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And here’s the final batch of photos of the dress, I’ve been making.

Flowers added to part of skirt

Bodice completed front

Bodice completed back

Skirt almost finished

Below the bodice with the ribbon inserted. That was such a pain to do. I think I’ve been working on that for at least 4 hours. Silly me wants the ribbon not rotated in all directions, so that took an enormous amount of time to get it right. Then something went wrong, and I had to start all over again *sigh*.

Bodice with ribbon

Close up of bodice with ribbon

I’ve seen this with another dress some time ago: ribbon through lace. I loved that, and I simply had to do it with my own dress as well.

Bodice with ribbon through laceClose up of ribbon through lace

Back of bodice

And another batch of photos will come tomorrow

I know, I know, I’ve been neglecting with updates of the dress. So here’s another bunch of photos of it. I have to admit: The dress is finished. I’ll post more pictures tomorrow.

For the skirt

For the bodice

Bodice front with sleeves

Bodice front with lace

Bodice back with lace

Today, my mother and I did some more sewing. We’ve been working from  9.30am till 3.30pm with a short lunch break. My mother made the sleeves, and did some alternations to the bodice, because when I fitted it, it didn’t fit right. It took some thinking and time, but it fits (now all I need is more breast LOL).
I’ve sewn the complete bodice together. After that I hand sewed three of the six bias strips which will hold the bones. That took up all my time …

The sleeves

The complete bodice

A few weeks ago I’ve ordered three sewing patterns from Simplicity. Saturday I’ve made a start with a 19th century ball dress by buying everything I needed and today I made a start with cutting the pieces and even a little bit of sewing already. Being a newbie at this, I’ve got the help of my mother, and the first thing she said to me when she saw the costume was: “Of course you want to do this the hard way. This will not be easy.”  And she’s right of course, it isn’t easy. Especially since the guide is in English, and I’m not used to all the sewing terms, and my mother is not used to read English. But I’m pretty confident that together we will get there, and of course the dress won’t be as good looking as show below, but I’ll be one proud first-time sewer (or actually second time sewer, since the first thing I’ve made was a little hand bag). 

I’ll probably make a page later on, when  the dress is done. With all the ‘steps’ shown and of course the final piece. 

Simplicity 2881 - 19th Century Dress as shown on the package

Cutting the pieces

Part of the bodice