Botched Botanical

So here I am continuing on with my collection of leftover “EllyAna Cards fabric” outfits with a western theme. I really didn’t intend for this outfit to be western at all but I was not having the best of hair days so this hat was kind of my only option. Now I feel like a modern day Southern Belle! (pretty much the exact opposite of what I am).

I started making this dress a long time ago—probably two years ago—and then I put it in the pile of “outfits I’ve started” and moved on to other things, per usual. I’m just now going back to that pile to finish what I’ve started. I have discovered that time traveling back to past visions is not that easy to do. :/

I’ve put together a collage of pictures showing my struggles with constructing this outfit so you can see some of my process (potentially boring for you and for me, extremely frustrating). So for Botched Botanical, I had all of the pieces I needed (pictures 1 and 2), but I couldn’t find my original sketch, couldn’t find the pattern I had been using, and none of the pieces logically fit together! I felt like a plastic surgeon on Botched (hence the name), trying to piece together and reconstruct someone else’s awful mistakes (except that someone else was just my past self). As you can see from pictures 3 and 4, putting the top front together and the top back didn’t really work out. I could either align the bottoms of the two pieces or the arm holes, not both. I decided to align the bottom, figuring I could deal with the armhole later and as consequence I had to fill the space left at the top from shoulder to neck (picture 5). Big mistake… After I did that, I tried on the top and realized the darts were completely out of place! They ended way too high—up where my finger is pointing in picture 6. So I had to readjust the location of the darts and then the only way I could get the top to fit was by taking out the shoulder-to-neck-seam inserts I just put in and aligning the armholes, which I should have done in the first place! :_( So I took out all of my super clever solutions and hard work and moved on. I contemplated how to finish it, either leaving the current waist space there, creating a faux two-piece outfit (picture 7) or covering it with a waistband (picture 8). Due to popular demand (mother, sister, and BFF’s opinions) I covered the space with a waistband and finished the dress. :-)

All said and done after my many trial and errors, reconstructive surgery was a success! :D

Peep the fabric of those valences!!!! My mom initially bought the fabric I used for my latest creation for her EllyAna card kiosk canopies and for her house! :-) This is a picture of me and my little sister running our first business together (a bookstore). Date: 2002ish