~wiws~ When Sewing Gives You Limes, Make Limeade

Linking up with Fine Linen and Purple for What I Wore Sunday.

This is the dress I mentioned yesterday--I made it during my flurry of sewing productivity toward the end of Lent.  I really love the fabric, but I'm not so sure I love the finished dress.  It may be too soon for such a light colored dress.  Although it was close to 80 degrees today, so maybe I'm overthinking it.

I'm sort of weird about such things--I just can't wear light colors until it gets hot, and this is definitely a dress for warm weather.  I did find this cobalt blue lambswool sweater on etsy recently (only $5!); it matches very well and is so soft.  It does have some nibbles near the cuff on one of the sleeves that I need to repair, but they aren't super noticeable.  I'm not as much a fan of the longer boxy silhouette, but the sweater goes with this dress and my Spring for Cotton dress, so I guess that is something.

This was my first attempt at trim, and I do like it on this dress.  I had a single package of narrow lime green bias tape that I had no idea what to do with until I realized it perfectly matched the green leaves in the fabric print.  (Incidentally, it was fiendishly difficult to photograph the dress without the sweater--the left side of all the photos is blown out, but that was the best I could do with my equipment and the time available; i.e. not much)

The back of this one fits quite well, I think.  (I wish my front silhouette was less boxy, but digestion/allergy issues do not a svelte torso make)  I did iron that crease out of the front skirt, but it seems like all these dresses need a wash before that crease really comes out well.  The fabric is very pretty up close, but a lot of the detail gets lost at a distance. 

This was another one that I agonized over the buttons/buckle.  My original intention was to use white, but it just looked weird with the buttons and buckle I had picked out.  I tried this blue orphan buckle I had in my stash and it matched perfectly, but I didn't have any matching blue buttons.  I did have some matching green ones, but they looked funny with the buckle and also washed out the fabric.

I did some etsy searching and finally found these buttons, which are a good match for both the fabric and the buckle, as well as brightening up the dress quite a bit.  I like them quite a lot, actually.

The detail of the fabric--subtle but pretty.  It is a vintage repro fabric I got from RockPaperScissors on etsy.  

The button detail is quite lovely.

The buckle has some interesting detail as well--it is an unusual color of blue and was difficult to match to buttons.  I'm very curious to know what the original coordinating buttons looked like, as these things were frequently sold together as a set.

In any case, I think it will be a decent warm-weather dress, and I was able to do a bit of stash-busting at the same time.  

Lime Flowers Dress: Color Me Happy fabric from RockPaperScissors, vintage buttons and buckle from etsy, vintage bias trim and vintage bias binding from etsy

Sweater: etsy

Pin: etsy

Shoes: dankso via ebay