Purple Adelaide Dress

I know this is a summer dress, and we're already way into fall, but I knew this was a pattern I could knock off my list in less than a week. I wanted a quick win to gain some sewing momentum, and I need to get more of my sewing todo list accomplished so I can buy new fabric! Those who follow me on instagram may have seen that I prematurely bought new fabric, but that's no surprise. Is there a support group for spouses of people who buy too much fabric? I think my husband would feel the need to attend.

On to the dress. This is a relatively lightweight woven material that I picked up from the sale section of Fabricville for about $3/metre, labeled "unknown fibres" (which seems to be how they label them all). I wasn't sure if I was going to need to increase the size of the armsythe, but I tried in on after I assembled the pieces and discovered that it was almost cutting off circulation to my arms. Luckily, increasing the armhole size was easy, and I will keep it in mind for modifying patterns in the future. I added 2 inches to the bodice length and 3 inches to the bottom in hopes that it will fit me with minor adjustments.

The snaps were possibly my favourite part of this dress. Getting out a hammer and installing them was therapeutic, and I might look for more excuses in the future to use them. Maybe bibs for friend's baby showers? For those afraid of installing snaps, fear not! I needed to make a decision regarding the snaps around my bust: either let it gape a little, add another snap, or add an invisible snap. I decided to add the snap for now, with the option in the future to remove it and use an invisible one. Pro tip: If you want to remove a snap, use a flat-head screwdriver to pry it apart. I learned this because I accidentally installed the female side backwards after I had install the male side.

The bias binding at the neck and sleeves went awfully. It turns out that while I got better at knit binding, I have a long way to go for using woven binding. I'm still not happy with how the neckline turned out (is anyone surprised?) and the sleeves are only half decent, but I spent so much more time on this dress than I intended that I gave up. I did one of the sleeves 4 times. Moral of the story: I still have a lot to learn. Thank you to the lovely Ruth for these pictures in the church nursery between the potluck and hanging of the greens, it turns out getting pictures of a summer dress in the almost winter is difficult.

Details

Pattern: Adelaide by Colette Patterns
Material: Printed purple woven similar to quilting cotton from Fabricville (3$/m)
Modifications: Added 2 inches to the bodice, 3 inches in length and increased armsythe size. In the future I'm going to add some length at the top of the dress to make it a bit lower and widen the straps, the bust darts sit a bit too high on me.
Learning: How to install snaps! I also finally got to use the bias binding creating doohickys I bought off amazon, and they are super fun.