Sundress Awesomeness

I love sundresses. I love that I can go to work in a sundress and it's appropriate.

I was at JoAnn's to see what they had on sale a couple of months back. I noticed that they had the ready made smocking sundress for 50% off, and it was a black & white print. I bought 1 1/2 yards just in case and thought of a nice project for the weekend.

I'm all about easy. It has to be interesting, but easy.

My design idea: make a tiered black & white sundress.
The plan: cut off the skirt to use later. Select black & white fabrics. Cut

random large strips of fabric, around 8 inches, each tier is different because I don't do that much planning.

With smocking at the bust, you know it'll be form fitting in that area, but my hip area is way larger. I am definitely a pear shape. So I put little pleats along the bottom of the smocking to create a more flowy skirt of the dress.

Next, sew a fabric strip to the bottom. Then sew another. Than ANOTHER! I have 5 tiers, some being more white on black, or black with white, but I also incorporated my "cheater" fabric that looks like rows of black & white fabrics sewn in rows but going vertical. I used the leftover fabric to make wide straps. Sew up the ONE seam for the back and put in a shirttail hem.

Sundress project completed in 1 hour.

I have wore this dress to the Tri-Cities Quilt Show, got 4 compliments. Wore the dress to the Sumpter Flea Market and 3 compliments. Wore to a day of yard saling last week (plus some shopping) and I got 6 compliments!

I hope you can make one too.

Tie Dye My World

I think I'm a hippie wannabe. A friend of mine gave me this blue tie dye dress from Target she's had stashed in her storage for a couple of years. She throws me the dress and said I could re-do it to make myself a dress. Well, this baby was 5 sizes too small. Then I noticed that it had a lining that was the SAME fabric and tye dye as the dress. So I took it home, cut off the top (empire waist), removed the smocked waist (way too small for me), and started the project.

I added panels to the sides and made sure the white stripes lined up like everything else. I stitched the skirt directly to the top that allowed me to widen the front & back since it was a standard overlap for sundresses. Then I had leftover fabric. This means I can make a MAXI DRESS!!! I really love long dresses. I used the leftover fabric, made strips and attached to the bottom, creating a vertical visual interest at the bottom. VOILA!

I wore the dress last week and got compliments on it. My only complaint is that I have to wear a slip underneath because it is just a shirting fabric that is light for summer, but see through enough that I don't want to wear it alone.

Sewing mission accomplished.