MMJ Day 5

Well, I salvaged the tie dye knit from that dreadful concoction called Vogue 1250. You can see the original disaster in my previous post. I purchased the fabric to make another version of Donna Karan’s wrap dress from Vogue 1159, and, thanks to piecing the remains of the disaster and the little bit of yardages I’d not used, managed to sew it up after all.

So here’s my salute to the tie dye world. And I like it a million times better than that other dress. Outfit: Vogue 1159

Activities: My niece’s first communion and a small family get-together at my MIL’s afterwards.

Thoughts: This design is very comfortable to wear. I did change a few things from the first version during the construction, and fiddling afterwards while wearing it. I was still pulling threads and cutting away linings in the car on the way to the church!

It was a day full of me-made items. DD1 and DD3 decided to wear dresses made at home. Hannah’s dress was her summer project last year, and although she loves wearing it, she is not interested in sewing for herself. She’d rather be creative on a miniature scale. Here’s the Flickr set. And Isabella is wearing a sundress I smocked for Hannah about 5 years ago. I’ll add the details to Tia Dia Needleworks soon, I hope. It’s a green & white gingham with hearts picture smocked on the front. There’s small ruffles around the arms and neckline, and a deeper one at the hemline that are accentuated with orange and pink spider web flowers.

And my first niece wore a sundress I’d made for her birthday last year. There’s a certain sense of fun and satisfaction to see garments one’s made being worn with pleasure and flattering the wearer. This little dress was made of batik, bound with Liberty of London and smocked in the front. I must say smocking the batik was awful. It’s not a dyed batik, but a printed one, and the printing put an almost impenetrable finish on the cotton, so the smocking could only be done in small doses. The original design was navy blue with white binding, which is very classic, but doesn’t suit the lively personality of my niece. Every birthday she requests a new dress, and this year she wants a “something made by Tia Dia” in purple!