Sewing for a Wedding

My current sewing goals revolve around my new role as a mother of the bride.  My daughter is getting married this June, and I have volunteered to make the bridesmaid dresses.  There will be five attendants plus a flower girl.  Whether or not to make the flower girl dress has not been decided, but I am committed to making bridesmaid dresses in a simple but elegant style.  We have chosen Vogue 1250 that everyone in the sewing blogosphere has probably made by now.  As I perused some bridesmaid styles, I saw a dress almost identical to this one in a mint green with an inset of dark green sequins at the neck.  The price was $173 for each dress.  I thought to myself that I could make an almost identical dress with this pattern but for significantly less.  Most of the attendants are college students who are also saving and working to pay for college expenses.  Here is the view from Vogue:

I have measurements for four of the five attendants, and we are currently looking for a stretchy satin or knit to use for the dress.  We plan to lengthen it.  Danielle (my daughter) wants me to add some flare.  Just as I was about to give up and go with a different pattern, I found another blogger's picture of a sequined gown.  Check out Sew Intriguing's pictures of her sequined gown.

Now, I need to figure out how to create fullness in the lower skirt without having to add a side seam.  I also need to find a way to add an inset under the draping neckline.  Danielle wants to use a light turquoise blue and the inset will be a darker sequined fabric.   I hope to create a fake tube top with the inset and sew it underneath the arms across the bodice so that it will appear to be a simple tube top underneath.  

Any ideas or suggestions will definitely be welcome.  I plan to make a trial run in different fabrics very soon.  

I have also been eyeing some fabrics at Gorgeous Fabrics for my mother of the bride dress.  There is also a sequined fabric that is gorgeous--I am not sure about the color.  I need a simple pattern with a beautiful impact if I choose this:

Decisions, decisions, decisions . . . !

Launching Sewing at the Rock

Welcome to my blog.  I plan to use this blog to chronicle my sewing, quilting, and other needlework accomplishments and attempts.  I live in the rural community of Little Rock, Mississippi, where we have one store and a post office.

My time for sewing is very limited, but I have been inspired by many sewing bloggers who are also working mothers and still manage to sew many beautiful garments.  It is time for me to join in the fun.  I have sewed all of my life, and I enjoy the process as well as the feeling of accomplishment that comes from knowing I have made something that is stylish and looks well.  I am not ready to go on a total ready-to-wear fast, but my ready-to-wear purchases have significantly declined.

To launch this blog, I would like to showcase a picture of a prom dress that I made for my daughter a couple of years ago.  The pattern is still in the McCalls pattern book, so I hope  that this is still relevant and inspiring.  The fabric surprisingly came from JoAnn's.

I made a muslin using similar fabric, and I used the smallest size.  I still had to cut several inches from the width of the bodice.  I sewed bra cups into the bodice, and added boning.  This was my first garment that I ever underlined and used boning.  I enjoyed the process of creating this dress for my daughter, but it was indeed a challenging project.




There were no markings on the skirt pattern to tack the poofs in the skirt in place to the skirt lining.  It took several hours of trying this on and playing with various poof arrangements to finally come up with the final assymetrical arrangement.  I believe my daughter thought that an impending disaster was about to occur.  She was very pleased with the end result.  A friend of mine helped to lay out the beads which were hand sewn to the shoulder and under the bust.  Here is a close -up view of the beading on the shoulder.

Here are a couple of these two bff's' pictures as they prepared to leave for prom.