Making progress...

Yes, I am sewing. 

A dress. 

But not just any dress...no, this is a Mother of the Groom dress! 

Yikes! 

What possessed me to do this? 

...especially when the wedding is less than 3 weeks away! 

 

Well, I really didn't want to make my dress

I wanted to buy one.

Already ready already.

I put off shopping, because I didn't want to find out that I couldn't buy a dress.

If I didn't shop, I could continue to delude myself that I would be able to buy off the rack.

But the time came.

I had to shop.

I tried on a gazillion RTW dresses, and although many of them were nice, there was always something I wanted to change about each one.  MANY (most...no, ALL!) needed alterations to make them fit me. 

I was seeing a trend.

Apparently, I am short-waisted for my circumference.

A size 10 is the right length through the body, but MAN is it tight!

By the time I get into the 12s and 14s, the waist is way too low.

 I figured, why buy an ill-fitting dress and alter it when I can just make a dress from scratch for about the same amount of effort?

 

Yeah...right.  The same amount of effort?  Pfff.....

 

But I am plugging away, and, happily, I am nearly finished. 

 

 But not so fast!

 

This afternoon, I put in the sleeves...little cap sleeves.  So very confident that this was going to work, I didn't baste them...I sewed with a 'regular' stitch length. 

 

And now I must rip them out.

 

I am using PMB5 for my pattern, and things have gone remarkably well, fit-wise.  My construction, though, leaves something to be desired. 

 

But that is neither here nor there...right now, I am talking about the sleeves.

 

I drafted the PMB cap sleeve.  I wanted it to be about 3.5" tall at the mid-cap, so I (stupidly) lowered the cap height until it was the desired size.

 

I cut these sleeves, both layers...a lace and the gold mesh that goes under it. 

 I stitched the layers together along the hem, then understitched, turned, sewed the underarm seam, then aligned the layers to be sewn as one. 

I inserted the sleeves...both of them!...into the dress using a 2.5mm stitch length. 

 

Luckily, before I trimmed the seam allowances, I decided to try this on to be sure these sleeves were good.

They were not good.

Not good at all!

 

What was I thinking...lowering the sleeve cap?  Yes, I wanted the sleeve to be 'shorter' but that was NOT the way to do it!  That was a rookie mistake!  I know better.

 

So now I am printing a new pattern for my sleeve.

 

This time, I started with the basic SET IN sleeve (above), then drew a shaped hem (below)
...maintaining the original cap shape as drafted, and manually changing only the hem shape. 
 

I am not sure that I have the hem shape just right...I had to wing it!
But I will certainly BASTE this time!

 Cross your fingers!