had to try it on several times to make sure it was tight enough in certain spots, but still crossing in the back.
I was pleased to discover that the weight of the skirt helped pull the pleats down, keeping them straight and helping to hide the tacking stitches.
The sleeves were a bit funny, because I didn't want puffed sleeves or cap sleeves, like in the pictures above. I really like the idea of making a circle sleeve, where you cut out a half circle and sew the straight side to the armhole. Since I didn't have a pattern, I measured all the way around the armhole and the free-handed a circle with that circumference. To make an underarm seam, I added a little curve and cut it straight on the edge of the round edge. Because I only used sheer for the sleeves, I had to hem the edge of the sleeve and make sure the edges underneath and the armhole seams were very clean cut and straight because you could see right through.
Poor Mom; she had to pin the hem up several times before getting it straight because the sheer was so slippery.
It's cool, because the buttons on the back were given to me from my Grandma, and she got them from her Grandma. It didn't take any time at all to get them and the buttonholes sewn on.
I think I am in love with large hook and eyes. My new favorite tool! Every dress needs one.
Note to self: small hook and eyes are worthless.

 These are the only pictures that I have of my dress; I wish I had more.

Camille's Reenactment Dress

I finally finished Camille's dress!!! I am so excited about how it turned out, because I didn't use a pattern. I wanted to make her dress sort of like mine, but as soon as I saw this style, I totally decided to do that instead.

Lizzie again helped me to draft the mock up. She took the pattern to the dress, and made it fit Camille, then chopped off the entire bottom piece so that was left was the top bit to make the yoke.
The bottom part of the bodice was a bit trickier for Lizzie, because she had to make it up. But she was able to pretty much just take a big rectangle and cut out a little bit at the side for more arm room.

 I did the skirt first. It went pretty much just like my dress, but faster, because I did 3 panels instead of 4. I was a little worried that gauging wouldn't turn out very good because there wasn't as much fabric to smoosh up, but it went better than I thought. Somehow, though, the gauging is uneven in the back. I don't know how that happened, but on one side in the back there is a bunch of gauging, and on the other side there isn't really any. Hmmm....
Here is a picture of the skirt before it was gauged:

 Lizzie gave me very clear instructions on the top, which really helped keep me on track. The only part that was really tricky was the waistband. I didn't do a waistband on my dress, so that sort of made it trickier. I had to sew the bodice to the waistband, then sew the skirt to a ribbon, then sew the ribbon to the waistband.

The hardest and most unsure part was cutting the bottom part of the bodice off. Lizzie cut it very generously and told me to cut the bottom bit off. But I didn't know where. So I had Camille try the bodice on, then pinned the waistband over it snugly so it looked like it was gathered. That made it sit just at the right place. Then I took pins and made a line all around the bottom of the bodice, just along where the top of the waistband was. When I took it off, I gathered along that line and then cut off quite a lot off the bottom edge.
What I like about how I did that is it is very straight. Most patterns, just in the spot where there are gathers, go down just a bit, so that it looks straight when you are finished. But making up a pattern, there are usually straight lines, so it sometimes goes up where there are gathers. By doing it this way, I was able to get a pretty straight line.

 The sleeves I shortened from the original pattern and also made it less full, because you want the fullness of the sleeves to match the skirt. 

 For the buttons, I was able to use some really pretty mother-of-pearl ones that belonged to our Great Great Grandmother. Which is pretty neat.

Reenactment Dress

My Civil War dress is finally finished! AAHHHHHH! So excited! Didn't really want to take it off when I was finished, so I went for a walk in the neighborhood and got several funny looks.

 A good picture of the piping on the waistband

 Piping on the sleeves

I am going to go extensively into the making of this thing, so if you get bored, please feel free to leave. 

The first thing that I did was make the skirt. I really wanted my friend Lizzie's help on the top, because it needs to fit really well. So I made the skirt, sewing all the panels together and then gathering the top and sewing it to a grosgrain ribbon as a waistband. I had to hand sew the skirt to the waistband, which took quite a lot of time. 

The first thing Lizzie said when she came in was, "What did you do to the skirt?" Uh oh. "I just gathered it to the waistband." Come to find out, women in the Civil War did not  gather their skirts, but rather gauged them. So off the waistband went, the gathering stitches were thrown out, and I had to start over. Brilliant.
 But gauging was fun, even though it took a really long time. I had to do the stitching over several times, because I didn't know how whether to use one thread and gather as I go, or do different threads for each panel. I ended up redoing the first two panels at least 3 times, finally going with 2 threads for each panel. That worked, but now I have a ton of threads hanging out my skirt and would probably go with 2 threads all the way around next time.

Lizzie showed me how to do a blind stitch, so I blind stitched the hem. When you read that I had to hand stitch the hem, it may sound like it took forever, but it goes quick when you listen to a story!

The bodice was the hard part. Lizzie had to come over multiple times to help me get it to fit. We used the Butterick pattern 5831; the pattern makes it a little slouchy in the front and back when you really want it to lay smooth. So Lizzie made a mock up and did a ton to that pattern! She cut the armholes a little bigger in front so I have room to move, and then did a lot of other slashing that I probably don't even know about.

One problem we ran into was that she did quite a bit of the fitting on Lucille, my dress form, and come to find out, Lucille is not quite the same size as me because her back split a little, so she was a little bigger in some areas and a little smaller in others. It wasn't too big a deal, but it did take a little more time because Lizzie had to start putting it on me to make sure it fit.

Lizzie gathered the front just a bit and then sewed it to a ribbon waistband. She then discovered that the gathers weren't even and had to rip out one side and bring the gathers more forward.

She also suggested making the back smooth by bringing in the side seams, and then not putting any gathers in the back at all. The gathers make it puff out too much, but now it fits perfectly in the back.

The sleeves I did myself, and the only thing I would change about them next time would be to make them a bit shorter. They are not too long, because of the cuffs, but they do hang down a bit past the cuff if I put my arms straight down. Because of the piping, I hand sewed the first sleeve to the armhole while watching Gone With the Wind. Keep in mind that sewing entertainment is about all that that movie is good for. I apparently wasn't paying attention, because as soon as I finished, I realized that I had sewed the underarm seam of the sleeve to the side seam. Palm. To. The. Forehead. I was supposed to sew the underarm sleeve a few more inches forward, allowing for more give when I stretch my arm forward. Ugghh. So out the stitches came. I re-hand stitched it back on the right way, then decided that hand sewing it wasn't worth it for the other sleeve. I still feel like the second sleeve wasn't sewn on as well as the first. Next time, I would also make sure I center the top gathers more by my shoulder, because I made then line up with the very top of the sleeve. But when the sleeve rotated, it made all the gathers in the back.

For this project, I needed to make piping, which I had never done at all. Making it was easy; you just sew strips of fabric cut from the diagonal of the grain and then sew a cord inside. That was the easy part, but attaching it is a pain because you have to get right up next to it. For that reason, I hand stitched that one sleeve and also the bodice and skirt together because when hand sewing, you can be sure to get right up next to the cord on the inside of the fabric. The neckline and other sleeve have piping as well, but sewing it with the sewing machine is not easy, and I had to redo some parts to nudge it right up to the cord.

Sewing the skirt to the bodice wasn't too easy. The grosgrain ribbon we used was just to keep all the gauging and gathers neat, and I needed to sew the piping on as well. My machine isn't great with sewing thick stuff, so I hand sewed that part as well. The grosgrain ribbon doesn't show on the outside.

Lizzie sewed a placket to the front for the buttons, explaining that it helps reinforce the front. She did most of that part, so I don't really know how to explain what she did. I sewed all the buttonholes (not by hand!) and the buttons onto the placket, then sewed a really big hook and eye onto the inside of the waistband. Lizzie was right; I now love those big hook and eyes! It is really sturdy, and helps the bottom button from too much strain.

I actually did have to hand sew the very bottom buttonhole, because my poor machine was getting stuck on all the layers from the waistband. The hole doesn't look very good, but it doesn't show on the outside. I also had to make a buttonhole with the zigzag stitch for one of the sleeve buttonholes, because the machine was not doing well and I was getting impatient. It too doesn't look very good, but not noticeable as well.

I learned from the Sewing Sisters something I didn't know before that I was able to apply to my dress: buttonholes weren't sewn vertically until clothing was made by machines. Vertical buttonholes are almost useless because buttonholes are supposed to be horizontally, to take all the stress on the side. But machines can do vertical buttonholes; they can go from one hole to the next without needing someone to move the clothing.

Gauging Tutorial

Lizzie also taught me how to do gauging. What is gauging? It sounds really weird, but it really is a reenactor's term for cartridge pleating; gauging is what it was called in the Civil War. I like to call it gauging, because it makes me sounds like I know what I am doing and because no one really has any idea of what I'm talking about.
I once heard that gauging is just very organized gathering, which makes sense to me. Skirts were gauged instead of gathered, because it was much less bulky and looked very neat. Personally, I think it is also one of the faster things to hand sew, but sewing gathers takes longer.
To gauge, you will first need to take your skirt and press down about 2 inches; now is a good time to even your skirt out. Hems were done first, then evened out and controlled at the top. What I did for my sister's reenactment dress was blind stitch the hem, then did relatively about 2 inches; I measured from the hem and made it a little more in some areas.

The next part is a little time consuming; best to turn on an audio or a movie! Taking a ruler and pen (pencil if your fabric is thin), mark out every half inch along just the very top edge. All the way around. This takes quite a lot of time. Then mark out every half inch about a quarter inch down from your first set. This takes just as much time.
Some tutorials don't have this, and they just say to do very even stitches, but by doing it this way, it is very precise. Some tutorials also say to do 3 rows of stitches; this makes it look more like pleats that gathers, but I prefer the more gathered look.

Take a needle and thread (no machines; that's cheating!) and sew along the first dotted line using a double thread, going in and out at the dots.  For your skirt, measure your waist and add about, oh, maybe 10 inches, and just push gathers into the skirt as you go. I made the mistake of doing different threads for each panel in my skirt (4 panels), and now I have a lot of threads hanging off that I don't really need. You will spare yourself if you make it all on one thread. Do the same for the second set, but make sure that if you went out for the first stitch on the first row, you do the same for the other first stitch, so that the stitches are synchronized. Like this:

 If you have multiple panels on your skirt, then take your waist band (I just used a grosgrain ribbon on my dress and in this example), and mark out where you want the panels to line up with the ribbon. For instance, I wanted the back seam on one panel to match up with the center back on the top, so I found the middle of the ribbon to match that up to. I did the same with the other panels, so that one seam would line up with the back, two at the sides, and the front would line up with the ends of the ribbon, because it has an opening at the front.
Pull both threads to gather and match them to the areas marked on your waistband. Pin it together, right sides together.

Tie off the thread once you match up the ribbon to the skirt.
Take a needle and a closely matched thread, and with a double thread, pick up just the inside fold of the first pleat and through the ribbon, just the very edge. Like this:

Keep stitching, picking up just the close edge of the fabric and the very edge of the ribbon until you reach the end. Because my skirt closes in the front and because I made an error in the cutting, I didn't have pleats up to the very end of my ribbon, so I just whip stitched it together. Here is what it should look like when it is finished:

It sort of looks funny on the wrong side with the other unsewn edges hanging off, but that is the key to the entire thing. When worn, because it is only sewn on the very edge, it keeps the bulk of the pleats off your waist. If it had been sewn flat, like a gather, then it would be smooshed against you; very uncomfortable! But by only catching the very side, it causes it to hinge out, away from you. When worn with a hoop, it looks not quite so stiff. The fold that you did at the beginning also helps the gauging to keep it's shape.
One last thing: keep the stitches in! If they are sufficiently squished together, you should not be able to see them very well. If the bottom thread is still visible, pull it a little tighter. 

Blind Stitch Hem Tutorial

As I've been working on my reenactment dress, I've been learning some cool techniques from Lizzie; my favorite one is the blind stitch, which I used to hem my dress.
To do a blind stitch, first make sure your hem is pretty even on the bottom and doesn't curve. I'm not sure how this stitch would work with a curved hem.
Press down 1/4 inch on the bottom edge, evening out any 'lumpy' edges, making it more or less where needed to make it even.

Then press it up to the length that you want it; my hem is quite large, to become like a hem guard, which you can trim off and wash when the dress becomes dirty.

Using one strand of matching thread, lift up the large hem and stick the needle in up through the 1/4 inch fold so that the knot is hidden. Pull the thread all the way through.

The next part is the secret to the whole stitch: take your needle and pick up literally one or two threads from the fabric, barely securing the fold to the fabric. Pull the thread through all the way.

I know the picture isn't very good, but you can picture it, right? Next, push the needle back into the fabric right next to where you first came up, and slide the needle about a needle's length through the 1/4 inch fold and poke up a needle's length away.

Picking up only one thread may seem like it won't be very strong, but unless the hem is too long and you trip on it, the hem doesn't get pulled on very much. Once you poke up a needle's length way, begin again by picking up one or two threads.
Even though I used contrasting thread, it is still practically invisible; you may not know what you are looking at, but that is the hem on both sides!

Makenna's Birthday Present

Our friend, Makenna, absolutely loves playing dress up and stuff like that. The colonial dress I made for Camille is her favorite, and she hates taking it off when it's time for her to go!
So we looked into how much it would cost to make a costume; it only takes about 4 1/2 yards for a dress. We decided that it would be worth the money for a present like this!
The dress went very smoothly, and it fits her great! It may be a bit large, (Note, it doesn't really fit Lucille, and shown in the pictures below; I had to stretch it a little to get in on, but not stretch it too much for permanent damage), but nothing unfixable.
One thing I want to take note of is that I did not do the yoke lining as in the instructions. I had a terrible time with it and just ripped it off and hemmed the neck edge. It turned out fine, and in my opinion, it's better, because the lining always folds up on the right side, where it is visible and quite ugly.

Civil War Dress

For the next reenactment, I really wanted to have my own dress. In the last reenactment, I was told that the dress that I'd made was not historically accurate. So for my birthday, Mom and Dad offered to pay for the making of my costume.
The first thing I learned was that historically accurate prints in fabric is very hard to find. Plaids are always good, but I really wanted a print. I joined the Sewing Sisters Facebook page so I could get there opinion on some prints that I found online. The first one I fell in love with they immediately said no; the background was a little splotchy. Also the flowers were too realistic. And there wasn't enough contrast.
So I was rather exasperated that the one that I loved wouldn't work. So I kept looking and found a pretty one that was sort of a rust color, with brown and white flowers. I really liked this one, but the Sewing Sisters said the flowers were too modern.
I was beginning to feel a little burned out with looking for fabric. I kept posting fabrics and getting turned down each time. I finally found a fabric that they said might be a possibility. It was almost a light faded red, with a lighter print with almost no contrast.
After thinking about it, I decided that it was too faded, and that if I lived in the 1860's, I definitely wouldn't buy fabric already faded.
So I was back to base one. Several ladies told me that the colors need to contrast; like pink with dark pink isn't really a contrast because they are the same color. The print can't be too small; the flowers can't be too realistic. The Sewing Sisters also told me that back then, geometric patterns were very popular.
A great website is Reproduction Fabrics; however, their prices are rather high. I got a good idea of what to look for; I realized that Joanns doesn't sell any fabric that would be even close.
Several ladies recommended a certain print that I really didn't like. But after looking at it later on, it started to grow on me. It was a dark red color, with goldish leaf/fern print and little blue dots. I didn't like the blue dots because on the computer, they popped out unattractively. However, at a distance, they didn't look so much like eyes.
I finally decided that I liked the fabric; we ordered 12 yards! Now that it's cut out, I see that I could have gone with maybe 9 yards.

Hailey's Dress

For Hailey's birthday, I wanted to make her a dress for her doll. After finding some inspiration from a doll dress store on Ebay, I decided I wanted to make a party dress out of some sort of leftover silk. I used the navy silk that I used to my Regency ball dress and planned out how I wanted to do it. I reallly wanted to make it close fitting, but none of the patterns that we have are very good at making sure they fit just right. So with this dress, I tried it on the doll lots of times and pinned it together on her.
I got it to fit pretty well by making darts in the front, but it really makes the doll has a big bust. Definitely won't do it that way again....
By the time I was almost finished, I realized that I pulled in the front too much and didn't have room for velcro in the back; the back edges just touched. So I made a lace up back and hand-sewed all the eyelets. I also made a cute flower with the hot glue gun.