Progress.

It's been forever since I've talked about sewing. Last time I mentioned that I was going to use Maddie's tutorial on making a sloper. I tried, got frustrated, and changed gears. I am still going to make a sloper, but I think I'll wait until the summer when I have more time. So instead I've been working on altering the Simplicity 2444 dress in preparation for the Mad Men Dress Challenge 2 and for the navy polka dotted dress I've been meaning to make for months now. Here is a quick peek at the muslin I've been working on. Although it looks pretty bad in this picture, I've actually made quite a bit of progress:

  

Now, you can see I've circled where I screwed up sewing in the sleeve. I know that on a muslin, you don't really have to sew in a sleeve, but I've never done it before so I thought it would be good practice. I found out that I cut the sleeves a size too small because they are so tight that I can't really move around in this bodice with the sleeves. Like, at all. They have since been removed, I figured I'll work on them later. I don't need sleeves for my Mad Men dress, so I'm not too concerned right now.

I am also pointing out some major sagginess under the bust. I've fixed most of this simply by bringing the bodice back in significantly, but there remains a little. I've tried to alter the darts the way that Gertie suggests, but I ALWAYS end up looking, as Trevor puts it, nippley. So I'm going to work on the darts a bit more and see if I can't figure it out with the pattern making book my sister lent me. And who knows, when I insert the button placket, it might completely change the fit again.

As for the Mad Men Dress Challenge 2, I actually chose my inspiration dress a while ago:

I don't even watch mad men, but I like this dress and I can see myself wearing something like this so, why not? I said I wanted to be more social this year, and this joining in this challenge would be a great way to do so, don't you think? I've been debating between making a real button up front, and making a fake button up front. I am leaning towards real, that way I can learn some new techniques, but again, we'll see when I make a muslin of the top with the collar and the buttons.

I've already started to look for fabric. I think the fabric is going to have to be inspired by this, but not exact. Which is fine. But I haven't been to Fabricland yet. Not that I have high expectations for finding a fabric that looks like this. Of course, I could try to make a fabric like this using different techniques, but hey, I've got a day job and a night job to hold down, so I don't think that is going to happen.

Thanks for reading this little update. I can't wait to get my muslin done and get started on my dress. Are you sewing in the Mad Men Dress Challenge 2?

{Somebody}