Wedding Dress Update

I will get back to posting regularly - eventually - but for now I'm afraid my daughter's wedding preparations seem to be taking over.

I did think you may want an update on the wedding dress situation though as the wedding is now only 4 weeks away.  I'm afraid it's not good news - well it's not bad news but probably not what you are expecting.

You may remember I started off like this back in March - making a tuille of the bodice

Well that worked out fine and fitted reasonably well so it was time to make the real thing! Unfortunately this is where things started to go wrong.  Due to circumstances beyond my control it took weeks and weeks to get the material ordered.  I think I finally received it at the beginning of July.

I immediately started cutting out the fabric, 4 layers in total, organza, satin, lining, bodice canvas oh and a loose layer of lining to add on later.

So despite the delay, I was happy when the bodice all came together.

The next step was to begin work on the skirt and as you can see below, I had 4 layers of tulle and was then in the process of adding more gathered layers in between to give the fullness required.  Me and my machine seemed to be buried in tulle!!

The picture below shows the bodice and the skirt with just the four layers of tulle before adding any gathered layers.  There was to be another 3 layers of organza and lace on top of this.

So this brings us up to about 3 weeks ago now and the need to have another fitting with my daughter. It was all arranged for the Monday, but literally 10 minutes before I was due to leave for the 2hr journey up to see her, I had a rather upsetting phone call to say her father-in-law to be had been taken seriously ill and they needed to go and see him as soon as posible.  A 4hr journey for them at short notice.  Perfectly understandable but another delay to the dress plans!

Ok so move on a week to the next Monday (thankfully father-in-law to be pulled through) and this time my daughter came down to us.  By now we were approximately 6 weeks away from the wedding and I was starting to get a little concerned.  If this fitting went OK then maybe it would just about be feasible to get it finished in time for the wedding!!  But for some unknown reason the bodice needed a bit of tweaking around the bust so that night I set about the alterations.  Well when I had finished the bust fitted beautifully but now the bodice wouldn't meet at the back!  

Not the best photo - but you see my problem?  Well by this time it was late at night and I was tired - we knew we had to think of a Plan B!

We put the dress aside and began to work out how much was left to complete, how many hours it would take and how many hours I had available to complete it.  It appeared it would take me until the day of the wedding and that was if everything went according to plan - which I doubted very much!!! So an executive decision was made!  We decided to STOP making the dress and go out and buy one! Well I have to say when I realised how impossible the situation had become it was a huge relief.

My daughter was with us for one more day, so first thing in the morning we made an appointment at a local bridal shop and I am very pleased to say by mid day my daughter was the proud owner of a beautiful wedding dress which fitted perfectly and needed no alterations.  Totally different to the one we were making but it looked gorgeous on her and she loved it!

Now I can relax and start looking forward to the Wedding.

The only downside to this is the amount of fabric to dispose of.  The tulle and the organza are not a problem I can probably use this over time but I have 6m of exquisite beaded lace which has never been touched.  I am trying to sell this so if anyone thinks they can make use of it or knows of someone else who may, please direct them to my post on facebook which will take them to the advert link.  It is truly beautiful lace and would make a stunning dress.

And for those of you wondering what dress my daughter chose ... well you will have to wait just a little longer until after the big day - but I promise you, there will be photos.

Thanks for reading and please feel free to share the link if you feel it would help.

x

Oooh I forgot to say I will be sharing this post over at Handmade Monday on Lucy Blossom Craft Blog.