Appleton wrap dress hacks!

Just before the Christmas holidays I made 3 more Cashmerette Appleton wrap dresses. Two for myself and one for my daughter.

Since this was the first one I've made for my daughter I used the pattern as is. I let her pick a fabric from my knit collection and she choose this soft cotton/lycra animal print. Not much else to say about this! She looks great and feels comfortable so that's what counts.

Melissa showing off her animal print Appleton.

For the two dresses that I made for myself I did change up the pattern to introduce some variety to my closet.

Dress one: I changed the skirt on this one to be a full skirt. In order to achieve this I traced off my pattern and then from the waist line and below I made vertical cuts from the hem line to the waist and spread these out. I employed a basic slash and spread techniques keeping CF and CB on grain. I kept in mind the width of my fabric because I wanted to be able to cut the CB on the fold and keep CF from having to be cut single layer. This also kept me from going with a skirt that was too full. The only consideration that you need to keep in mind is the overlap portion on the front skirt. If you take that out in too far of an angle your fabric may want to fold back on itself. I know this from experience! I ended up having to change the skirt portion of the overlap just slightly. I took 2 inches off the width at the hem and angled it to nothing up at the waist area. It was just enough to keep the overlap hanging straight. I really love this slightly fuller skirt. It makes the dress a little more frilly and feminine.

Yay  for a twirly dress! Photobombed by Blue. Poor baby is so lonely after losing her 2 best friends in the space of 10 months. Now she is VERY interested in everything I am doing!

Dress two: I wanted this dress to be a party dress. Something for the holidays that was a bit more dressier than my normal Appletons. I thought about lengthening it into a maxi dress but when I held the fabric up in front of me on the mirror it just seemed to swallow me up! So I left the length alone and ended up lengthening the sleeves. I added enough so that they would be long sleeves and then an additional 8 inches so that I could ruch the bottom portion. I loved it. It gave it just enough something different and special in this party fabric. Which by the way is a burnout stretch velvet so it is sort of see through depending on the lighting. I decided against lining and wore it with a black camisole and tights. This is a winter dress so the likelihood of it ever seeing daylight is next to nil. So, I think i'm okay with it!

This stretch burnout velvet is very shiny!

Detail of the ruching on the sleeves. I think this fabric just lends itself to this detail.

Here I am in my new dress at a Christmas get together! Man, you just have to love that suit!

Since I have lost so much weight since I made the first trio of Appletons I think I may still need to add one or two more to my current wardrobe. I did end up altering one of my existing dresses. My favorite of the 3, the gray lightning dress, it lent itself to being easily altered due to the type of knit and the random pattern if the knit. The other 2 have made their way to the goodwill bin. To take in some of the fullness I decided to take it in at the center back. I literally laid the dress out, found CB, folded it on CB and then pinned it about 3 inches away and hit the serger running! I took off about 31/2 to 4 inches from CB. I serged right through the hem and right through the neck band leaving long enough tails at each end so I could bury them in the seam.

Happy Sewing!!

LOL!!!! I had to add these photos! I looked entirely pissed off... I was home alone. I wonder what I was thinking about? That Face!!