This will be funny tomorrow...

On President's Day I tried to outsmart JoAnn Fabrics and use all of the coupons that they send me in the mail to buy fabric needed for Easter dresses this year. That's like going to LasVegas and saying you're going to outsmart the casino. It can't be done. But I did walk out with some reasonably priced fabric and several $1 patterns. I got really brave and even bought a pattern for myself. I forgot that women's patterns (vs. chilren's or unisex robes and tote bags) have curves. And how your actual curves comply with the curves on the pattern can be tricky. This is will important later. My short amount of sewing experience has taught me that a muslin (or trial run) is important. So I bought some denimish cotton to try to work out the kinks on Simplicity 2424.

I won't bore you with the details but I'll say that I am NOT a standard size. To get this dress to fit I ended up with parts from all 5 sizes that came in the pattern. No wonder we women have trouble finding things that fit!

So...blah, blah, I finally get the muslin almost done. I need to pin the back to see how much to take in before inserting the zipper. Except it's impossible to pin yourself in the back. Enter loving husband who worked at JosABank for years in college and is handy with tailor's chalk. We're still married, but it didn't go well. I will blame it on my faulty instructions.

I've been dreaming of having a dress form for a while now. But I always assumed I wouldn't get one until we moved houses and I had an actual sewing room where she could live. This situation sped up the process a bit. With the husband's blessings I marched into Hancocks this morning and there they were ON SALE just waiting for me. Lolly Dolly now lives next to my sewing table in the corner of the kitchen. I was just going to name her Dolly (cause she's kind of like a big doll I can dress up and also a private joke to myself because I will never be called Dolly for any other reason). Camille thought Dolly was not quite right and named her Lolly Dolly.

With Lolly Dolly's help, I got the dress completely made! Success! I even took notes to remember the parts I need to change/pay attention to when I do the real Easter dress using pretty Plum Shantung fabric. I put on the dress to snap a final picture and then...I was trapped. Inside the dress. During the construction of the dress I made sure the zipper went all the way to the top so I wouldn't have to add a hook/eye or button or whatever. It seems that I pushed the zipper too far up and actually clipped off the zipper stop at the top. Did you know there was a zipper stop at the top? I knew about the one at the bottom... Oh well. When I zipped it for the first time it zipped right off the top and I was left holding the zipper pull in my hand - with the zipper shut and me inside. The zipper was locked closed - tugging on it didn't seperate it. And there is no way I could re-attach the zipper pull behind me.

Here are several pictures that I took in case the dress had to be destroyed in order to get it off me.

**Update**
The dress is off. Don't ask. The zipper is toast but otherwise no harm was done.