I LOVE IT WHEN VISIONS BECOME REALIITY...

...unbeknownst to me, and way out of my norm, I'm wanting to FLIP ON OVER INTO FALL right now.  But I don't think I'm  absolutely finished with summer yet!   Thank God I'm a woman!  This constant battle of changing my mind would surly drive a man crazy (lol).  I just couldn't wait to stitch up this classic knit dress from Vogue 8939.  Got to make the vision of my last post a reality...
 

Simple, yes!  But I think "simple" best describes my style.   "Simple" affords me limitless possibilities of mixing and matching, and the opportunity to play with the accessorizing I love so much for the Fall.  So this weekend I traced off the pattern, and picked out an inexpensive light weight ribbed knit from Hancock to play around with the pattern for fit.

• firstly, this turtle neck is no joke!  It's a real deal turtle - Choke city here, might I add; and thick even with using my light weight fabric. Got to figure out a way to eliminate some of that bulk or I'd be pulling at that thing all day long.  Got to definitely remember to apply my make up after I put the dress on or I'd end up with a real smear mess.

• I have several options concerning the collar:  pull a turtle neck pattern piece from an old Kwik Sew pattern that I've used before; or make the collar a cowl.  mmmmm we'll see...

•  secondly, the dress is S-H-O-R-T, as can clearly be seen on the model.  I added 5 inches to my muslin.  I thought that would be more than enough, but since I do plan on wearing it with boots, I'm thinking about adding 2 inches more - the pattern calls for a  1" hem.

• the dress runs large in the side seams.  I cut a 14 through the neck, shoulders and bust area and expanded to size 16 in the side seams.  As always, I'm glad that I made a muslin*.

*Please note that although I constantly talk of muslining, I do realize that it is not for everyone.  There are plenty of experienced sewists out there who just adjust the pattern itself for a perfect fit every time thus eliminating the need for a muslin.  Shucks, if I still had my out of the envelope size 12 body that I  thought was too fat back then, but always thought I'd have, I wouldn't EVER make a muslin!  It's a tremendous use of my limited sewing time.  But time and time again, I am not sorry that I bothered making it up.   It's like my fitting insurance policy.
 

so glad I finally learned to crop pictures.  That way I don't have to show ya'll the entirety of my junky sewing room (lol).  Add the elongated blazer from this same pattern and some boots, and I'll be off to professionally dressed work day!

I can see from my picture that I tapered more on the right below the hips than I did on the left.  Need to correct that.  This turned out to be a pretty good mock up, and could very well be a wearable muslin if I go back in and add a lining to the body of the dress.  That wouldn't be hard or take too long to do with some hand stitching at the sleeve opening and neck.  I'll finish this muslin, and hopefully start working on the actual fashion dress in pontederoma...