Ides of March

Courtney, of CJane fame, is preggers. Making her postpartum dresses is such a joy for me, not only because of the learning experience of fitting a dress to someone else's body, but she is just so nice, so genuine, and I REALLY like coming over to her house. I've done about 4 fittings already, and I just don't want them to stop! 

Sadly, today was probably the last real fitting I'll do. I managed to make the perfect bodice muslin mock-up of the pattern i'll be using for all five of her dresses. The bodice will have enough ease around the bust so that if her bust grows after pregnancy, she'll have enough room to grow without looking like she is wearing a muumuu everyday (which is my goal of this whole project, after all).

I have to say that I am REALLY proud of myself. I have never fit another person's body before, and it really wasnt as scary as i thought it would be. Strangly enough, it is very simple when I apply everything i have learned in my classes. I did take a big jump, but i knew how to land safely without breaking anything along the way. 

Still to do: widen the bust width. The bust width is the area above the bust and under the neckline. It was pulling on Courtney, which is why I let out the shoulder seams in the picture. I have to add about 1" to both seams on the bodice to make it fit the way I want, and so it is comfortable. I also need to shorten the bust in the front to make it fit like a real empire waistline.

Other than that, I'm good to go with the cutting out the fashion fabric (which is the actual dress fabric I'll be using). We decided today to make one of the dresses out of a great denim I bought at Yellow Bird on Saturday. I hope to have the first dress done by next Tuesday, so that I can use it in my Business Plan Competition presentation that day (i'm still extremely nervous for that!). Keep those fingers crossed people!