ready. set. gather!

I decided to make a (hopefully) wearable muslin of the Chelsea dress out of the ink blue and floral fabrics I posted last night, but when I went to lay the pattern out and realized that my hips were not one, or even two... but a whole 2.5 sizes bigger than my bust/waist according to the pattern sizing, I started to feel a bit sick about cutting into those fabrics straight-away.  I've become fond of them and would actually like to be sure I can wear them outside the house.

So, I decided to make an intermediary muslin... is it a muslin of a muslin?  Or a meta-muslin?  Who knows how many times I will do this before I make what I define as a real dress... but more on that later.

I scrounged around in my sorry little stash and found 2 yards of this Asian-inspired cotton print.

It's a bit stiff and crisp, as cotton often is... but it will do the trick.  I only had enough to cut the dress front and back with it... so I found about a yard of black muslin too to make the yoke and sleeves. I decided to make the v-neck yoke to keep things easier & I skipped the pockets.  It dawned on me that the only make of this dress with v-neck that I've seen is the official one from the pattern.  Everyone wants that darling collar.  As do I.  But not yet. 

I made the whole v-neck yoke out of black, with black short sleeves. I got the yoke and the dress completed last night and separate pieces.  Tonight, after dinner, I will gather the dress and attach to the yoke.  Fuss around with fit if necessary.  And add the hem.  I may or may not make the little bow. I wish now that I had made the v part with the floral... I think I could have eked that piece out of the leftover bits from cutting the dress front and back and it would have looked cool.  I think this dress pattern is super-fun because there are a lot of different options for mixing and matching pieces to create your own style garment that is a riff on the designer's original vision...  It seem like she planned it that way.  You can recognize a Chelsea as a Chelsea... but the variations are endless.  Just do a Google image search of "Christine Haynes Chelsea Dress" and you can see what I mean!  That is... if you haven't already made your own variation!

So here's what I will be gathering together this evening... I am looking forward to seeing how it turns out and getting the courage up to make a proper dress with the blue linen/cotton and the floral cotton.

What is a proper dress, by my definition?  Well - it's something that I would either wear to work or wear on a date. That's pretty straight forward, right?

My goal for the month ahead is what I have dubbed the Mini-Me-Made-May challenge.  I want to make one dress that I like well enough to wear to work. And one dress that I like well enough to wear on a dinner date with my husband.   Maybe this time next year, I'll be ready for the full-on me-made May... but for now, a mini-version suits me fine.