Butterick 5244 day 5 muse navy dress: I think I'm done!

I took a break from the Muse dress last night to garden.  It was a hot evening but I felt like I was neglecting my plants which needed attention.  I may have gone a little overboard with finishing planting AND weeding in the same night.  I am sore today in several places....

But tonight I was back at it with the fitting of the back of the Muse dress. Thanks to all who left comments regarding my dilemma.

Jacqui, I did go back to Joann's on Tuesday and they only had one of those anchor buttons left (I had thought about adding a back tab with two anchor buttons as a way of tightening up the fit). Ironing helped but the CB seam wasn't great. I took out the shaping of the CB seam and redid it.

Mushywear and kbenco,you were right about adding darts and playing with them til they are right. I wound up adding two smaller darts between the existing darts and the side seam. This did the trick.
So now it looks like this:

Remember, it looked like this at the end of day 4;


and this without any darts at all:


Here's how the back looks now;

And the front is as cute as ever:


All the dart excitement:


And on Emma:


As far as where I "knew" to put the darts--the longer darts were in the same vicinity as the darts on the purchased dress. For the additional darts, I put on the dress and used a binder clip at the point where I wanted the major thickness of the dart on each side. Then I took the dress off, turned it inside out, and used tailor chalk to mark the positioning of the clip. Then I removed the clip and sewed the darts. They were shorter and not as deep as the original darts. Ironed, and tried it on and phew it finally fit.

I did go through my dress patterns looking for one with 4 back darts but alas, none of them met the challenge.

The shaping is starting to pull the side seam toward the back but not enough to make me want to play with it more.  I think I'm done with it now.

Ok, the collar one last time:

and the tab detail: (The buttons are navy blue (like the fabric color) from Joann's, La Mode buttons, Hook 1068, style 39994.  They are 1.25 inches, washable and dry cleanable, made in France, ooh la la!).  The fabric itself is from Jomar in Philly during Antoinette's visit last Sept, $2 a yard) mid-weight knit:

and the welt pockets outside (yeah, this picture does look purple--it's navy blue)

and inside: (the dot fabric is Joann's lining fabric)


Overall this dress took me 20 hours but it was well worth it for everything I learned--welt pockets, the importance of ironing (again), using a sewing gauge, and the importance of enjoying the sewing and being patient and learning...  Thank you PR member Kathy in NM for the inspiration!  She wore the muse dress at PR weekend.

I will pattern review it this weekend. And I'm changing my PR name to BlossomKyle with 100% of registered voters voting for it!

I am excited to start my next sewing project. Most likely a dress (maybe even the vogue rose dot one, like Jacqui's !) or possibly a simple gingham skirt.



OH, apparently Hal gave himself a time out:

and here are my pumpkin seedlings that sprung up from last October's decaying pumpkin:

I have always wanted to grow a pumpkin myself. 2011 is definitely my year!

Good night and be well!