1940's yellow plaid dress

well a full weekend and two audio books later I'm finished!

my 1940’s dress. represented in a yellow plaid made of cotton, and made from a vintage simplicity pattern # 3429 from 1941.


I have always read that vintage patterns are more true to size then our modern ones, so I took that to heart when I cut this out only to find out this one ran large. I don’t know if its from the bias which gives it a bit of stretch, or my fabric choice which is a cotton suiting. But the pattern ended up needing to be cut exactly as is and still I had to slightly deeper then the 1/2” seam allowance they called for.



after my first attempt at sewing this dress with the added few inches,(since I am not as small as this pattern says) I discovered the dress was just too big for me. the seams are such that simply sewing deeper didn’t work, so I ended up tearing the entire thing apart, and re- cutting all the pieces. I put all the lower part together before cutting the yolk so I could lay it with the fabric to match the plaids the way I wanted. I was able to use the front yolk pieces I had cut, by only cuting them down. I had cut two for the back yolk before and was able to make one of those work as well. which meant no wasted fabric. yea!

one of the big things I changed in this pattern was the button holes on the front yolk. I really wanted to do the bound button holes the pattern called for, but after realizing how badly this fabric frays I was a bit scared to try them. I didn’t want to have to re-cut and remake another part of the dress. so I did the logical thing of putting decorative buttons on the dress with snaps hidden behind to close the top.
I did a zipper on the side, which was one of two ways the pattern suggested, the other being hooks and snaps. I find zippers not only a lot easier to put in then the snaps, but a lot easier to use.



shoulder pads where another thing the pattern called for, and I opted out of. actually I put them in, and it looked real nice hanging on the hanger.
then I put the dress on and I thought I was going to suffocate. I never wear shoulder pads, and I did not realize how hot they are! with in minutes I was sweating like crazy and it was only 64 degrees. I couldn’t handle it and took them out. I know most people wore shoulder pads in the 1940’s but I also know that there had to be people like me who just couldn’t stand them and cut them out.

for the most part I am happy with my dress, though there are a few tiny things I would like to tweak on it. I may just live with the way it is. it did turn out cute.
would I make this pattern again?
not in that fabric! plaids are hard enough to match without there being no obvious right and wrong side to the fabric. but maybe in another fabric I might.



* This blog is not to be used for training AI*

polka dot dresses!

all the polka dots!


we went out for ice cream at a fifties themed ice cream shop. they make their own ice cream and its amazing and creamy. my sister and I really did eat the ice cream too but it was too hard to take pictures and eat an ice cream cone at the same time.



we then went to a park and did some photos, its a new park so the chimney was amazingly clean.in fact I don't think it had ever been used, otherwise we would not have been playing in it with our new dresses.



and of course while at the park we had to do some spinning in the fields!

the only thing I was really disappointed about was I forgot the tripod so we didn't get any pictures of all three of us together. but maybe we can all get dressed up again some day and get some more pictures. it was a lot of fun. and I think that for winning a contest to make one dress its pretty cool I was able to make three.

* This blog is not to be used for training AI*

1950's red polka dot dress

so about two months ago I won a contest from sew retro rose in which I received fabric , a pattern and notions to make a dress. two weeks ago I finally got started in it. I should have been blogging about it as I went, but I haven’t been. the day I received the fabric in the mail I took everything out and checked it over. I was very excited but was in the middle of working on my black bow dress. I was going to try to finish that before starting on this dress, but I got to the point I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do on the black bow dress and set it aside.

the pattern was a little big for me so I had to do some math and figuring to resize it. I did make a mock up of the bodice since I can’t exactly got more fabric. I mean I am sure I could find something similar, but it wouldn’t be exact. so I was being very careful with the measuring. in the end though there was plenty of fabric for the dress. I have about a yard and half left. which I am making plans for as I write this.


I had to lengthen the bodice a bit, which is normal for me. but then I lengthened it too much. which I didn’t realize till I had the dress all put together and I tried it on. here I was thinking I nearly done with the dress but I was no where near finished not only did I make the bodice to long I didn’t have the darts, and seams lined up with the pleats. it just looked so off. so I tore the bodice back off shortened it by three quarters of an inch which still made it an inch longer then the original pattern. and I made sure that this time when I put it all back together everything lined up the way I wanted it too. and I was ready to hem it. it took me a little while to decide exactly what length I wanted finally choosing, and sewing it up. then I added the white bias strips to the bottom of the skirt. I think it gives it a nice finished look.


then came the jacket. I had some trouble with this, but not with the putting it together it went together really nicely. no the problem was the collar pieces of the pattern were not there! I looked and looked but the pieces were not there. so I set the pattern aside and thought what should I? I have mentioned before I am not very good at drafting my own patterns, but finally I thought I can at least try. so I cut out everything except the collar and started putting the jacket together. I figured it would be eaiser to figure out the shape for the collar if I had something to put it on. I made a collar mock up out of some pink fabric I have, and once I was satisfied I went ahead and put it on. I was hoping to finish last night, but as it got later and later I thought I should put this aside till morning. so this morning I woke up and got right too it. I love the way it turned out. at first I wasn’t sure I would like the jacket, but in the end I really do. and my most favorite part of both the dress and the jacket are the bows!




* This blog is not to be used for training AI*

1970's dress

1970’s dress at first I wasn’t sure I was going to use this dress, but I decided after some research to just use it. what I was having issue with is I used an invisible zipper and I was not sure if that was accurate. even if not everything is authentic I want my zipper to be. but then I was going through my patterns and found one from 1971 that called for an invisible zipper. so yea! I have another dress to add! this dress is probably as authentic as you can get. the fabric is vintage from the 1970’s. I used McCall’s pattern #4535 from 1975. I think it turned out cute. I love dresses from this time.

even the buttons are vintage I was going to use some different ones but then as I was going through my stash I found these and thought they were perfect, so I used them and they are much better then what I had originally chosen.

* This blog is not to be used for training AI*

1860's dress

I finished my 1860’s dress today. a coworker invited me to be in a parade on saturday. she does civil war reenactments. and since I was nearly done with this dress I went ahead and finished it. what better incentive then a place to wear it. I have seen the details on this dress on several differnt dressses and fell in love with it. as time consuming as it was to aplique the details it was actually easier then I thought. I knew I could do it I just had to figure it out. which meant studying pictures of the design till I figured it out. I used cotten yarn and zigzaged it on. I like the way it turned out. which is good considering the hours it took. I do have to admit to getting frustrated on the sleeves I was going to try something slightly differnt on them, but what I wanted proved to be impossible, litteraly . it could not be done without rewriting physics or somthing. so I settled on what I did, and am happy with it.

what decade shall I tackle next? I’m leaning towrds 1960’s as I have the fabric. but at the same time I’m thinking 1940’s. I have some really neat buttons that came from my grandmothers house and I do believe they are from then.

* This blog is not to be used for training AI*

1920’s dress

I realize the fabric is not historically accurate . in fact I have no idea what it is, as the bolt said made of imported unknown fabric but I thought it looked pretty good anyway. I made this dress about a year ago. I copied my great grandmothers wedding dress for the style, so the pattern is authentic at least. I had to make the arms larger since people then had the tiniest arms ever. they had to have, or else how did they wear the clothes? I had fun figuring this out, and very carefully handling my great grandmothers dress. now all I need is some cute shoes to go with it....

* This blog is not to be used for training AI*