McCall's 5576 day 1

I have four classes sketched out so far - an introduction to the machine, first pattern (a robe), introduction to zippers and sleeves and darts, and a skirt fitting class. I'm considering using McCall's 5576 for the intro to zippers et al class and figured that maybe, just maybe I should make up the pattern myself to see if it would work for newbies. Plus I get a couple dresses out of the bargan. Score. :) So the making of the dress, day one...



I bought some snazy (and, for Joann's, expensive) black quilting cotton with silver sparkles. I keep hoping I didn't make a mistake - it was more than I wanted to pay and it's pretty stiff - certainly not the nice soft stuff I'd recomend to students. But it looks really fantastically sharp. Part of the trepidation is knowing that I can't frankenpattern or modify this pattern like I normally would. The standard saves I'd typically make really don't help the students see what their dress will look like. Though, if it really looks that bad, it could be an example of a creative save. But hopefully it'll work out fine. For my trial version, though, I'm going to use a much softer cotton (also from my little local J's) in a beautiful black and green geometric print that I love and which has been aging a year in my stash but has waited until now to tell me what it wants to be. The print should help hide errors, as well.

Back to the black fabric, it came home and I wanted to wash it immediately but we just did laundry yesterday and I'm not spending the 75c our apartment washers cost for one length of fabric. So I googled how to wash clothes in the bathtub. Ask and you shall receive! I so love all things Wiki.


After washing the fabric I traced the pattern. I'm a very slow tracer. An hour and a half later I finished and pinfitted the traced pieces - looks good! Tomorrow I hope to cut and start on the actual sewing. Tonight I'm tired and I know better than to cut while tired - very odd things happen. So avoiding that. :)