Wedding Gown progress!!!!! Granny fun.

I’ve been making HUGE progress on the gown. Most nights I dream about the next steps. It is turning into a more complicated project than I first thought it would be – but isn’t that always the case! Last night – I even plunged in and cut out the lace pieces!

Pardon the layout of this picture – but I was trying to get her in the sunlight from the patio doors to reveal the ever so slight pink tinge to the gown – which we are both delighted with! If you’ve been following along, you’ll know that is from layering the silk taffeta outer fabric over a pale pink batiste. I found when going to baste all the princess skirt sections together, that I couldstillsee the seam allowances, so I also added a layer of china silk under the pink batiste – so the skirt is 3 layers thick, then to be independently topped with our wonderful lace – as shown here.

This photo will show the sloped empire line I worked and worked on – and which makes my darling daughter look VERY slim indeed! Please don’t dwell on the drag lines – as this bodice is ALL basted together, and I don’t have the boning in the side seams of the corset that is underneath all this yet – as OF COURSE, she is working on losing weight! I actually don’t plan on stitching the side seams of the bodice at all, much less attach the bodice to the skirt finally until after May 9. The wedding is June 6 – so she’s just gonna have to settle for that!

She is thrilled with the silhouette of the back skirt – with the additional pouf we added from the donated crinoline as previously described. See it – well kind of – in the picture on the right below.

Sew… this fitting was actually to determine – for positive sure – the exact hemline. I then transfered that info to the muslin skirt pieces – for which I had made one muslin piece for EVERY skirt piece – clearly labelled as to which was the OUTSIDE – and cut the muslin hem OFF at the finished hemline. That enabled me to then utilize those pieces as the pattern pieces when cutting out the lace. I could lay each piece with the exact hemline on the scallopped border of the lace. OF COURSE, though – realize that the lace is straight – and the hemline is curved. But that will be all ‘fixed’ with cutting and handstitching those lace borders up into place. AND, sure enough – the lace was not symmetrical – not horizontally – NOR vertically. One scalloped edge had a row of lace/flowers above it with 3 flowers, and the opposite scalloped edge had less flowers in the grouping above. SEW… we decided to do the front pieces along one edge and the back pieces along the other – and I will add flowers to theback to ‘balance’ it – as if anyone other than myself – (and all of you) would EVER know such was the case anyway……….! I couldn’t decide on placement of the bodice pieces – which direction, or motifs to center – but I had plenty of lace left for that – so at 11 pm – I decided to wait on those decisions. I’m so glad though that narrowing the circumference of the skirt yeilded ample extra lace and border. We plan to create some delicate straps of the scallop as well.

The fun part then was cutting off the beading and 3 D flowers from the seam allowances of the lace. We plan to scatter the flowers on the veil a bit too (a bargain at $6 from Hobby Lobby on 50% off!).

Jewelry: she seems to see that a simple strand of pearls is all this dress needs – nothing more ‘showey’. I have a very sentimental strand that turn out to be the perfect color. She took them along to see if she could match some drop earrings.

OH – and all this on a day when my precious grandson Cole was with me. We had a blast going out to ‘puddle stomp’ after the rain died down. We also went on a worm hunt – but to our surprise, there weren’t worms all over the sidewalks. Sew…we had to dig in the garden. Found 3 – one for him (a white centipede), and then a medium worm he named “Mommy” and a big one he named “Dabee” – her fiance who he dearly, dearly loves. This granny must show a picture…

Oh – and in filling out an application – actually decided I needed to mark the ‘grey’ box under hair color instead of brown… WHAT A DAY!

Really must get to WORK! The ‘Barney’ van awaits – packing for the International Quilt Festival show in Chicago I leave for tomorrow…

For Londa’s books, patterns, and supplies as described in her sewing escapades, please see Londa’s Creative Threads – http://www.londas-sewing.com