Progress on Eyelet Cambie

I love that point in the sewing process when you see the garment start to come together and actually look like something. That's what happened to me early Sunday afternoon while working on my Cambie.

Prior to that, it was just a bunch of pattern pieces:

(Since Ms Flooz won't move, she might as well help model my fabric.)
 
But Sunday afternoon, a skirt emerged! I could start to see the finish product.

I also have this amazing ability to pick out the most unsuitable fabric combinations for shells and underlinings.  I did this over a year ago when I sewed the Lonsdale dress pattern from Sewaholic. My fabric choices were this wonderful gauzy fabric for the shell, and crazy stretch fabric for underlining.  In the end it worked out beautifully, but it involved many hours and much swearing to get to that point.

My eyelet, while beautiful, was tough to keep on grain.  It didn't help that I decided to go with the satin mystery fabric as the underlining.  I struggled to keep both fabrics lined up enough to baste together.  I think I've managed so far, but it definitely slowed down the project.  If I had been patient and waited until some nice cotton in the perfect color came along, I probably would be finished already.  Oh well, onward and upward...

I was also having a bit of difficulty with my skirt gathers.  I guess I'm just not used to making and wearing something this gathered at the waist.  It almost felt too gathered and I worried I did something wrong.  Contributing to this is the fact that the skirt is getting heavy with both fabrics. I'll admit that I had a few panic moments where I thought that this dress going to be a puffy mess and that I had wasted good fabric.

I draped it on my dress form and pinned the sleeve/straps to their correct position.

Then, Magic:

I LOVE IT.  It has a wonderful vintage vibe.  It's beautiful.  No more worries.  I can't wait to finish.

Next steps - I need to insert the zipper and bodice lining. I think I'm going to omit the skirt lining. The fabric is opaque enough to leave it out and I am still a bit concerned about the extra weight and bulk.