Just because..

 

Wedding dress update – The final fitting!

She loves it…

*tears*

I love it too.

 

One more flower girl dress and hairstyles

I went shopping again yesterday to find a dress for Destiny, the older flower girl. She’s 11, and as I had a lovely ivory satin ankle length dress in my hand, I just kept thinking about how she will never wear it again.  Dest is a funky stylin’ girl who is not really the super fancy dress wearing type,  you know? I mean she’s almost a teenager. I really wanted to find something that she might actually wear again, and maybe even like.

So I put the dress on hold and looked at virtually every store in the mall. The gap had a purple sun dress that was a strong contender,

except for the fact that the bodice is pretty skimpy, and well she is only 11 and not 17.

And then I walked into the Lovely Girl store and found this gorgeous, fully lined funky sundress:

Yeah, Maya really was too hard pressed to pose nicely..

Keep in mind that Destiny is probably 2 feet taller than Maya, so the dress should fall around her knees.

I love the back:

This periwinkle blue happens to look fantastic with the ivory and orange of the bride and bridesmaids dresses. I hope she likes it!

We also played around with some hairstyles for the girls. Rumor has it that the bride will have some kind of french braided style. With that in mind, we perused this amazing website: Dream weaver braiding

Holy moses are those amazing or what?? Look at this page

So Maya has chosen this beautiful classic braid with accent twist combo:

I couldn’t find a bobby pin to save my life this morning, so the ends will be much neater on the day.

I think we’ll look for some wildflowers to put in her hair too. I’ll let Kira and Dest pick their own hairstyles too.

Oh, and the wedding dress is so nearly completed. Just fixing the skirt today and will hopefully have the whole thing done by tonight! Whoo hoo!

 

A quick wedding dress update

One very happy woman just left my house.

Analise (the bride) came by tonight for a skirt fitting and decision making on the bodice draping. The skirt/petticoat need a little taken in on the sides, but fits perfectly otherwise. We tried out a few draping ideas, but we agreed to keep it as simple and streamlined as possible to showcase the texture of the silk.

I also passed along her chocolate brown silk shawl, fully lined with a lovely organic cotton knit jersey.

Why I didn’t get a picture of the shawl I have no idea. So you’ll just have to imagine just about the most luxurious and cuddly wrap.

So there it is. I’ll be spending Canada Day sewing, but I’m optimistic this dress will be done by the weekend!

Happy Canada Day everyone!

 

Wedding dress construction well underway!

Well,  even though my husband left for a week long business trip, I’m happy to report that I have been a busy little bee this past week. My dear sweet great Aunt helped me babysit Liam so I could sew. Thank-you Auntie Gisa!

I’ve inserted boning throughout the bodice, and I’ve cut and sewn up the silk overskirt, and 2 layers of the petticoat. The bamboo voile was just too see through on it’s own and actually kind of scratchy, so I basted some lightweight silk liner to it and so far so good.

I’m planning to attach the tulle to the petticoat, insert the zipper and hem all the layers tomorrow and Wednesday evenings.

What do you think? Is it too see through? (I’m just holding the layers together, so they’re not lined up properly or anything yet)

here’s the back:

I think I’ll wait until the sun’s lower and directly behind the skirt before I sew it all together… just in case..

Once the skirt’s done, then I need to finalize the draping for the bodice and sew that up. Then attach it to the skirt.  Oh yeah, and then sew 7 lined shoulder wraps.

Ok, the wedding date is July 18, 2009. That leaves me…19 days to finish everything.

 

The “New” Flower Girl Dresses

Oh Geez. Here I was, all my shopping done with 3 lovely dresses in hand. And as we were heading back from the shoe store we just happened to walk by “the flower girl dresses from heaven” store.

Oh lord.

The brides response to my purchase of the first dress was, and I quote:

“Why don’t the girls pick their own dresses? I’m not particular about color or style.”

I wonder if she had considered the strong liklihood of blinding bright fushia poofta dresses when she said that? Because that’s exactly what Maya made her very fast B-line towards, and subsequently fell madly in love with.

After a rather frantic “are you really sure you don’t care about dress color” phone call to my brother, I was given all deciding rights on the dresses. By the grace of all that is holy, there was the same exact dress in a very nice ivory.

I give you the “new” flower girl dress for the 2 younger girls:

Complete with flowered headband and matching shawl for the shoulders. She was so very very excited about wearing something so beautiful, how could I say no? Especially when the price was within $15 of the first dress? Her cousin is going to be completely ecstatic, and “will wear it every day if she can” as my older brother tells me.

So there it is. The other dresses are getting returned and I will make one last trip to pick out the dress for the older niece next week when her size comes in.

And Maya will be a princess for every Halloween, Christmas, Thanksgiving, birthday party and special occaision for the next 3 years….

 

Wedding dress progress – Flower Girl Dresses!

Ok, the bridal shower post is delayed, in lieu of my great shopping success today

Let me begin by saying a humongous “THANK-YOU” to my 4 year old son Liam for being such a great shopper with me today. We cruised the mall for 2 hours and he was very persistent in asking everyone if they knew where the dresses were. And then he found us the elevator in the Bay. I’m so proud! (see, usually shopping with him involves crying, struggling, running away and hiding all in the first 2 minutes of entering the mall.)

Anyway, with the bridal silk and my bridesmaid dress in hand, I cruised literally every children’s store and department looking for 3 flower girl dresses in sizes 8, 10 and womens xtra small. Just finding matching dresses in those sizes I already thought was a feat in and of itself, but they had to also be good compliment for the ivory silk bride’s dress and rusty orange bridesmaid’s dresses.

Just when I thought it would never happen, I found this fully lined and completely charming summer dress:

Look at it with the bridal silk:

Gold foil on white ….. who’d've thunk?

Now look at the rest of the fabric pallette…

Is that gorgeous or is that gorgeous? That orange was the kicker. It’s a very interesting color which changes it’s undertone as you move to a different light. I actually had a soft, light apple green in hand which under the lights in the Bay looked just amazing with the rusty orange. But then when I held the combo under the lights in the mall, I found myself cringing as the red brown undertone turned to a coral pink undertone and looked just ick with that particular green.

Anyhoo, I found the other 2 sizes in a different mall and will pick those up on Saturday. I also bought Liam his snazzy wedding outfit:

And I also found my shoes for the wedding as well! Hrm. I suppose I should take a picture of them eh? Ok, maybe the next post I’ll show you my outfit. Oh did I forget to mention that I am a bridesmaid?

 

Wedding dress progress – Omg the liner fits!

Like a glove, I tell you LIKE A GLOVE!

Yes, after redrafting all10 pieces and painstakingly sewing it all together, it’s perfect. I’m just beside myelf right now, I’m so so happy, relieved and excited! Ha, Analise and I were whooping and cheering when she put it on! She’s pleased as punch, as it’s far surpassed anything she had envisioned which just sends me over the moon. YAY!

PHEW! I can now finally move on to drafting and sewing the mock up for the skirt and petticoat.

I bought this gorgeous, silky and very lightweight eco friendly bamboo voile for the petticoat. I’ll be sure to snag a picture of it in the next day or two. It’s just the  perfect fabric for a sweltering hot summer’s day (which is most likely what we’ll have). It’s extremely breathable, and won’t stick to her legs if she get’s sweaty. I almost bought this cotton batiste, this extremely thin thin cotton, but I could just see it plastering itself to her legs the second they caught any moisture at all. I mean how awful would that feel? Nope, bamboo baby, I can’t wait to see how it works out!

I also have decided to keep the silk as streamlined and molded to the bodice liner as possible. I tried out some draping and no matter what I do it either ends up looking like mummy wrappings or just plain bulky. See?

a center pull draping..

a sweetheart draping…

It just seems to muck up the nice clean line of the bodice liner.

Ok. Next up, a post about her wedding shower..

 

Wedding dress progress – the sash arrived!

And is it ever beautiful!

Those are authentic abalone shells tied down with a proper sinew lacing. Wow, the craftswomanship of this traditional Native American wedding sash is stunning. It’s about 2″ wide, woven with what looks like 9 strands of cedar bark strips and closes with a pair of hook and eye closures hidden by the abalone shells.

We had a fitting last week and we finalized the bodice liner pattern:

I extended the top right to the bottom of the empire waist line and will attach the skirt directly to the bodice. Now I need to redraft the pieces for the back of the bodice. I think I need to insert some boning into the back to help it stay put. Then I can begin piecing together the skirt/petticoat.

I tried out some draping ideas with the silk yesterday, but I haven’t found the “right” way yet.

Off to Fabricana I go!

 

Some cute critters for Marilyn

Remember how Marilyn is waiting for my really late blocks? for the Sew Connected 2 swap?

Well I finally finished them. Phew!

Ooh man these are some of the cutest patterns I’ve worked with. I mean look at this racoon!

I totally giggled my way through this one. She’s the fanciest racoon in town! We were allowed to add coordinating solids from our stash, so I pulled a variety of pinks and brown to help with this block. The background is a super soft prewashed baby flannel which I thought was perfect for this baby quilt.

And how could I resist this puppy pattern?

If I had more time I would embroider some eyes on all of these little critters.

The sparrow is definitely one of my all time favorite patterns. The movement in this block is just perfect.

I found all of these great 6 inch blocks at the Piece by Number Etsy store . You have to click over and check out her patterns. There’s a great variety of patterns in all ranges of difficulty.

These patterns ranged from easy – puppy, to moderate – sparrow, to difficult – racoon.  The racoon pattern has several small pieces which are a little tricky to piece together at the end. But with a little patience and careful alignment it all works out.

I can’t wait to see Marilyn’s quilt all done. It’s going to be just beautiful, I’m already coveting it!