Dress to blouse refashion

[iguanasdefuego.livejournal.com]

Last fall, Target had the cutest dress on sale for $10. There was one left, and it was my size and we were to live happily ever after.

Until the lining ripped :( The outer fabric is lacy and just sheer enough that I couldn't do without the lining that kept ripping a bit more each time I put it on. It's been sitting in my craft room, waiting for me to find the perfect solution.

Enter...

Here's my dress:

As you can see, it's pretty fabulous. I love the ruffling at the neckline and it fits really well.

The lining kept ripping- it was a super lightweight material and I think the dress was a teensy bit too snug, plus I think there was a flaw in the fabric. Several months ago, I hacked off the bottom of the lining, hoping I could buy more and sew it in.

I kept trying to sew in a new lining, but the fabric I bought wasn't right and kept fraying. So I gave up on that.

I finally realized that I was never going to get my dress back, so I planned to make it into a blouse.
Chop chop!


Before I could flip up the edge to hem it, I needed to pin the lining to the lace, since it was two layers and only attached at the zipper and neck.



I folded over my hem twice and pinned it in place

(My mom would be so proud- I ironed my hems! Although, maybe not- I don't know what fabric this was so ironing could have ruined it, oops!)
Yes, it's a lot of pins. This was really slippery fabric!

Time for a trip through the ol' sewing machine:

Don't you just love my blue Sharpie seam allowance marker?

The zipper posed a bit of a problem, as I needed my hem to go up a bit higher than the bottom of the zipper. I ended up ironing the heck out of it and hand sewing that bit of the hem.

And the final result:



I am pretty satisfied with how it turned out!

Hope you liked it, too!