After one sewing project

 

Hi. Sometimes, I cannot get my dopamine fix through knitting due to hand injuries, so I figured sewing would take the torch when this happens.

These are the records of my first trepidations into Fabric Land. Enjoy.

Can I just begin by saying it's not the same flow? Oof, when I start a knitting project, even casting on annoys me because I want to just get in the rhythm of things. Sewing? Heck it's more preparation than the actual act of stitching.

I opted for a dress, for the first project. Something simple, but with some challenge:

 

Burda 6687, view A. It's 5 panels and an invisible zipper. Fabric picked for that was a black linen, and cotton voile for the lining.

And with by "some challenge" I mean starting from scratch, knowing nothing about sewing, and just learning along.

• tracing
• measuring the seam allowance, as it was not included
• darts
• invisible zipper
• lining and sewing that b*tch in there (instructions were confusing as heck)
• hemming... we'll talk later about that
• I heard about interfacing for the very first time 
• the term "princess seam" just to show you how blindly I jumped in this
  

The quality of the picture reflects the quality of the time spent tracing. *fart noise*

Burda doesn't include seam allowance. So it was interesting to deal with that for the first time. There I went, tracing some more, 1.5cm around the drafting paper and chopped that off.

After ironing on the interfacing, I pinned the center front and side fronts together. First difficulty, and first spark of excitement, coming from the same thing: curves. It took me by surprise for some reason, how it's a bit of a fiddle to get the curved lines to lay against each other to be pinned. But once that was done, I saw some shape take form, and THAT got my motivation up!

The floor is my working table. Super ergonomic! Not shown: the chalk line I had to redraw on the seam line, because the cut wasn't exactly even.

After stitching, before ironing

Okayy now we're getting somewhere, now I can understand the hype! I was a slow start, but the "I'm making things with my hands" buzz is finally kicking in.

Thennn came the zipper.

It's not that they explain badly in the pattern's instructions, but they explain like they're talking to someone who's been in the sewing universe all their lives. So I ditched the instructions, went on YouTube, got the zipper in, got a soul-boner from how proud I was.

Booyah, invisible zipper.

 

Then I stitched the rest of the sides, did the whole thing all over because I forgot about the lining (thankfully I had 2m of cotton voile lying around from a mistake purchase. Happy little accidents!)

Came the time to attach the lining to the dress aaaaand I understood none of the instructions once again so back to the Tubes I went.

Some guts showing before the lining was put in

Lining was attached to the neckline and armholes by machina and to the zipper band by hand, shoulders were closed, one thing was left.

The Hem

 

Wow what an unpleasant ride that was. They just say something along the lines of "hem it." in the instructions. Yep. Ok. Cool. How. So I folded it twice over, ironed it, stitched it. For both the linen and cotton voile, separately.

That was not a good idea.

The linen still cooperated as much as linen does. It's far from haute coutûre, but there's nothing glaringly wrong with it, you can just tell it was made by someone who's probably hemming for the first time.

But the voile? The freakin' cotton voile? Don't do it like that! I don't know how else, but don't double-fold-iron-pin-sew, it won't work! I won't even show how bad it is, because I don't have to, it's the lining, it's hidden, it's my dirty-ass secret, y'all can't see it, but you just have to take my word for it: the way Denethor eats a cherry tomato looks less disturbing than what I've achieved with this hem.

/rant

So, I got a dress.

Don't mind the dead plant, I forgot to move it.

It's a bit heavy. And thus a bit warmer that I intended. But it's a dress. I made it. I made a dress. Dopamine aquisition is a success.

I did cowardly follow the sizing chart to a tee, so the waist seems a bit undefined. I could take it in, but probably won't. Next dress I'll try to be a bit more courageous and use MY size, although I'm unsure how.

It's a very simple-looking dress, perfect for sporting bold accessories without being over-the-top.

Now, on to procrastinating for my already chosen, already bought for next project! (I need to know my cup size, idfk send help)