Finally, some sewing!

I finally got around to sewing the dress today and I'm quite pleased with the results. The waist is a little tight but that's because my waist is big in proportion to my bust and hips - middle-aged spread, I assume :( . Letting the waist of the dress out will be easy because it has four darts, each with 2" taken in at the waist, plus four seams along which I can make changes.

Aside from that one fitting issue, the dress fits perfectly and looks exactly like the picture. Looking at the dress on me, I decided to make two other small style changes: bring the neckline in a bit as I find it wide for me; and bring the skirt in a bit on the sides as I find it sticks out a bit more than I like. After that I have to test the matching jacket, but I'm fairly confident that the jacket will fit as well as the dress.

Once I'm finished the adjustments on the test garment and the paper pattern, I'll go ahead and draft all of the facings. Then I can pick out a fabric (hopefully from my collection of fabrics, but I'm not adverse to buying new fabric :) ) and sew an actual dress and jacket.

I'm very pleased with my work this time. For the first time, the grading is *perfect*. Not only that, but I sewed the test garment without having to rip out and re-sew any seams! These are both firsts for me, and I'm quite proud of myself, if I do say so myself. It's about time that my grading and sewing went right. :) Yay for me!