#51: Black Frilly Layered Children's Dress

Hello, and welcome/welcome back!

After my 50th transformation post a week and a half ago, my blog soared past the 10,000 views mark! Thank you all for your fantastically wonderful support!!!

Today I've got a new transformation for you as well as some other style markers that filled my week. But first, here is the new project I've got for ya today:

Before: Black Frilly Layered Dress

Before: From behind

I got this children's dress for $1 at a local thrift store. It was clearly a children's dress, and there was absolutely no way it could zip up the side on my grown-woman body.

No zipping up the side

It was ratty and frilly and even had a hole...

Hello hole

...but I liked it.

So for my first step, I removed the straps.

Straps removed

Next, the inside seams were trash. Mounds of ratty mess everywhere. I took some time to cut off all the gross frayed parts.

All over the place!

Ratty mess cut from the seams

After that I completely cut off the top bust area, keeping the zipper in tact, and leaving the lace lining just under the bust in tact. Connected to the bust was a ripped-up inner lining of the dress. That had to go too.

Separating the bust

I'm sure it was a stylized plan, but there were 4 almost sheer triangular panels which gave the dress a twirl-factor. But they hung lower than the rest of the dress, and they didn't fit with what I wanted the dress to become, so I pinned them up...

Pinned triangular sections

...and sewed it away! (I sewed the hole closed too).

So long triangle panels!

Then I cut off the excess material and fake-serged the edges so it wouldn't get that ratty fray again.

After I sewed and cut off all 4 triangular panels, I removed and re-attached the zipper lower (the zipper would now be on the back instead of the side).

Re-attaching the zipper

It still ended up being too tight at the top, so I folded and sewed the back in a shallow V, cutting off the excess, including some of the zipper.


Finally, I re-attached the straps, but since they were too short to go over my shoulders, I sewed them together and sewed the opposite ends onto the front at the new bust so it became a halter.

And that was it!

Here again is the before photo:

Before: Frilly Layered Children's Dress

Before: From behind

Paired with a black skirt, here's the new look by itself:

After: Frilly new top

After: From behind

To make it a little less voluminous and more shapely, I added a thick belt:

After: with thick belt

But my favorite look of the day was adding a thin cover and a long necklace. I felt work-ready!

After: Accessorized

I was decked out yesterday, ready to go to work, when...I had to suddenly take my car to the shop and walk to and fro to find a Starbucks so I could work remotely on my computer. Lame. But at least my car got fixed! Praise God!

I'm so excited about my look yesterday because nearly everything in the photo above is either altered or I got second-hand. I took the long sleeves off of the cover to make it summer-ready, I made the shirt for this post, the belt and skirt I got at a clothing swap party last year, and the shoes I got at a thrift store for only $1.50!



Talking about shoes, I'm excited to share that I got my first pair of $130 shoes this weekend. Check them out:

$150 Thigh-high boots!

Sexy, sexy!

I've always wanted thigh-high boots!

"But Leanne," you say, "I thought you liked being frugal and saving money. Why would you spend $130 on shoes???"

Well, I DIDN'T! I got these on SUPER DUPER RIDICULOUS SALE! I was browsing through Frederick's of Hollywood over the weekend with some gal pals looking for a bachelorette gift for her friend, when we spotted this sale. The boots were marked down to $29.99, and there was a 75% off sale on top of that! I came away with these awesome new boots for only $8!!! $8!!! SCORE!!!!!

Another of my favorite finds this week was this new Calvin Klein yellow dress I found at a yard sale for $5. The only alteration it needed was taking up the shoulders a bit.

Yellow Calvin dress

To accompany my new yellow dress, I painted my fingernails in one of the most iconic, simple yellow designs:

Charlie Brown!

This simple design has gotten lots of attention this week!

And another of my favorite finds was this shirt I got at a yard sale. I didn't take too good a picture of the shirt, because I was too excited about the tie necklace I strung and twisted together with 3 beaded necklaces:

Checkerboard shirt and a tie necklace!

This week has been filled with fun fashion finds and styles!

I hope the upcoming week finds you all rested and rejuvinated. Happy Friday everyone!

Until next time, blessings.

50th Transformation Post!!! Labor Day Two-fer #2: White Sequined Jumpsuit.

It's my 50th transformation post!! It's my 50th transformation post!! WOOOOHOOOO!!!!

Not only that, but as of just before publishing this post, my blog is only 94 views away from reaching the 10,000 views mark! LET'S DO THIS!!!

So a few weeks ago I teased you with a photo of this ridiculous jumpsuit I found at a thrift store for about $4.

Before: White Sequined Jumpsuit

My goodness. I have no idea what this is. M.C. Hammer dance uniform? Circus acrobat costume? Saddlebag holders? Please don't tell me this was an actual daytime outfit.

This thing gave me back wedgies, front wedgies, side wedgies, wedgies everywhere!

"You get a wedgie!..."

"...And you get a wedgie!..."

"...And you get a wedgie!"

I just couldn't pass this thing up.

Initially, I wanted to dye it a different color, so I browsed the internet looking up fabric dying methods. Some were pretty intensive per the type of material. Given that I have no idea what material this is, I chose to keep it white.

Now take a look at those sequins!

Gold and White Sequins

While browsing online, I found that white dresses with gold sequins are actually pretty popular. For example:

Formal white and gold sequin dress

Taylor Swift rocks white with gold sequins

More examples

I decided to go the dress route with this one.

My first step was to remove the shoulder pads and the sleeves completely.

Fly away shoulder pads!

I also sewed around the edges of the arm holes and used no-sew adhesive to give more structure to the new arm holes.

Next, I removed the seam between the legs.

Removing the inner leg seam

After that I folded the piece sideways and sewed a new seam straight down the front and back seams I had just removed, cutting off the excess material.

One solid panel

That baggy side-hip material (no, they weren't pockets) had to go. But there was overlapping material at the waist just under the sequins which didn't allow me to just sew it off. So I had to seam rip some of the waist material to unfold the extra side-hip material. Then I re-sewed the waist seam using some gold-colored thread my friend A.S. sent me  (Thanks A.S.!)

Gold-colored thread

Stitching the waist with gold-colored thread

Once I had the waist fixed, I still had to cut up the sides of the legs in order to straighten out the side-hip material to sew it away.

Sewing away the excess side-hip material

Once sewn, I cut off the excess. I broke 2 needles in the process because each sequin I had to sew across had a bead in the center which the machine hit a few times : (


Next, I shaped the skirt. Since the original legs of the jumpsuit were form-fitted to the leg, it didn't give me much length before it began tapering. So I had to cut it pretty short into a mini-dress. Otherwise I would have been wearing an awkwardly-fit mermaid-style dress. I cut the front a bit under the bottom sequins, and cut the back about 2 inches longer to account for the lift from my rump :)

Cutting the front

Then I sewed a hem around the bottom edge of the skirt.

Lastly, I pinned and sewed a deeper back neckline so it would look less costume-y.

Pinning and sewing a deeper back neckline

I did it!


Here again is the before look:

Before: Wedgie-fied White Sequined Jumpsuit

Before: From Behind

Paired with my white belt with a golden buckle and white strappy heels, here is the after result!:

After: Gold-sequined Mini-Dress

After: From behind

I think I redeemed this costume. And it passed the highest approval rating of all: my husband's :)

Thanks for waiting so long for me to finish this one! I hope you enjoyed it!

:)

Please help me out and let's see if I can pass the 10,000 views mark! Woohoo!

Thanks so much for all the support getting to my 50th transformation post! I've got plenty more to come (even potentially some men's wear in the works)!

Stay cool out there, and happy Labor Day!

Until next time, blessings.

#49: Labor Day Two-fer: #1- Black Slit Dress

Happy Labor Day! I'm so glad to have an extra day off from work today :)

It's been a while since I last posted. I've been super busy over the past few weeks with weddings, friends visiting from out of town, work schedule changes, etc. that I haven't found time to sew. To make up for it, I've got a double post coming at'cha today! This first project post is super simple, and only required one alteration.

I found this dress at a thrift store a while ago for $1, if I remember correctly.

Before: Black slit dress

Before: From behind

The dress itself wasn't that bad, but I didn't like the way it tapered down the legs, and I didn't think the thigh-high slit was very practical. I'm also pretty sure it once had a long sleeve, because the thick-side shoulder was cut very unevenly and frayed a bit as if the previous owner had cut off a sleeve.

The winner for me was really the side ruching, the asymmetrical shoulders, and draping at the bust. I wanted to keep those in tact!


Though this was a very simple remake, the hardest part to maneuver around was the elastic ruching because it pulled the material unevenly when trying to cut it. So the first thing I did was pin the skirt into my carpet to straighten it all out.

Pinned to the floor.

Next, I measured how high I wanted to cut, and pinned markers on both sides.

Measuring length

I wanted to cut across just below the ruched elastic, but I wanted the cut to be straight, so I lined the tape measure between the markers and pinned on either side of the tape measure to create a straight path.

Creating a path

Then I cut on down the line!

Follow the blue-pinned path

Lastly, I snipped off the uneven parts around the arms.

That was it. Literally. I only needed scissors, a tape measure, and pins, and I was done! I decided to leave the cut edge raw to match the raw-edged arm holes. Plus, the material didn't fray :)


Here again is the before photo

Before: Black slit dress

Before: From behind

And here's the simplified look:

After: Asymmetrical black shirt

After: Asymmetrical black shirt

After: From behind

From dress to shirt in 1-2-3! I know it's hard to see the draping and ruching on a black shirt, so here's a closer shot of the draping:

Can't hide 'em!

I'll be rockin' this black top and some shorts today as I eat some BBQ this afternoon!

As for the teaser shot I showed on my last post, that one's done and will be up later today. It will be my 50th featured transformation!!! WOOHOO!!!

Coming up next...

Check back in later today to see my second transformation in this Labor Day two-fer!

Until next time, blessings.