It's not 100% complete - it still needs to be hemmed on the bottom, but since that's hidden under a dress or a skirt, who really cares? - however, it's close enough for me! Sadly I can't get a picture of the full thing because HTB is asleep upstairs, and I don't want to disturb him for a clothes-hanger, and any time I try to drape the chemise over the chair artistically this happens:
Also, our photographer is still cleaning up the pictures from Calico, so I don't have any of those yet :P
Remember how I said that gussets where a royal pain in the you know what? Well right there is an example of the gusset in the sleeve. It wasn't too much of a problem when I was finishing the sleeve, but attaching it to the body of the chemise was a whole different story. There's a method to sewing princess seams, and I wondered if that would work here since it's the same concept - just without the curves. Sadly it didn't, so I had to sew the gusset on the sides and bottom, and then the corners, which resulted in these little tucks where the fabric wouldn't lay flat when I was sewing it. Which no one can really see because it is in the armpit of the chemise so who is really going to look that closely at the piece? But still, it was such a pain. Like I said - I HATE gussets.
Also I made a boo-boo here. When you have to gather something, the easiest way is to sew two lines parallel to each other on the loosest stitch your sewing machine has. Then you pull the threads on one end of the lines and, viola! Gathering! Then you have to pin it and arrange it so that it fits and looks good, and sew it to the waist band, or, in this case, neck band, and once that is done you're supposed to go in with your seam ripper and rip out those lines that you did the gathering with. Well, I forgot to do that and didn't realize that I had forgotten to do that until we got to Calico and we were taking our pictures. Oops. Thankfully it's another one of those things that you don't really notice until you're actually looking for it.
Overall - not too bad for my first Civil War era piece!
Most impressive! Especially since I can't sew - very nice job, even with your "oops!"
ReplyDeleteGreat work! Are you making things to go with it as well?
ReplyDeleteExcellent! I envy people who can sew...
ReplyDeleteIt looks great! I can't wait to see the pics of you wearing it.
ReplyDeleteVery nicely done!
ReplyDeleteCan I tell you how glad I am that you included the picture of Kitty Chemise????? That gave me SUCH a big smile!
ReplyDeleteI still couldn't see the problems with the chemise even when you pointed them out. :p
Excited to see the photos from Calico! :)
I am in awe of this -- excellent work despite any glitches along the way.
ReplyDeleteLove old time clothing, just glad I didn't live in the day they actually wore it all the time!
ReplyDeleteIt looks great! I love the picture of the kitty jumping on it, because that's how things work in my house too.
ReplyDelete