McCalls 6032 First Look

This dress took me far longer to sew up than I anticipated so I'm not entirely feeling the love right now, although I am planning to wear it to work tomorrow. Mostly because I spent more time sewing than doing laundry. ;-)

Apologies for the blurry pic, but it's probably just as well since I spent most of the day in loungewear (OK, it was my PJs!!) and my hair is sticking out in all directions. I'm hoping to get a full complement of outside pics after work tomorrow.

I resized the pattern down to a 16 and cut/sewed that with the only other alteration being to move the underbust seam/gather hole thingie down 1". I didn't do an FBA and there's plenty of room for the girls. The shoulders keep wanting to slide outward so while I'm watching TV tonight, I'm going to "whip up" some bra keepers to hold things in place. I think I really need no bigger than a 14 in upper bust these days so some more resizing will be in my future if I stick to my pattern stash.

I'm going to need to stick on some Hollywood tape at cleavage level because even though I raised the front neckline about 2", it's still hovering in "look down to see my belly button" range. Nothing shows, so it's technically not too low, but I want to keep it that way and the tape will do that. I also raised the back neckline mega inches and it's OK now. The pattern notes as drafted it's something like 9" below the back neckline. Uh, no thank you. Not for work, anyway.

The front waistband is supposed to be twisted, but when I tried it, it collapsed onto itself and looked wimpy so I left it straight (still gathered into the sideseams). The "belt" is just a length of the border sewn into a tube and tied around the waistband. I'm still deciding on it, but it does cover the CF seam running down the skirt, which even though it pretty much matches across the seam, still looks weird to me.

I also added a back waistband, which I like, and I cut the back pieces on the fold so there's no weird seam. In a knit, I didn't need a zipper so I didn't need a seam. If I ever make this dress again, and I probably won't, I will cut the front piece on the fold too. There's really no reason not to.

This dress is supposed to be lined at the bodice. I didn't bother. I just turned the neckline under 5/8" and coverstitched it in two passes (due to the vees front and back). Lastly, I cut the armhole seam allowances to 3/8" and subbed in my TNT Ottober tee sleeves (after walking the stitching line to be sure it would work).

Thanks to Eljean for suggesting I look at Walmart for toe hose thingies. I found some and I think they will work fine. Some of you seemed to be confused - I'm not going to wear them with open shoes where they would show. They are for my closed shoes that will feel funny with bare feet and they won't show with those, I tried 'em out already.

Speaking of shoes ... these cheapies fell into my cart while I was Walmart. They will probably only last a season, but they are priced to be pretty much disposable anyway. At least now I have a pair of black heeled sandals to wear with the new dress.