Yesterday's Progress on the Wedding Dress

So far so good. I'm pleased with how things are coming along. Yesterday I sewed the bodice pieces. This was (in reverse order from how you see the dress), the lining, the corset, then the top layer has the underlining, the base fabric (a polyester shantung), organza, and lace. After I sewed the bodice pieces together with the organza layer on top, my daughter came in to look at it and said, "I wanted the other lace on the top"! Fortunately it only meant taking out the side seams since the lace needed to cover the top with as little seams showing as possible. But that was a trick on the front, getting the lace to look right without the seams over the bust area. I ended up basting the lace down while the backing part was placed over a pressing ham to get the curves right. It worked. Then the lace edging was cut around the design and tacked on to the top of the bodice piece. You can see by the picture that the bottom part of the lace is not tacked down yet. It will be, but since there is a lot of beading to add, I didn't see any sense to do this now.
The waistband was tricky too. It consists of underlining and the base fabric with the organza fabric gathered on top. When I first gathered the organza and put it on top of the base I could see that it was going to be difficult to get the gathers to look nice all the way across. So I ran gathering stitches about every 6 inches all the way across the waistband. Then after gathering all those areas I had someone hold each end of the waistband while I ironed the gathering all the way down the length of the waistband. Then I took out the gathering basting. It made it look much better.
Today I will start on the skirt and train. This time I will ask my daughter what it's supposed to look like before I sew anything :)

Working on the wedding dress

After one day I'm already behind! I had hoped to have the corset, lining and the rest of the bodice cut out yesterday. But alas, other things to do got in the way and I ended up only getting part of the corset done. The steps are: take apart the muslin. This will be used for a pattern and also will serve as the underlining unless it has too many marks on it. After taking apart the muslin I used it to make a paper pattern. This may not have been necessary but I wanted to be sure and get it right. I used the paper pattern to cut out the corset and then the lining. This part of the dress will not have the empire waist band but will go all the way down to the waist seam. After cutting out the corset, I sewed the 7 pieces together and then added boning. So far it just has 6 boning strips. That is the minimum for a strapless dress. It may have two more in the front -- not sure yet. The corset will also have a elastic strap like a bra strap at the bottom. So I added 1 1/2 inches to the corset pieces at the bottom and will turn this under to make a tube for the elastic to fit through. The elastic will have a hook and will fit quite snugly just above the waist. This will give a lot of extra support. We don't want that dress slipping off halfway through the ceremony! I'll continue to post pictures all through the construction -- who knows it may help someone else sew a wedding dress. I'm no expert, but I am enjoying the process.

End of September

It's hard to believe it's the last day of September. Does time accelerate? I think it probably does. Remember when you were a kid and time seemed to stand still. Christmas came so slowly, school lasted for an eternity. Not anymore. You blink, summer is gone and fall is here. I was actually surprised this morning to look at the calendar and realize it was the last day of September.
With time flying by I'm hurrying to finish a couple more customer quilts and then get into sewing my daughter's wedding dress. I hope to be working on it early next week. Plans are coming along wonderfully from my point of view. The invitations are almost done (my married daughter has made those), tomorrow we look at and order flowers, plans for the cake and/or desserts have been made with another friend, and a friend from the photography school that my daughter attended last year is flying in to do the pictures. So I better get busy. A wedding dress is a big project! I'll post pictures as it progresses but hopefully not give away the final look since I'm not sure who really reads this blog (and we don't want the groom taking a sneak peak)!

Customer Quilts

Here's a couple customer quilts that were done recently. Both turned out very well. The one with the blue border is an older kit from the Pine Needle quilt store in Lake Oswego. I've done several like this one. I think I like this one best. (Once again I'm not sure why these photos turned sideways -- aargh computers)!

Expo Quilt Show

I saw some stunning quilts today. Many art quilts at this show. It was fun to see what other quilters entered in the show. When I first came into the show I headed to the right to go down the first aisle of quilts and there around the first corner was my wholecloth quilt hanging. It was exciting to see it especially with the blue ribbon hanging next to it. There were a couple ladies standing by it insisting that it was all done on a computerized longarm. I didn't correct them -- if only they knew how much work that quilt really was! Here's a couple photos of me by the quilt and then after the award was given holding the certificate I received (along with the check for the award). A good day in the quilting world for me!

Happy Fall

Fall is my favorite time of year. I love the colors, the crispness of the air, and the decorating. I like the way my house looks in the fall. The quilts I hang up are my favorites. It's such a great time of year. Last night fall began at 8:09. So at 8:08, I turned on the lights in my decorations, lit a couple candles and wished everyone a happy fall!

First Place

My whole cloth quilt won 1st place!!!! I am so excited. I screamed when I got off the phone with the quilt show coordinator. I've put quilts in that show for about 5 years now and never won anything. This was an amazing quilt and I'm so happy it won something. It makes me want to do another -- well maybe not until next year :) I don't think I have an extra 40 or so hours to devote to doing another right now. I guess it will be in the local newspaper tomorrow and the awards ceremony is next week -- on the day that my sister will be here. I'll post a picture of it at the show. For now I'm just so happy!
(the show is the NW Quilt Expo here in Portland Oregon)

Sewing a Wedding Dress

I really love to sew. Whether it's sewing a quilt, pillows, purses, curtains, decorations, clothes, etc. I enjoy it. The challenge I started today is sewing my daughter's wedding dress. This will only be the third wedding dress I've made. Most people wouldn't tackle such a project or do it with fear of ruining one of the most important parts of the wedding -- 'the dress'! I think I felt somewhat that way when I sewed my younger daughter's wedding dress two years ago. But after finishing and seeing how beautiful it turned out I don't have that fear with this dress. In some ways this dress will be more difficult because of all the hand beading and lace on the dress. I have read books on couture sewing, watched some videos and basically I feel capable of doing this. So we start with the muslin. It's precisely that, the dress sewed out of cheap muslin. The seams are all at least 1" wide. There's writing on the fabric identifying each piece and making marks where changes need to be made. When a muslin is sewn the seams are put on the outside. That makes it easier to adjust. Yesterday, I made the muslin for my daughter's dress. She only got to try on the top before she had to leave for work but that fit almost perfectly. I'll have her try it all on today and then probably leave it on the dress form for a week or two before getting back to work on it. The wedding is December 19 -- plenty of time to get the dress sewn!

September Customer Quilts

Just a couple photos of customer quilts recently done. Both were lovely quilts and fun to do. I have fallen in love with the Dresdan Plate pattern and am working on a miniature quilt of that design. When I have a few more blocks done I'll post a photo or two.

Whole Cloth Quilt Is Done!

Wow -- it's done! It was much more work than I anticipated. I put this quilt on the first part of August and it took a month. Of course I didn't work on it constantly and during that time I was on a week's vacation as well as my week out at the fairgrounds helping with 4-H. I didn't keep track of the hours. Maybe I should have but I decided early on that I didn't want the clock to be this nagging pressure on me to get it done. I would guess that it was somewhere between 40 and 60 hours to complete. Some of my favorite parts are the paisley tear drop shapes in the wide border and then repeating them in a much smaller scale in the center and also I love the background around the center design. The most difficult part was the binding on the scallops. I wanted to have a double edged line around the scallops and found it very difficult to get even close to perfect in stitching it down. I ended up handstitching much of the binding around the scallops. In hind sight it would have been better for me to stitch this from the back side of the quilt using my sewing machine rather than trying to do it on the longarm. I'm also still wondering if I shouldn't have put the scallop on all four sides, but most of my family has thought that just three sides with the straight side being for pulling up under your chin on the bed a logical idea. Well, it goes in a quilt show at the end of this week. How it will do I have no idea -- when I know in a couple weeks I'll let you all know.