Half way there! It was significantly easier to reach for my handmade clothes this past week for Me-Made-May, though my choices are starting to dwindle (laundry is my achilles’ heel). Through this exercise I’m experiencing a lot of revelations — both good and bad — and I plan on ruminating about them at the end of the month, but for today, I have a quick and dirty update to what I started calling my ham hock dress.
Mutton chop arms are not my look of choice, so early yesterday morning, I took my scissors to the sleeves and hacked off most of the length. I also remembered that I didn’t like the neckline, so I widened that too. Luckily I had enough of the fabric left to make a new bias tape. As I worked on this while K and her friend slumbered (I take the neighbor girl to school with K sometimes and she comes over early), I was reminded of a college friend. She told me once that she wakes up every morning at 5 to sew something for herself. At the time, I had no interest in sewing so it struck me as a little odd that she would forsake precious sleep just to make something to wear, but now I totally get it.
And did you notice? I’m wearing the dress backwards! One of my astute readers suggested trying that, and I really like it. I scooped out the neckline a little for a boatneck vibe, and the gathers seem to hit at the right spot.
I also wore it the “right” way, and I like this too! I’m patting myself on the back for chopping the sleeves — I LOVE the dress now, and not a ham hock arm to be seen. And being able to wear it both ways just makes it all the more lovable. Big win!
Here’s the round-up from this past week. Temperatures have been rising here, and it already feels like summer, which is very unusual for May in Seattle.
Day 8: Moss Green Jacket (I’m also wearing my skinnified jeans)
Day 9: Kimono Top + Clover Pants
Day 10: Weekend Getaway Blouse
Day 11: White Skirt
Day 12: Buffalo Check Washi
Day 13: Waffle Maxi
Day 14: Altered Khaki Linen Dress
And you can see last week’s roundup here!
Turn it around? Genius! Now I’m trying to picture what the backs of some of my less-loved items look like. And the sleeve alteration is perfect. I have one handmade dress that I adore, save for the slightly awkward sleeve length. Color me inspired to just cut them already!
I can’t take credit for the idea of turning the dress around, but thank you, Meagan! And yes, chop those sleeves off! It’s very cathartic 🙂
Love how you changed the dress – so much better! And I like it backwards! Favorite outfit: day 8!
The dress is so much more wearable now! I love it when small changes make all the difference in the world! Thanks, Ute!
I heart the new fluttery sleeves!
Yay for fluttery sleeves! With this sudden spike in temperatures, it was a necessary move and now my other long-sleeve dresses are starting to look like they need a good pruning too…
I like all the outfits and I like the khaki one either front or back! Great job!
Thanks, Greta! Creating these collages of my weekly outfits is actually quite excruciating, but I’m pretty sure that I’ll be glad that I documented the process later on 🙂
Talk about a versatile dress!! Not too many outfits look just as good backwards as well as forwards:) So glad you love it even more now with the shorter sleeves – the joy of sewing is that you can make it the way YOU want it!
Sewing is really a superhero skill if you ask me, Lucinda. I was telling the husband the other day that nowadays, whenever I see a piece of clothing I like, I immediately start deconstructing it in my head. Progress!!
turning it around is such a classic project runway move! Nice! I like the below boob gathers
You’re so right, Tara! So proud to have a PR moment 🙂 And yep, it helps a girl to have extra boobage support.