My Hobbit Maid Costume

Originally, this was supposed to be done by September 22, Bilbo's and Frodo's birthday. My excuse? A sewasaurus rex is never late; she finishes costumes precisely when she means to!

Walnut trying to get down = slightly better view of the whole outfit on me.

But if you ignore the fact that my self-imposed deadline was a couple months ago, technically this costume was finished early! I was only going to wear this for the movie premiere on December 14, and wear my Rohirrim gown for my party instead. However, I decided last minute that I should do a test run of the costume since it's done; I want to make sure it's comfortable enough for standing in line for several hours, and then sitting through a whole movie. I'm pleased to report that aside from it being very warm (too warm for our crowded apartment!), it is quite comfortable. With my elven cloak, it will be definitely be warm enough for SoCal on a December night.

I almost re-donated this pattern, but I'm so
glad I didn't!

This costume is basically three parts: the skirt, the chemise, and waistcoat/bodice. While I could've used the recently released Simplicity 1771, I know that the pattern drafting for Big 4 costumes tends to be ridiculously bad -- scanty directions, anachronistic zippers, up to eight inches of ease in bodices (I'm not even exaggerating), etc. -- and I wanted to make do with what I already had. The skirt was the easiest to make -- just two rectangles (a twin flat sheet torn in half), gathered, and bound at the top with a waistband. It closes with a grosgrain ribbon drawstring and a couple of snaps. The chemise was made from Simplicity 7842, a pattern I only picked up because it was part of a thrift store bundle, but I'm glad I had it, as it makes an excellent hobbit chemise. However, it would be pretty easy to make one even without a pattern; it's essentially a peasant blouse. For the bodice, I used Vogue 8648 because of its over the shoulder (as opposed to into the armscye) princess seaming. I did have to put together the bodice and waistband pieces to get the look that I wanted, as well as take out some of the ease to get an appropriately fitted look. To make the button front, I just cut my front bodice piece in half and added about 3 inches to the center front so that I could fold it over to make the button placket. My shell was originally a tablecloth, more recently cut into this dress failure, and now has taken its final incarnation (hopefully) as my hobbit bodice. The lining is an old pillowcase in a thankfully coordinating green.

My sketchy directions for making your own hobbit maid costume. 

To actually put together the bodice, I sewed the assembled shell to the lining, wrong sides together, then tried it on and folded the center front over to make the button placket. I topstitched all the seams so as to make the whole thing stiffer, then bound the edges in narrow olive green bias tape. Joann's didn't have too much by way of natural-looking buttons, but thankfully I found these buttons that have a similar motif as the tablecloth. Oddly enough, they're made of coconut shell -- somehow, it feels wrong to have such a tropical button material on a costume for what I imagine is a temperate-deciduous-forest-type community.

I was so please to see how all the various materials looked together!

Close up of the skirt opening. When it's all tied and snapped together, you can't even tell that there's a gap there. Also, if you look at the left side, you can see the place where I accidentally cut a square out of the fabric because I wasn't paying attention and had multiple layers stacked on my desk. I ended up putting in a bizarre little patch that people keep mistaking for a pocket. 

The chemise hits at about mid-thigh. 

The inside of the sleeve: I sewed a piece of seam binding on and threaded my elastic through that. 

A close up of the ties inside that gather the neckline. 

I'm really pleased with how this costume turned out, and I have to say that making it was also immensely enjoyable. I worked on it while my husband was just watching football, and we just so happened to have plenty of leftovers in the fridge, so I had nice large blocks of time to just sew away! There were only minor fitting issues, and no crazy new techniques to puzzle over, so I totally got into a groove, almost like runner's high, but sewist's high? Anyway, by the time I finished, I had a huge grin on my face because of how successfully hobbity I looked!

Summary:
Fabric: A cotton-poly blend twin flat sheet for the skirt, a 100% king-size cotton pillowcase for the bodice lining, 3 yards of 100% cotton muslin for the chemise, 1/2 of a small tablecloth for the bodice shell
Notions: Grosgrain ribbon for the skirt drawstring, 6 coconut shell buttons, a package of narrow double-fold bias tape, seam binding for the chemise elastic casings and drawstring
Hours: About 20 hours, most of which happened over one weekend!
Will you make this again? Not unless someone else wants a hobbit costume from me.
Total cost: $3 for the sheet, $6 for the muslin, $2 for the bias tape, $4 for the buttons, and the rest was free. $15 total for the whole costume -- not bad!

I'm hoping to get more/better pictures of me wearing this costume at the midnight showing. Elaine and I will be at the Chinese Theater line party. The last time I dressed up for a midnight showing on opening night was for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2, so it'll be nice to do the whole take-pictures-with-other-geeks thing again!

Because, you know, I didn't do enough of that at my party. Also, doesn't Shayna make the most adorable male hobbit? 

My Lembas Recipe

When throwing a Middle Earth party, having lembas is pretty much a requirement. The much-lauded (except by Gollum) Elvish waybread is supposed to be very nutritious, enough to sustain a grown man of Minas Tirith for a day's labour. Dinner table discussion concluded that if that were truly the case, you might as well hand everyone a Tiger's Milk nutrition bar and be done with it. Unfortunately, lembas is also supposed to be tasty. Most of the recipes out there err on the side of tasty instead of sustaining, and while I don't think it's possible to make real lembas here in Ordinary Earth, I can at least try for something slightly more authentic. Because, you know, there needs to yet another lembas recipe out there on teh interwebs.

My lembas is more like Scottish shortbread than the thin cakes Tolkien describes, my reasoning being that the high butter content gives it the necessary calories for a day's worth of work. I also used almond meal along with flour in order to up the protein content without resorting to those nasty powders from the Vitamin Shoppe. Many of the extant lembas recipes I looked at also called for honey as a sweetener, the reasoning being that lembas is described only as being better than the Beornings' honey-cakes, and not that they necessarily use honey to make lembas. For that reason, I chose to stick to sugar. In the future, I may experiment with honey, though, as it really is better for you than sugar.

Recipe:

1 cup (2 sticks) softened butter
0.5 cups sugar
2 tsp almond extract
1.5 cups all purpose flour
1 cup almond meal (I got mine at Trader Joe's, but you could throw frozen almonds into a food processor to make your own if you can't buy it at your grocery store)
0.5 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon

Cream together the butter, sugar, and almond extract. Try to get it as light and fluffy as you can. Fold in the flour, almond meal, baking powder, and cinnamon as best as you can, but you will eventually need to use your hands to really work all the ingredients together into a dough. Divide the dough into two portions, rolling each half into a log. Flatten the sides of the log so that they are kind of rectangular with rounded corners. Wrap the logs tightly in plastic wrap, chill for an hour, then cut into 3/8" slices. If so desired, use a butter knife to carve runes into the surface (I suggest the G tengwar for Galadriel). Bake for 25-30 minutes in a 300 degree oven, until the outside is a very light golden brown. I made about 30 pieces of lembas from this batch. They can be stored in an airtight container for several days.

I got tired of carving Gs into the surface very quickly, so I resorted to using tiny cookie cutters to make Bill the Pony/Fatty Lumpkin, Gollum's fish (because having a fish on top makes it slightly more palatable?), and Radagast's woodland critter friends instead. 

The cookies made from this recipe feel more substantial and not quite as dessert-y as a cookie normally is; the texture is similar to shortbread and they are crumbly and buttery and only a little sweet. The almond makes for a lovely aroma that seems appropriately mallorn-y. With the wealth of lembas recipes out there, I don't expect this one to surface in searches, but if you're reading this and just want a pleasant almond shortbread, you don't have to call it lembas if you don't want!

I still have one more LOTR/party-related post to go (but at least it's about sewing), and then I promise I'll be back to normal!

A Long Expected Party

After lots of party preparations late into the night...

Dwarven treasure in wooden boxes for the trivia winners!

Including last-minute inspiration while looking at our recycling and an ugly shelving unit that needed hiding...

Two cereal boxes + some tape + judicious application of Sharpie to a yellow balloon + black fabric stash = Barad-dur. Since the Eye of Sauron was a balloon, it swayed back and forth with every air current, making it look like it was actually turning to watch your every move. I don't think I've ever been more pleased with myself.

A day spent whipping up Middle-Earth-themed goodies...

It's too bad our door isn't green! We had Radagast the Brown wizard hat cookies, not-coney stew (with taters, of course), some nice crispy bacon ("Put it out, you fools, put it out!"), lembas (actually almond shortbread, with the reasoning being that the added protein would help keep a grown man going at least for an hour, if not all day...and all imprinted with either G runes for Galadriel and Gandalf, or with Bill the Pony, Gollum's fish, or Radagast's animal friends), and nametags with gold rings (actually grommets).

The One Ring was passed from Bilbo to Frodo, Photogenic Hobbit made an appearance, elves looked serene, people gambled on LOTR trivia...

Merriment was had and awkward prom photos were taken.

It was seriously the birthday party of my dreams! I had so much fun and felt so loved, and I'm pretty sure other people were having fun too. Walnut poked his head out twice, only to decide that there was too much going on for him to make an appearance. So of course I had to steal him afterward for a quick photo.

Come on Mr. Walnut, I can't carry the ring for you, but I can carry you!

Even though I asked for people to bring children's books to donate instead of gifts, Shayna (of course) disobeyed and brought me the exact same kind of Rainbow Brite sheets that I had as a little girl! I loved these sheets when I had them and wanted a Starlite of my own so badly, so I was thrilled beyond belief; I think I might have accidentally let loose with a ringwraith scream in my excitement. And the icing on the cake was the LOTR Pez dispensers from my pastor!

And to keep happiness going...the winner of the Care Bear sheets is Trisha! Please email me with your mailing address as soon as possible so that you can get these sheets by Christmas!

One last picture: Walnut the ethereal elf-cat. 

The Doors of Durin, Lord of Moria

The completion of this project marks the end of one of my most long-standing UFOs* -- it languished for eight whole years.

Peter Jackson's LOTR trilogy of movies came out when I was in college, and for the three years that Elaine and I shared a dorm room, our walls were wallpapered with LOTR articles, magazine covers, calendar pictures, and other paraphernalia. I wish I had thought to take pictures, but alas, there is no evidence that we ever reached such a level of geekery. At the height of this obsession, I began working on painting the Hollin Gate on a huge piece of canvas. Unfortunately, life and and schoolwork got in the way, and at the end of my junior year I sadly took down my uncompleted project. I had only finished the white outlines and a fraction of the gray background, but I folded up the canvas and stuffed it into a storage bin, and somehow managed not to lose it despite moving eight times in eight years. I always thought I'd finish it someday, but after ROTK came out I lost some of the fervor and consequent motivation. Well, apparently a birthday party is sufficient motivation, because I finally finished it!

All Christmas-ed up and ready for picture-taking on Saturday! 

The arch is actually blank, but I cut out runes to say "happy birthday" so that I can change out the greeting depending on the occasion!

The real inscription on Durin's door doesn't actually say happy birthday, of course. Besides stating the riddle one has to solve to open it ("speak friend and enter"), it also proclaims that Narvi made it and Celebrimbor made the symbols, but that's silly and non-applicable in this case, so I opted to leave the arch blank. 

I actually have no idea how I managed to sketch out the design for this on such a large scale; I didn't have a projector or transparency machine to help me out, and the only reference picture I had was the tiny one in my copy of FOTR, but somehow I managed to capture the very recognizable look of the West-gate of Moria. It's a good thing I did such a thorough job those many years ago, because it was quite easy to finish up the painting of this. Probably the most difficult part was pacifying Mr. Cation while this giant canvas took up all of our dining area, as that's the biggest non-carpeted space in our apartment.

It reaches almost from the floor to the ceiling!

It's a good thing I covered surfaces with garbage bags, because the paint definitely seeped through. I learned this lesson the hard way junior year: when I took down the canvas from the wall a day before I had to move out, there were all of these dark gray blotches all over the wall! I panicked for a little bit before realizing I could whip out my paints again and paint over all the blotches. Good thing I was able to match the whites and get my deposit back!

Summary: 
Materials: Three yards of 54" wide heavy duty cream-colored canvas from the UCSD Bookstore, two 16 fl. oz. bottles of white tempera paint, one 8 fl. oz. bottle of black tempera paint, several different sizes of paintbrush
Time required: I don't remember how much time I put into this in junior year, but it took me about ten more hours to finish painting this. Even though it was just mindless filling in of space, it was tricky mixing the same shade of gray every time, and the canvas was also extremely hard to paint, with all its divots and ability to suck up huge amounts of paint. I managed to watch The King's Speech and listen to several episodes of Radiolab and EscapePod while working on it.

[source]

Will you do this again? Is it crazy to want to do my whole (imaginary) house in LOTR decor? Mr. Cation got me the Hobbit art book that has all of Tolkien's original artwork for my birthday, and I'm thinking that the Elvenking's gate would make a fantastic living room mural. I don't think I'll ever paint such a large canvas again, though.
Total cost: A little less than $50, but most of it was so long ago it feels much cheaper than that. $6 in paint, $30 for the canvas, and another $10 in paintbrushes. If I were doing it again now, I would know that canvas can be gotten for much cheaper with coupons at Joann's.
Final thoughts: Last year's Christmas decoration was just a cardboard fireplace...I'm thinking that this is taking the DIY holiday focus piece to a whole 'nother level! Also, unlike the fireplace, which we ended up recycling, this is something I can fold up and keep and bring out at appropriate occasions. When we move to somewhere more permanent, I'd love to actually stretch it out onto a frame so that the edges don't look so grodilated. I thought about binding the edges with some extra-wide bias tape, but I don't much fancy trying to sew through canvas covered with a thick layer of paint.

Walnut looking especially fuzzy in front of the door. 

Mr. Cation also got me the first Hobbit Lego set: Riddles for the Ring. It's just a tiny set, but I appreciate that Gollum's arms are articulated, as well as the ring's hiding place behind a couple of "rocks." It's also nice that they included an extra ring, because a piece that size is just asking to be lost... LOSSSTTT, my precious! Curse us and crush us, the precious is lost!!!

Walnut makes a reluctant showroom model. 

Gollum comes with a nice fish. "Give it to us raw and wriggling! You keep nasty chips!"

Lego made minifigs for each of the characters! I love that there's a warg!

It's Hip to Be a Square

Does anyone remember seeing this music video on Sesame Street? For some reason, this one song has stuck with me through a couple of intervening decades. My sister and I used to whisper it to each other all the time and say it was a secret (not so secret anymore!)...we were odd children. Anyway, when I finished this dress, there was really only one obvious choice for a name, and it doesn't hurt that it's a song with a good message too!

I actually originally picked up this knit fabric thinking that it would make a really cozy bed sheet. I know, what was I thinking? Well, that was three years ago and now I know better than to turn fabrics into sheets; instead, I take sheets and use them for fabric! With three yards of such a large-scale print, I knew it could only be a maxi dress. And while it's certainly not a normal maxi dress print, it's my favorite color combination and gosh darn it, if I want to wear squares all over me, I'm going to just do it. I love the way this dress flows and it makes me feel a million miles tall. And my husband loves it, so that's always a plus.

This dress was inspired by Andrea of Four Square Walls' black raspberry chocolate chip dress, which was based on a Renfrew bodice and unapologetically simple and practical, but oh-so-lovely at the same time. Well, I've got enough summery maxi dresses, but I wanted one that was slightly more suitable for winter, and with the longer sleeves and plenty of space under the skirt for boots, this fits the bill. At least for SoCal winters. It's my usual not-a-Renfrew top with some-fraction-of-a-circle skirt, and even though it's so simple in cut, the length and pattern make it frosting-y enough to please me. It's just what I needed to distract me from my less-than-stellar return to zippered dresses.

Even though I like the idea of making complex dresses with interesting pleats and tucks and lines, sometimes I need to step back and remember Occam's Razor -- if simple will do, there's no need to turn everything into a production. I think that's a good thing to remember as December really gets going and the holidays approach. I don't need to make Christmas decorations (or even party preparations!) into a big ordeal; let's keep things simple and focus on the important bottom line, like family and friends and the reason for all this celebration. I don't need to make things complicated just so I can compare with other people. If somebody else wants to make yards and yards of homemade bunting, good for them! I don't have to. I can be a square, someone else can be a triangle, and I'll still play with them and celebrate who they are. As I start my last year of being in my twenties, I'm continuing to learn to be confident in my own square-ness, and even if this dress doesn't look like the trendy numbers out there, it's still hip enough for me.

Summary:
Fabric: Over three yards of 60" wide knit fabric, mystery content, but fairly high in lycra since this is remarkably stretchy. I've already had to trim the bottom twice and it still keeps stretching out!
Notions: Elastic to stabilize the waist
Hours: Less than two. Sometimes I think I should just make knit dresses for the rest of my life, they're so addictively easy.
Will you make it again? Considering how many of this basic type I've made so far, I think it's safe to say that there are many, many more iterations in my future.
Total cost: I got this fabric so long ago, it feels free. But to be honest, it was probably less than $8.
Final thoughts: I don't know why I love maxi dresses so much...I think it's my love of feeling swishing around my ankles. They make me feel all dramatic as I walk around, sort of like when you wear a cape. Gee, I guess it's that simple -- maxi dresses are the closest I can get to playing dress-up while not actually wearing a costume.

When I was in high school, I truly and seriously thought that being almost thirty was the end of the world. Even now, when I talk to my students in AP Psych about aging, they all talk about how they think life only goes downhill after 25. And while it's not even like I have that much perspective, I think it's safe to say that getting older means getting more beautiful. I don't mean that in a gosh-I-look-awesome way, but in a I'm-understanding-and-embracing-myself-more-and-giving-myself-permission-to-like-what-I-like way.

Quote by Simon Pegg, image from here.

I wish I had understood this more when I was a teenager wasting time angsting about whether boys liked me, or if my clothes were cool, or how awful my skin was, or if I was taking as many AP classes as everyone else. But hey, I'll take the realization now and just do my best to communicate it to my students, and live like I believe it to the best of my ability. I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

Many thanks to all of you who took the time to wish me a happy birthday! I am so grateful to all of you who continue encouraging me on my journey of self-discovery through sewing, and for all the wisdom you ladies share in your comments and in your own blogs. So many of you inspire me through the way you embrace yourselves and your lives.

Another Birthday, Another Mathom Giveaway

After all my wibbling about throwing a birthday party, I'm sorry to say this is another birthday post, but I hope you'll excuse me as today is my actual birthday! This year's birthday proceedings feel very different from last year's -- instead of swanning about the house in a dress that will never make it out into public, I'm planning a Tolkien-themed birthday party for this coming Saturday night -- who would ever have thought? It's funny, when you're in high school you think that all the important psychological growth should be over by the time you're in your late twenties, but given how much my state of mind has changed (in positive ways!) since a year ago...well, it just goes to show, what do teenagers really know?

While I was in San Francisco for work last week, I dropped by the San Leandro Thrift Town, which has never disappointed me when it comes to sheets. I came away with this amazing, like new, seashell print, king-sized, 100% cotton duvet cover. It reminds me of those scientific drawings that hipsters frame, regardless of whether they feel any connection to the sciences or seashells. Well, I'll see your hipster print and raise you a whole hipster dress. I'm thinking that with this amount of fabric, I might actually attempt a bustle dress. Because, you know, all those Victorian dinosaur hunters and their scientific drawings. Or something. Look, I never said my thought process made any sense. I suppose I could use this duvet cover for its actual purpose and cover our king-size duvet (do you have any idea how difficult it is to find such a large, high-quality duvet cover for cheap?), but that would be too sensible. 

Even better though (at least where you all are concerned), I came across this Care Bears flat twin sheet! Children of the eighties, where you at?? Much as I think this would make an awesome sheet dress, I have to be honest...although I loved watching the Care Bears when I was growing up, this sheet is a little too pastel and sweet for my taste, so I'm giving it away to one lucky reader (who will hopefully make it into an awesome dress)! Just so you know, a twin flat sheet measures 66″x96″, so that would give you about two and two-thirds yards of 66″ wide fabric. This is plenty of material for my usual sheet dresses with a fitted bodice and full gathered skirt. Alternately, you could save it for actually sleeping with.

"Snuggle up with sweet dreams!" This is 1/4 of the sheet, to give you an idea of the scale.  Although there's no tag, I'm guessing the fiber content is probably 50% polyester, 50% cotton, like most of my thrifted sheets from this era. 

Here are the rules for entering the giveaway:

1. Leave a comment, telling me who your favorite Care Bear is/was. Mine was Cheer Bear, because my secret girly-girl loved that she was pink and her tummy badge was a rainbow! Yuck, sometimes I gross myself out.  Alternately, tell me what your dream bed sheet find would be. I would just about die if I found Sailor Moon, Batman Beyond, or Rainbow Brite sheets. 
2. This giveaway is open to all geographic locations. 
3. Same as previous giveaways: it goes without saying, but you really should be a follower of my blog. I'll assume that you're a follower if you leave a comment. 
4. Also goes without saying, but I hope you really intend to use your winning! Please don't win just so you can turn around and sell the sheet, shred it for hamster bedding, or use it to decoupage a Regretsy-esque wooden plaque. Also, I know some people have businesses making dresses to sell from vintage sheets; while I think that is a perfectly legitimate and totally awesome way to make a living, I would really like this sheet to be acquired for personal use.
5. I'll close the giveaway at the end of the week, on Sunday, December 9, 2012, at 11:59 PM PST, and announce the winner on Monday morning. Again, thanks for reading Cation Designs and leaving all of your awesome comments that encourage me! 

Also, you know last year's dress? I managed to finally finish off the neckline with gold bias tape, find a full-length cream-colored slip, and thrift a gold chain belt! All that I really need to do to make it complete (at least in my mind) is get some white chiffon to redo the sleeves. I'm thinking something more like the bell-shaped, long, flowy sleeves that elves have, impractical as that may be. 

Life is Dangerous on the African Savannah

After my knit fiesta dress turned out to have a less than satisfactory neckline, I quickly started another dress, hoping to finish it in time for Friday's WoF taping. Looking back, I should have known that that was a recipe for disaster; rushed, last-minute projects never turn out well. Especially when said project is the first woven, zippered dress in several months, and with a new, untested pattern. Here was my inspiration:

[source]

I loved the chevron pleats on the bodice, and thought New Look 6067 would be perfect for recreating that look. Elaine had found this awesome polka-dotted sheet that featured rows of large African mammals on it, and I was so excited to make it into a dress.

It was even the right color scheme and everything! 

Gummy was also pretty thrilled about this sheet...when it arrived he spent a good fifteen minutes rolling around in it like it had been smeared in catnip or something. 

Oh, I'm sorry, did you need this for something?

I really, really, really wanted to love this dress, but since I only started sewing on Thursday, I didn't have enough time to fit the bodice properly, resulting in a wrinkly, bulgy mess instead of the sleek, fitted look that I wanted. And most unfortunately, the row of cheetahs actually detracted from the cool pleats.

See those lovely pleats? Yeah, me neither -- I got distracted by the cheetah body parts. 

And here's what it looks like on me. Eeeyurgh.

Besides being poofy and weird, the bodice was also a little too long in front, but because of the pleat placement, I couldn't cut it any shorter without cutting off the bottom chevron. When I tried the dress on  Thursday night, I was so angry with it that I just crumpled it up and threw it on the floor for Walnut to sit on. Except that he refused to sit on it, and usually he's a sucker for fabric on the floor. Yeah, that's how bad it was. Anyway, after some mental distance, I decided that having it be a UFO was even sadder, so I hitched up my bootstraps and finished the waist stay and hem today.

Lining and waist stay. Oh, and seam allowances finished with rayon seam binding. At least it looks nice on the inside?

These photos are pretty dark and grainy since it was gray and drizzly all day, but I just wanted to get them done and out of the way so that I wouldn't have to think about this dress anymore.  

Back view.

Moral of the story: just because you love the design and the fabric print, doesn't mean that they should go together! This would have worked so much better in a solid color, where the pleat design could really have shone. In other words, the African savannah sounds cool and exotic, but when it comes down to it, life there is tough and not everyone can hack it! Or something. Yeah, coming up with analogies is not my strong suit.

Slouchy side view.

In the end, though, it didn't matter that the dress didn't turn out well; Mr. Cation didn't win on WoF, so I never had to make an appearance! It turns out that the audience is random people, and the contestants' guests only get shown if the contestant is the big winner. Ironically enough, I ended up wearing, at Mr. Cation's request, the very first "real" dress that I ever made -- which was sewn last minute, in a rush, right before a wedding! That one turned out just fine, though...go figure.

Summary:
Fabric: A flat twin sheet, 60/40 poly-cotton blend, and some more of my cotton voile leftover from my steampunk blouse for the lining.
Notions: A 22" zipper (my first dress zipper since oh, July), grosgrain ribbon, a swimsuit bra hook, and hook and eye
Techniques used: Putting in a waist stay, and I also tried just inserting my zipper without pinning or basting, as Tilly said professionals do. It worked, too -- this might actually be one of my better zippers in terms of matching at the waist seam and the neckline. Of course it would be, right?
Hours: Too many. Between trying to salvage the bodice to be best of my abilities, and trying to remember how to best gather so much fabric into so little bodice, and then the hand-sewing today...ugh. So much time that could have been spent making something I actually like and will wear. I'm proud of myself for persevering and not having a UFO, though.
Will you make it again? I really want this pattern to work, but I'm afraid I have such a grudge against it that I'm not going to give it another try, at least for a really long time.
Total cost: About $2, since the sheet was a gift and the lining was leftover from another project, so I only paid for the ribbon and zipper.
Final thoughts: I hate the bodice, but still love the fullness of the skirt, so if I find a cropped sweater or cardigan that I can throw on top, this dress might still get some wear.

It's a teensy bit better when I forcibly pull down the bodice to smooth out the wrinkles...