To all who mourn in Israel, He will give a crown of beauty for ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning, festive praise instead of despair. In their righteousness, they will be like great oaks that the LORD has planted for his own glory. Isaiah 61:3

Friday, September 19, 2014

Spelling Bee Update...

Here's a quick update on the progress of the Spelling Bee dress.  So far it has been going swimmingly...well except the issues I have been having with the velvet, but that is to be expected.  The bodice and underskirt are pretty straight forward as I followed the patterns without any mutating.  Well, except I Frankenpatterned the front and back of the bodice by using two different patterns, but in this instance it was no big deal...Huzzah!!!


Oh my does velvet not lend itself at all to being photographed!!  But you can get the general outline and idea of the dress


I have decided not to use a bustle under the dress as the stiffness of the velvet and the bustling of the back adds enough bustle...aaaaaand when I did have the bustle under the dress it caused the bodice to pull in a most unsightly manner.  Plus, I still have to add the yellow silk bustling in the back.


Adorable buttons I found at JoAnn's.  I wanted a flower shaped button because I'm going to be a bee and bees love flowers!  Huzzah for JoAnn's!!!


Here is where the dress started giving me some issues.  You see I had to draft the overskirt which was really no problem.  Where the problems started arising was where I had to use my most hated 4 letter word...MATH.  Ugh!  I had to try to figure out how far apart to space the stripes of velvet and where to start the stripes and multiply that by the length from where I would start the stripes and the point of the stinger...my poor brain started to melt.  99.9% of the time when I do a dress of hat project, I eyeball everything because that is what I can do.  Math baffles me.  But with this stinger overskirt, I had to get the stripes very even because hello!!!  black and yellow leave very little wiggle room.  I did over come the math issue and things started to go well.

After about 4 hours of trial and error, I decided that the stripes should be 2" wide.  I tried pinning the velvet stripes (I used the velvet from the dress) to the overskirt, but found that the silk buckled and puckered really badly and was super ugly.  So, a brilliant idea hit me in the face.  I would purchase 2" wide black satin ribbon, hand sew that to the silk then hand stitch the velvet on top of the ribbon.  The ribbon worked as a fabulous pattern and template for the velvet and the crying and sadness that was about to consume me was abated!!


The sewing of the stripes in progress.  On the left is the velvet stripe sewn over the ribbon...on the right is the ribbon.  I will have to remember this for future reference!


Almost done!  Now all that's left is the bustling for the back and the pollen pom poms for my shoes!!  Too fun!!!

Be blessed my friends!!

g

21 comments:

  1. Wow, this looks great! Historical fancy dress is so fun and I'm very excited to see you bring it to life!

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    1. Thank you Gabriela! I totally agree with you...historical fancy dress is very fun!
      Blessings!
      g

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  2. Well thats stinkin' cute! I would not have thought to sew velvet over a satin ribbon. Was there a reason velvet ribbon was not working- so you used velvet fabric instead? Its uber adorable and it almost but not quite makes me want to enter a spelling test. However I will tell you what, you enter for me and I will do your math homework. Love ya!

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    1. You, my friend, have yourself a deal!!!! hahahahaha!!! I couldn't find any velvet ribbon in 2" and the stuff I have in my stash, the pile was too short. I like the fuzziness of the velvet of the dress and the ribbon's fuzziness or lack there of, just didn't look right. The only reason I used the ribbon was for a template and to steady the stupid evil velvet! hahahahaha!
      Blessings!
      g

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    2. Well it's brilliant! I love it!

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  3. When you get tired of it, let me know. I have "The Queen Bee" dress from Beth and think I should have this too. ;-)

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    1. When I grow tired of it, you will be the first I let know!! What is the Queen Bee dress from Beth? I am sure I have seen it but need a refresher...
      Blessings!
      g

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  4. I literally jumped up in my chair and clapped when I saw that last picture. Great idea with the ribbon. You are amazing. Really and truly.

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    1. Oh Tracey, you know how to make my heart happy! Thank you for the cheers!!
      Blessings!
      g

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  5. Eee! It's adorable. I suppose you could always add a small bustle pad or stiff petticoat if you wanted just a bit more oomph, without resulting to the boom of a proper bustle. And that was an excellent 'cheap' with the ribbon.

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    1. Thank you Jennifer! I have been toying around with the idea of a bustle pad...I was sent an image of the costume done up in real life from Katherine of The Fashionable Past, and the bodice could very well be ok with the oomph of a bigger bustle...And of course I will be making the ball gown bodice now that I've seen it!!! hahahahaha!!! Ya, I love cheats. Especially if they make our lives easier!! They can totally rock!!
      Blessings!
      g

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  6. Goodness, I hate math too. It's the worst part of sewing. But you managed to get the apron perfectly even and stingy! And wow, the fabric must be really stiff!

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    1. It is indeed the worst part of sewing!!! Or anything for that matter...I love the way you described the apron! Stingy!! Too fun! The fabric suprisingly isn't all that horribly stiff...thank God! I was worried that it would be, but happily it's just right! Velvet can be a bit tricky that way can't it?
      Blessings!
      g

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  7. It's looking cute! And you sew so fast too! It seems only recently you posted the idea, and here you are, already almost done. =)

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