A New Day, A New Dress Inspiration: The Swing Dress

First off, thank you all so much for your lovely comments on my black shirt waist dress. I really appreciate it! I have since washed the dress and discovered that I have done a terrible job on the inside seam finishes. The dress looks like it has tangeld-up seaweed inside. Oh, I so wish I had a serger. But I don't, so I'll spend the weekend with a roll of bias tape getting those seam ends nicely tucked away before the dress unravels completely.

Also, after finishing my black shirt waist dress I went through a few inspiration-less days with no desire or urge to make a dress at all. Sometimes your mind just goes blank and you forget about all the ideas you've had. That's why it's good to keep a notebook or sketch book you can turn to when your mind is numb and uninspired. I have one but don't use it half as often as I should. But, luckily, I have plenty of online and offline inspiration folders to carry me over the dry spells - and from whence comes this inspiration: The Swing Dress.

Click for inspiring pictures of finished Swing Dresses

Not long ago, I'm sure you remember, Casey hosted a 1940s swing dress sew-along. I couldn't participate but stored some pictures as inspiration for the future in one of my many folders. And now the right time seems to have come: it's a summery dress, I have farbic I can use to make it and I could buy the pattern as an e-pattern instead of waiting for shipping until July :)

I've already assembled the pieces for a muslin and I'm in love with the fit. It seems too good to be true, but as far as I can see from my muslin, the only alteration I need to make is add a little more width to the waistband. I don't think I've ever used a pattern where I only had to change one tiny thing. It must be a good omen and sure is welcome in a month of sewing four dresses. Also, the sew-along tutorials on Casey's blog, which can all be found here, are very helpful and will certainly speed the sewing along. So, June Challenge Dress #3 is on its way....