I Now Have...

... not ONE, but TWO dressforms! They have been named Edwina and Darla by my students. Edwina is technically the school's dressform - she lives in a closet in my classroom and will be used next year for Fashion Club and costuming the play (which I HOPE is Bye Bye Birdie but THINK is going to be Little Shop of Horrors)! Darla is MY dressform that I have already draped a project on and have my tape measure hanging around the neck of, just because I think it gives it an authentic sewers look!

No pictures just yet as I'm tucking the camera away for the Senior BBQ tomorrow, but here's what it looks like from the store - mine pretty much looks the same:

Photo Gallery Updates

Pictures of my Music Man Project can now be seen in the photo gallery. This gallery is a work of progress as I will add more pictures as they come in.

View the album here.

My Latest Project

I figured since I was making all these dresses for the Music Man, I should have something new to wear to the evening performance on April 11. So I hunted around a bit. I already had this fabric, that I got too late to do anything with for Easter (though mine is pink, not green):


So I hunted until I found just the right pattern:


I'm using View B.

This is the first item I made for myself in a long time. I also just got some jersey fabric at only $1.95 a yard to make myself another dress, probably a day dress for work.

Presenting... A Reversible Jacket!

Well, I did it! I made a reversible jacket for Harold Hill for the Music Man! I was mighty proud of myself last night when I finished it off. It's not embellished yet, though I found some fantastic gold fringe this morning in the drama department stores to use!

Here it is:







It just makes you want to say, "Please observe me if you will; I'm Professor Harold Hill."

The Ladies of River City

Here they are - every dress was made by me, at least partially (the green one was made by a student!):


Another reminder that The Music Man is on April 11th at 7 p.m. and April 12th at 1 p.m. Family members should all clear their schedules and let me know if they want tickets as soon as possible. As you can see, it's going to LOOK really good!

A Day of Sewing...

More sewing away for the Music Man. This is much harder than I thought it would be, and I could always resort to premade clothes, but I think the effect will be nicer this way, in the end. I have just over a month to go and I intend to finish this off and see this through!

Here's the craft of the day for everyone! I modified a pattern to make this dress:



I also made this. It needs a lot of work:

Craftiness Update

As I have been neglecting craft month horribly with no projects this week (and just completely throwing nutrition out the window, as you can see in the below post), I thought I'd update on the crafts of the week. They are all sewing related and pictures will be up soon.

They're all for the Music Man:

1.) A dress and blouse for the Zaneeta Shinn character.
2.) A jacket, shirt, and skirt for the Eulalie Mackecknie Shinn character.
3.) A skirt for another one of the characters (it's red, but we don't know who it's for).
4.) An apron for the Mrs. Paroo character.

And much more to come... we have only FOUR Saturdays left. There's lots of work to do!

New Dress Pictures

You've seen them on the hanger, now see them on a person!

Another Nearly Finished Product

Just needs little button details and some hemming and it's ready to go!

More Productivity

The bodice of my latest work for the Music Man. Hopefully tomorrow I'll carve out an hour or two for adding the skirt!

Reminder to the family: the performance has been moved to April 11th (7 p.m.) and 12th (1 p.m). Let me know if you want to attend!

My Productive Weekend...

Here's what I've been doing this weekend, and probably what I'm going to be doing the rest of the week - Music Man costumes!

The "Goodnight, My Someone" outfit (yes, changed from the last time I posted with that name):



The coat that "Marian" is going to wear for about 3 seconds when Harold Hill is following her down the street. It's a little frumpy looking at the moment - it needs to be pressed and buttons need to be added.



The coat and outfit together:

Another Almost Finished Project...

The nearly finished blue dress for the Music Man! Don't know which character will wear it yet. It was intended for Marian, but we're trying to incoporate purple into all her dresses and don't know if purple would look very nice with this. But then again, the purple only has to be a tiny bit so it might work. I'll have to see how it looks.

Please ignore all loose threads. The sleeve cuffs are not yet sewn and the hemming is, as usual, not done yet!

Music Man Dresses!

I finally have two of the dresses finished, with a grand plan for Saturday to teach the crew how to use the sewing machines and cut and put together the other dresses! I expect ALL family members at the production on March 27th or 28th (two chances to see it so there's no excuse!!).


"Goodnight, My Someone" dress, front.


"Goodnight, My Someone" dress, back.


"Til There Was You" dress, front.


"Til There Was You" dress, back.

The actress playing Marian gets at least two more dresses and a coat, while all the other characters each get one dress and a creative way to cover it for other scenes (aprons, pinafores, etc. depending on age the character is supposed to be). All the boys will be getting store-bought items, as I wouldn't even know where to begin to make a suit, particularly one from 1912!

Anatomy of a Dress, Take Three, Part One

The next part of the Music Man costuming saga. Here's the plan for dress # 3. I haven't really taken too many in progress pictures, being too eager to finish and not knowing where the camera was, but you can see where the project is going.


The bodice of the dress. I thought it was too bland for the stage, which inspired the plan you're about to see.


Using the other bodice option, I cut the pattern and used the other bodice option with the inset, making a - for lack of a better way to describe it - suspender-type effect. This fabric will also be the sleeve cuffs as well as the sash.



The dress, roughly constructed. It's pretty much just pinned together, so it doesn't quite give the look it will once done (not to mention the fact that I'm using a CHAIR as a dressform... I really need to get a real one!).

Anatomy of a Dress, Take Two, Part One

Here's the next installment of my dressmaking for The Music Man. So far, I am not as happy with the progress on this one as I am with the previous dress, but I'm making due. Here's what I've got so far.


The fabrics - a sheer-ish white with flowers and a blue with a slight pattern (if you look closely) for the sash.


Cutting the bodice lining pieces.


The bodice, sewn together.


The bodice fabric.


The bodice lining and fabric put together, no sleeves added yet.


The bodice (minus one sleeve!) and sash on a chair masquerading as a dress form. It's obviously not there to check the fit, but I wanted to get a sense of where it was going!

The other sleeve will go on tomorrow. I'm getting tired and when I get tired, I get sloppy and I don't want that to happen!

Anatomy of a Dress: Part Three

Worked hard all afternoon and have an ALMOST finished product. I have to put in the zipper, the skirt lining and get the bottom hemmed, which of course I have to do on the model!


Here I am, working on the main skirt with the purple fabric!


The bodice pinned to the skirt layers, before sewing!


The "finished" product! (See above, as it's not exactly done yet!)

My model will likely be trying it on again tomorrow before I put the zipper on. Then I'll get the skirt lining in over the weekend and put on the zipper. Finally, she'll try it again on Monday and we'll get to the hemming stage!

I must admit - this pattern scared me before I started. I wasn't sure the final product would go well, but I went slowly and carefully and followed the directions meticulously and I am absolutely THRILLED!!

Anatomy of a Dress: Part Two

So yesterday I made the whole bodice of the dress. I probably would've gotten to the skirt as well, but I didn't have the right markings on the fabric and left the pattern at work!


The bodice pieces, cut out of the purple fabric being used. It's nice and soft and apparantly doesn't wrinkle - I barely had to press it before cutting.


The inset, just starting to pin.


The inset, all pinned and ready to go.

Then, I forgot to take pictures, but I got the inset in and lined the bodice, with the understiching, which I had never done before!


The finished bodice.


The "whole" dress - really just the bodice with the front skirt pieces laid on it to see how it would look. Obviously the lace will go on both sides, but I haven't cut it yet. I just wanted to see the whole thing a little bit, and how it looked with the sash - I love the contrasting pink!

The dress was met with great excitement today, and I'm excited to finish it. The back panel is a little small so I'm going to simply add a little bit of fabric on each side, totaling about an inch or two so that the zipper fits well and doesn't cut off any breathing - which would not be good for someone who needs to sing!

Can't wait to see the finished product, especially when it gets tried on!

Anatomy of a Dress: Part One

In non-Christmas related posting, I'm helping out with the costumes for my schools production of The Music Man. I am designing a dress, using this pattern from Sense & Sensibility. They had some perfect ones to use for the 1912-ish era, when the Music Man takes place.

I insisted on designing the final dress for the Marian character, partially because I had a vision in mind and partially because the student playing her is one of my students! Anyway, I went out and bought the fabric this weekend and today put together the lining to fit it on the student tomorrow. Then we'll get to work on the dress itself. I'm really excited to actually put something to use!

Here are some images:


The design for the dress; I traced the person from the pattern envelope and just colored in my design; I don't have a picture of the fabric today.




The above two are the lining pieces being put together to test for fit tomorrow


The bodice put together in lining.

Hopefully tomorrow we'll have the full bodice to show you!