One Dollar Remake

So July 15th, the day before my birthday, I decided to visit the Humane Society Thrift Store, to see what was there to be seen. I'd popped in a week earlier and noticed they'd dropped their prices a bit on clothes, which made me very happy! I expected $2 blouses at the least, which is about as good as it gets in my area. Lo and behold, I walk in on a one day sale, "All women's clothes $1, except bridal and new tags." YESSSSSS!!! It's not even my birthday yet, and it's already my lucky day! I hunted. It was a glorious hunt. I ended up with only four items, three dresses and one top, but I was quite satisfied. Given that for some reason it takes me forever to work up the courage to actually make the first cut, I figured these would last me awhile. 

Now all I had to do was wait for my birthday present, which I suspected would be the dress form I've wanted for months. It came on my birthday, but I was gone all day so didn't open it til midnight!

Yay!!!

I finally decided to start on the first dress yesterday. Here's the before. Size 14.

I'm wearing a slip under it, as it's terrifically see-thru. This pattern isn't quite my normal taste, as I usually prefer louder colors, but when I saw it I had visions of flirty, light summer frocks dancing in my head, so I decided to go for it, just for a change. 

Let the chopping commence!

Off with the sleeves! I debated leaving cap sleeves, but the weather decided for me that I didn't want sleeves. I'm in the South ya'll, this doesn't work so well most of the year!

I had noticed in the dressing room that there were a couple of buttons missing from the front. I debated replacing all the buttons for about 3 seconds, then realized I could probably simply take the two bottom buttons off and just sew up that little section, and use the buttons where needed. 

Yay! That idea worked out pretty well. Slight complication with sewing up the two inches where the buttons originally used to be, apparently as large as the dress is, it wouldn't fit over my hips quite right. It goes over my shoulders remarkably well, however, so problem solved. :)

I took in the sides about an inch or so on each side, and experienced more hassle sewing them up than I ever expected. I tweaked the machine a bit for a zig-zag stitch, and that stitch was the stitch from hell. I didn't take a pic so I can't show you what happened, but I had to take it all out and stick with a regular straight stitch. Grumble. Fabric has a mind of it's own, I tell you. And I am now out of white thread.

The sleeves were not a nightmare, I think I learned tremendous lessons from the last sleeves I hemmed. These turned out very nicely, and were probably the easiest part of the dress to finish. I debated taking off the collar, but then decided I liked it just fine. A touch 50's housewife maybe, but sometimes vintage is cute.

Finally, all that was left was the length to consider. My brilliant idea that I had when trying on the dress, was to chop the skirt in half, and sew the chopped half over the remaining skirt at the waist, making it a two layer skirt. (It was prettier in my head than it sounds like.) So I guesstimated where to chop, and chopped. 

And I chopped too much. Yes, I forgot the rule of thumb, it's better to leave more fabric than less..  Ugh! Here's a pic.

This length might be wonderful for those who do not possess mile long legs, but for me, this is just too short, and I hadn't even hemmed it yet. I think I stalked around the house pouting and grumbling out loud. I think my dog hid in a corner, questioning my sanity. Finally I decided to simply take the fabric I'd chopped, and add about 5 inches to the bottom of my skirt. I didn't see a good way for me to add the fabric over or under the skirt, it still would've been too short. So I start pinning. I pinned beautifully. Turned my dress right side out and looked to be sure I'd pinned it wrong side in. Nope. I pinned it the wrong way. The hem would be facing out of the dress, rather than inside. 

Seriously? I mean really? Sigh. I pull out all my pins, and re-situate the fabric. I'ma do it right this time. Pin, pin, pin. The thought occurs to me that I should check to be sure I'm not repeating the same mistake, but I dismiss the thought. Surely I've learned my lesson by now. Surely I am doing it right this time. Finish pinning and check again before sewing. 

'When will I listen to the voice of reason?' I cried. 

I had pinned it wrong the second time. Pinned it the EXACT same way as I did it the first time. This time I just laughed. No room to be grumpy now, just let me laugh as I take out the pins. I felt much better. This time I checked and rechecked, and then checked again. Started pinning. After about 6 pins, checked frantically to be sure I was doing it right. I was!

So finally I pinned, cut, trimmed, sewed, and my garment was finished. Try it on. Enjoy the feel of the light, airy fabric. Shed a tear that it didn't look exactly like the dress of my dreams. But it's alright. It'll wear. 

Here it is.

I had wanted it to be just an inch or two shorter, and I also didn't exactly want the 5 inch 70's hem, but that didn't work out due to my mistake, so I'll take it as a lesson learned and enjoy my very comfortable dress anyway. It's not something I'd wear to meet the Queen, but...

My hubs takes the picture, and informs me that he's not a fan of button up anything. How am I married to a man's man, fashion sense(less), fabulous guy for over 3 years and not know that he doesn't like buttons?

Before and after pic

Refashion is my new best friend!

Ok, so here's my first ever (truly successful) refashion!!!!!! I'm pretty excited about it! I was wandering in Goodwill the other day, when it occurred to me to check out the outdated, hideous clothes section, for possible refash's. Lo and behold, this 'beauty' caught my attention immediately!

Here it is, in all it's size 18, 80's glory!!! 

I stalked the store for several minutes, searching for a bolero type sweater to go with it, my plan was simply to hike the skirt up over my chest and strap on a belt (there was a zipper and elastic, so this required absolutely no sewing whatsoever, and I already had the handy dandy belt). I didn't want to wear just the skirt as my dress without some kind of sleeves or something to go over my shoulders.. Strapless is not my friend. Seriously. Then it occurred to me, even though it's only my first real refashion, why not have a go at that top and see if I could make it into something passable and pretty? Light bulb moment!!! Bought it! (Seriously Goodwill, $9 for a ugly 30 y/o garment? Not cool.)

Headed home and got to work on it. Chop goes the sleeves, chop goes the bottom part of the top! (Sorry, didn't get proper pics of that process.) Start pinning... 

Ah, what frustration, yet what joy! The vision I had for this piece was gorgeous (of course) the application, well, the less said about that, the better.

After many fittings, and many more fittings, and then a few more after that (I really need a proper dress form, although I think my zebra print is quite nice looking.) I finally gathered enough courage to put needle and thread to my creation, only to discover.....

I didn't have anywhere close to the right color thread. Grump. Off to Joann's I go. Arrive at Joann's to find that I DIDN'T bring a piece of the fabric with me to match the color!!! At least I remembered my coupon. Grumble grumble. Well I'll just guess and pray it's the right thing. (This rarely goes well.) After a good 10 minutes of agonizing over two nearly identical yet COMPLETELY different shades of thread, I gulped and picked the darker shade. Checked out, used the coupon, and treated myself to one of those 50 cent pieces of chocolate goodness thingamabob's. You know, the one with creamy, thicker-than-Hershey's-syrup-but-not-actually-cream consistency? Yeah, that one. It was delicious. Be jealous. So, I get home, and match up the thread.. Waddya know, it's actually a VERY close match! Yay me! Time to get sewing!

For some reason, this kind of edge was a pain in the butt to get even and centered properly. You can see in the earlier pic how it's got a rounded edge over the chest, it's very pretty, but very nit picky to get right. The first run-through I did, I asked my incredible fashion sense(less) husband if the edge was straight. Even he knew it was way off (not posting the pic because it's just not even worth it, use your imagination people!). Ugh. 

Anyway, fast forward, I finally got it even (more or less, we'll just go with more right now), and said, 'whatever, I'm sewing it.'

Whirrr.. It went so much faster and less scary than I anticipated! Done! Now for the sleeves. I'm not even going to go into the sleeves. Suffice it to say that I hemmed them eventually, and they were surprisingly easy after the headache they gave me went away.

Final reveal...

Ta Da!!!!!!!!!!

I'm quite pleased with it! (I actually took in that top a wee bit more after this pic, it was just a bit too big around the sides, but for some reason I don't have a pic of that.. maybe I'll take it and post it later..)

So, this is it! Waddya think? Before and After!