Derailing the plan

So apparently I'm going back to work next week, which is a week earlier than I was told. I guess that's a good thing....I'd be more enthusiastic if I didn't spend hours at a time scrounging for things to do every time I'm there. So that's going to leave me with a lot less time to do the things I'd planned to do, like mending.  But I did get several more things done over the last couple of days, which I'll get back to in a bit.

The main derailment of the plan, though, comes courtesy of one of my friends-- I was helping her reconstruct a dress for a holiday party yesterday (pics may come later if she allows it, once she finishes it), and while she was at it, she invited me to the birthday party she's going to be throwing for her boyfriend in a few weeks. It's a Mad Men-themed party, so the dress is basically early 60s cocktail. I don't know about you, but since I don't really spend a lot of time with vintage fashion like a lot of other sewing blogs I read, I don't really have anything suitable just lying around, you know? (Besides, when I go 60s, it's usually more the boho-hippie end of things!) I'd never actually watched an episode of Mad Men until last night, since she and I put it on Netflix while we worked, but I'm always up for a costume party! I want something I can wear again, though...

So, since I'm on limited time, I'm going to go with a pattern I already have on hand: the Licorice dress from the new Colette book.

 

 

(Picture from the Coletterie)

I figured it has sort of the look, and it has sleeves, which is definitely a bonus for December. I just hope it turns out ok, because my fabric's not ideal according to the recommendations. I have about 3 yards of that Casa satin stuff that anyone who's ever browsed the fancy fabric section of Joann's should be familiar with, in a forest green. It's leftovers from the dress I sewed for my masters' degree recital, because apparently I severely overestimated how much fabric I'd need for the very full skirt. I also have about a yard of this pretty green brocade that I made the top out of. I can't seem to find a picture of me actually wearing it on my computer--I guess this was when I was transitioning from my old film camera to my digital--so I just threw the dress on Donna:

Man, I hope I still have those recital pics around somewhere. Anyway.

What I'm thinking is to use the satin for the bulk of the dress, and then the brocade for the neckline bit and tie/belt/whatever. (I'm strongly tempted to get one of those belt kits from A Fashionable Stitch for this one! Even though I haven't used the first one I got from her yet, because I haven't gotten to the raincoat.) But I am concerned that the satin is a little heavier-weight than it sounds like it should be. So I ran out to Joann's this morning to see what I could find. Basically what it came down to is that all of the prints I liked were too late 60s or modern, all of the ones that looked like it might fit the look of the floral-print dresses I saw in the show were kind of ugly, and the one print I did like that would fit the look was basically a black polka dot on ivory. But it was a taffeta-type fabric, which is even stiffer than this satin. And if I was going to have to go for a solid color, I figured I might as well bust the stash I have. So instead of buying new fabric, I sprang for the nice Bemberg rayon lining and got a little extra, thinking that the dress itself appears to be structured enough that the satin will probably work, and if I underline the sleeves with the Bemberg too, it might soften them up a bit. Here's hoping it works.

Also, I do have a couple of mending updates that are actually worth showing, since they're more along the lines of refashionings:

I have this jacket that I picked up from the thrift store earlier this year, because it fits me almost perfectly and I love the color and pleat details. One of the buttons on the sleeve was actually broken though--basically, there was about a quarter of it left. I hid it by leaving it unbuttoned for several months, but finally went ahead and just replaced the buttons. There wasn't a spare, so I had to replace them all, and since Joann's didn't have a large enough quantity of any button remotely close to the right size, I had to make my own.

So here it is with its new fabric-covered buttons....

....which are more fun than those brown ones anyway.

I also had this long, never-been-worn, tags-still-on-it denim skirt that a friend passed along to me because it ended up not fitting her.

(Check out the detailing in the back!)

This is the after-- I didn't get a pic of it before, but it ended up being too big on me. So basically, I just took in the sides a nice chunk and re-did the topstitching.

(Took it in that much, to be exact.) So it fits much better now, and I'm excited to actually be able to wear it!

Now, off to trace a pattern....