Do you have one person in your life who thinks you can do anything? The consequences are amazing and oh so challenging. My person is Emma my sister-in-law. We’d been talking about her Christmas dress for about four months, yup she’s that Christmas loving person that starts in September! When this magazine popped through my door

We both agreed that neckline was stunning but a fuller floaty skirt would look better. This meant I could split the top and bottom and we could have fun with fabric contrasts. Many screenshots and much debate later I found this….

It’s glitter stuck on a backing with fish-scale lace over the top (in case you were wondering) and I had slight misgivings when I realised I was ordering from a craft supplier not a fabric supplier (!) I waited for it to arrive before trying to match a fabric for the skirt. It was certainly worth the wait but yep it was meant for card making not for sewing……

We had a client meeting (this is business after all) and I’m fairly sure she dared me to try to make a dress out of it anyway. Or perhaps that’s just what I heard 🙂

On with the search for the skirt fabric, welcome to my life a beautiful midnight blue moss crepe, yum. At the client meeting we agreed the full dress would be made from the skirt fabric and the sparkles as an over top. That meant if it all went disastrously wrong we could simply add jewels to the top of the under dress. I like to have a backup plan when I’m at the crazy end of the creativity scale.

There was no doubt the fabrics looked awesome together so time to cut and stitch. Except it’s NEVER that easy with anything for Emma, did I mention she’s tall, slim and not in a million years a standard size. So first job was to lengthen the pattern, remove the skirt, find a suitable transplant. Done! Well not quite that quickly I’m using artistic license.

Things quickly took shape for the underdress. And after some wrestling and persuasion for the bodice too.

So how did it turn out? It was stunning, the structured bodice really contrasted with the floaty skirt and the whole thing was perfect for Em’s figure and personality. RESULT! Worth every risk, worry and broken nail 🙂