Fit for Karine

Today was a big day: we did the major penultimate fitting. Karine was able to try the dress on and see how it would look all together. We realized that the dress needs to be attached to the corset so it doesn't fall down - this was good learning. We also need to put another layer of lining in the skirt of the dress, which I will attach to the bottom of the corset. Decided on no crinoline. Pinned for the zipper and the hem.




Also made Karine cry, which - if watching "Say Yes to the Dress" has taught me anything - means that this really is the right dress for her. I'm very glad.

Hours: 1
Tasks: fitting and adjustments
Entertainment: watching Karine's joy and delight in her beautiful dress!

Everything's Coming Together

Hours: 4
Tasks: sewed bodice to skirt
Entertainment: CBC Radio One; Karine!

Big day today: the two separate parts of the dress got sewn together.

Getting ready to sew the two parts together: skirt on left, bodice & silk on right, and my instruction manual in the middle - never far away!


A million pins...


...makes it all come out perfectly.


Now it looks like a real dress. Tomorrow: fitting.

Burning the Midnight Oil

Hours: 2
Tasks: applying lace appliquées to bodice to fill in empty spaces
Entertainment: Parks and Recreation

This was the Thursday night of the Sheldrake camping weekend. Bob and Di arrived around 5:30; Sheldrakes arrived later, due to two flat tires on the trailer en route. Jeffy was working in Campbellford. I stayed up and visited until around 10pm, when I went in to the house and started working on this little bit of the dress.

After finishing putting the scallops on the top of the bodice, I realized that there were some "bare patches" that needed filling in. I had saved the extra bits of lace, so I took 3 of those and appliquéed them on to the bare patches on the front of the bodice. These things always take longer than I think, and I ended up being awake until midnight getting it done. The bonus part was that before I went to bed, I found out that my cousin Courtney had had her baby! So it was worth it: the bodice looks complete and was ready to be sewn the following day, and I learned about a new member of our family. Success!

Carrying On

Hours: 3
Tasks: put boning in corset and underlining; sewed top seam of bodice; applied scallops to top edge of bodice
Entertainment: CBC Radio One; Jeffy; Castle

The scallops went on top of the bodice today. It's looking beautiful.

Another One Bites the Dust

I've finished reworking the lace for the edging on the bodice: cross another task off the list. Tomorrow morning is a kid-free time for me to hopefully get lots of stuff done both by hand and with the sewing machine. Fingers crossed!

Hours: 1
Tasks: finished reworking scalloped lace for bodice
Entertainment: Jeffy playing Super Mario Galaxy 2

Scalloped Lace

Hours: 6
Tasks: finished sewing bodice lace seams together; began reworking scalloped lace edging for bodice trim
Entertainment: Law & Order: Criminal Intent; Elizabeth I: The Virgin Queen

Today is the day I started adjusting the scalloped lace edging for the bodice of the dress. The lace fabric came with some beautiful scallops around the edge which will be perfect for the hem of the skirt, but were a bit big for the bodice. The woman at the shop where we bought the lace showed how we could make the scallops smaller by basically resewing the lace a bit closer together, so that's what I'm doing now. Here's a picture of it in progress:

(At right: in its original state; in the middle: pinned to its new shape; at left: sewn.)

There are two seams in this picture. Can you find them? I hope not!



Today was also the day I finished sewing the seams of the lace bodice together. Because the seams at the bust are curved, they needed to be pinned and sewn while the lace was on the mannequin. So I brought the dressform in to the living room (duly dressed in both bra and corset), threw on a biography of Elizabeth I, and finished seaming the lace for the bodice. (Sometimes watching a movie full of amazing costumes helps me feel empathy with the seamstresses of old, realizing just how much work goes in to a beautiful dress - and they had to do it ALL by hand!)

It's looking lovely, if I do say so myself. I'm very pleased, and so excited to be heading towards a completed dress!

Must Love Lace

Now that I'm working on little bits of lace instead of the big skirt pieces, it's a little bit easier to get the pieces out and work on small portions while the babies are asleep or after the kids have gone to bed. This means that I am finding more time to get stuff done on the dress - thank goodness!

Hours: 2.5
Tasks: pinned lace scallops to hem of skirt; sewed back seams of bodice lace
Entertainment: Must Love Dogs

Surprise Sewing Time

Managed to get a couple of hours of work done on the dress today. Neva and Hugh are elsewhere tonight, so it was just me and the baby boys, which meant for an earlier evening. Also, I'm working on hand-sewing the lace for the bodice, which is something I can do in small pieces in front of the TV once the littlest boys are out of the way, so it all worked out well.

Hours: 2
Tasks: basting outline on lace bodice pieces; hand sewing side back bodice seams on lace
Entertainment: Ancients Behaving Badly: Ghengis Khan (on the History Network); Castle

Something Blue

Today was another good day of progress on the dress. The interior corset is more or less complete...


...and the "something blue" embroidery is done.


At Karine's request, we put a little bit of embroidery in blue thread on the inside of the dress to fulfill her "something blue" requirement of the "Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue" rhyme. I am hopeful that the dress will be ready for its major final fitting when they come for Leitch-Sheldrake Weekend on Friday.

Hours: 3.5
Tasks: more work on bodice lining, underlining, and silk; corset completed, including blue embroidery and eyelet insertion
Entertainment: Super Mario Galaxy 2, as played by Jeffy while Hugh watched; Go, Diego, Go!

Before I got going on the sewing, Hugh wanted to know how to work the sewing machine. I duly showed him the basics of how it worked, and let him sew a couple of seams on some scrap fabric. "Okay, Mommy," he said. "Can I sew on Karine's dress now?" I want to encourage him to sew if he likes, but making a wedding dress seems like a bit of an ambitious first project!

Thundering Along

Today was the first dressmaking day I've had in a couple of weeks. As always, I had hoped to get more done than I did, but I'm pleased with what was accomplished. There was a surprise visit from Eva and baby Isaac which stalled things a bit midday, and then an incredible thunderstorm in the mid-afternoon which made it so that I didn't want to do anything but look out the window. Still: I got stuff done, and am generally pleased with it all.

Hours: 3
Tasks: sewed bodice silk and lining; cut and sewed broadcloth and cotton batiste for interior corset
Entertainment: CBC Radio One; an excellent thunderstorm; my parents; Jeffy; Hugh (who was very interested in how the sewing machine worked, but who wasn't allowed to have a sewing lesson on this particular project)

Fitting Phase 1

This weekend, Brad and Karine made a stop at our place to break their journey between Montreal and Holland Landing. Karine and I took advantage of this time to admire the beauty of my handiwork and do a preliminary fitting.



I am so pleased with the way this dress is turning out, and I think Karine is too. Mostly I just want to sit around and admire the loveliness of it, but there are these children who keep wanting my attention...

This week I hope to get going on the inner corset, but Rory has a birthday coming up and Hugh is being transported to Sheldrakes' house for a visit and then there's just the regular running of the household, so... we'll see. I'm still hopeful, as always, though!

Little Helpers

Today I reached a milestone: the lace skirt is done! (Except for the back seam, which will have to wait until the zipper is in.) But done enough that I can comfortably move on to other things: cutting out the fabric and the lining, and sewing the skirts of those two things together. It's amazing what a difference sewing with a machine can make in terms of getting stuff done.


The kids were intrigued, as usual, and Neva was dying to "help out" so once the lace was safely stowed away, I was able to give her some pinning tasks which she took very seriously:


She loved being able to help.

Hugh was more helpful in terms of the encouragement and praise: "I see you have the wedding dress, here, Mommy, and it looks beautiful!" He was doing some creative work with pins on the cutting board and once or twice came a little too near the dress with some markers, but no harm was done at all (I'm quite vigilant) and his positive attitude was a delight.

The kids were amazed by the "new rules" while I was working on the dress: they weren't allowed to eat at the table, or use markers there. Instead, they had to eat in the kitchen at the counter (which they loved) and were allowed to use their markers in the living room (which they also loved, given that in our house that is usually forbidden). I'm not taking any chances with this dress.

Hours: 6
Tasks: finish sewing side back lace seam; cut out lining and silk; sew together skirt portions of lining and silk
Entertainment: the rest of Persuasion; a little more "Super Mario Galaxy 2" and also some "Mario Party 8"; Treehouse TV; and Neva and Hugh, of course.