Hey, Guess What

Monday I finished the last round of sewing-my-ass-off for other people in preparation for the event this weekend, which will be the last one of the season for me, and one of the biggest Ansteorran events of the year, and...

 ...which starts, um...tomorrow...

...I did something completely insane.  Can you guess what it is?

I'll give you a hint: 

I got home from work at 6:00, and ate dinner. 

At 6:30 I started cutting. 

At 1:00AM this morning I had a finished gown.   

All except for the buttons, that is.  Those are a bit of an issue.  I don't have any I can use, and my favorite online button store shut down without warning a couple of months ago.  I can't get buttons for less than full price anymore, and those suckers are expensive, especially when you need anywhere from 14-40 of them per gown!  Payday's tomorrow.  Either I find some that are affordable, I harvest buttons from another dress, or I make cloth buttons and hope they hold.  

Meantime, aside from the possibility that I'll have to buy buttons I can't afford, the rest of the dress was entirely free.  The fabric, a midnight-blue, hi-pile, velvety, brushed denim twill, came from a friend's de-stash party last month.  The gold brocade trim was given to me by another friend who made waaaaay too much for a dress she made for herself.  The red linen and gold jeans thread you can see in some of the pics were from my own stash.  

I have to say, this dress was an exciting adventure in getting to know my new sewing machine better.  There are four different embroidery stitches in this dress, two different seam-edge treatments, and I got to bust out the buttonholer for the first time.  I've never used one; every machine I've ever had has had a buttonhole stitch on it, but not an actual attachment. This one has the giant gizmo that you put the button into.  I have to say, it works fabulously.  It didn't work on this dress, though, because of the trim on the front opening edge, which was in the way - I ended up making the buttonholes freehand, with a tiny, tight zig-zag stitch.  But the test buttonholes blew me away.  In general, this machine routinely blows my mind with how easy it's making my sewing life.  Thank you, new sewing machine! 

And as for the finished dress?  You'll have to see it next week when I bring you pics from the event.  :) 

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