Dinosaur Dress

Hey everyone and welcome back to another post about selfish sewing! This week I’m going to share my sewing process while creating my 17th completed dress of this year, the dinosaur dress. This dinosaur fabric has sat in my  fabric stash since the beginning of the year, when my sewing adventures began.

I purchased from  Fabric.com - Black dinosaur (the link goes directly to the fabric) and it sat in my stash until two weeks ago. I washed, dried, and ironed the fabric as usual and began the process of cutting out the fabric on a Sunday after work. This dress is a combination of a Simplicity 1873 style C bodice with my own self drafted skirt pattern and the pocket pattern from Simplicity 1419. I haven’t worked with Simplicity 1873 in a while, having switched to a low back bodice pattern from Butterick b5748. The biggest problem I have with Simplicity 1873 is that is runs a little small for me and my bust. It also has a high back style, which is hard for me to zip up myself. Having issues with the fit in the past, I have traced the pattern onto a piece of sturdy wrapping paper to adjust the sizing issues. When I finished sewing together the bodice front to the bodice back pieces for the dino dress, I believed the bodice was too small and would not fit. Panic set in and began to seam rip the side seam and thinking of ways to fix the problem.

I began to sew in an inch of extra fabric, and I didn’t realize I sewed it in on the wrong side of the fabric. Frustrated with my mistake, I let the torn apart bodice sit and I went to work. The next day, I removed the weird piece I made and decided to sew the bodice back together, but at a 3/8’s inch seam allowance instead of the 5/8’s inch needed by the Simplicity 1873 bodice pattern. That seemed to do the trick. I was also able to install the zipper with no problem. I took my time, sewed carefully, and took the time to move the dress out of the way as I sewed the zipper. I choose a 22" blue zipper that matches the blue Brachiosaurus dinosaur on the front of the bodice.

The only weird thing that happened was that my fabric kept gathering, and without notice, I increased the stitch tension to +2 when I gathered the skirt, but I had forgot to switch it back to auto or normal after I finished. After fixing that small mistake, everything was smooth sailing!

I am so happy with the final product of this dino print dress! I have wanted to make my own dino dress for half a year and having the ability and the skills to do so really makes me proud! It took me four days to make this dress from start to finish. My only complaint is that the back is a little poofy from the gathered skirt, I must find a remedy for this! I can't wait to wear this for Dinosaur programs at the Library or out to a museum! This dress is so appropriate for those outings and occasions. Thank you for reading and check in next week for my review of my current Halloween themed self sewing project. xoxo