I’ve been able to hand sew 2-4 hours a week.

Since I finished the olive green dress, I’ve been working on a black one.

It was originally from Holy Clothing (on Ebay) for $35.

Spaghetti strap, full length, and buttons right down the front. A tie back at the back, otherwise shapeless.

This is what it looks like at the moment :

(The white blob on the left is half of one of my cats. I had the dress spread on my bed to photograph, and he didn’t see why he should move)

The first thing I did was undo the buttons from about waist height down to the bottom. I then cut off the buttons and trimmed and folded the material back behind and sewed it down, leaving an upside down V shaped gap at the front.

I then inserted a piece of material from a vintage nightie into the gap. It’s ashes-of-roses colour (not that you can tell from the photo). I’m a terrible photographer.

Then I trimmed the bottom of the dress in 5” black venice lace.

Along the edge of the V, I placed some fancy black braid.

I added some wonderful rose trim I got from Etsy – 3 dimensional black cotton roses, each about 1.5” big, (about 12 to the yard), on a fine black net background (about 2 inches wide). This went along the edge of the V, just outside the braid so the net on the inside half covered the braid.

I had placed the nightie material so a ruffle the nightie had ran along the hem of the V. I put some roses along there as well

Can you see the roses running up the sides of the V? It’s a bit hard, being black on back. And the braid on the inside.

The actual colour is a bit pinker than it appears in the photo – just a bit.

I cut off all the buttons from the waist to the top and sewed the gap together so I wouldn’t have gaping across my bust.

I’m currently covering the buttons with some ashes-of-roses material, and then a scrap of the venetian lace

I’ve got two more to do. They are just serving as decoration now.

You can see the embroidery that came on the dress originally in this photo too.

I found out how to cover the buttons from the tutorial at

http://mademoisellechaos.blogspot.com/2010/03/inspired-me.html

tho mine aren’t as quarter as nice as Madamemoiselle Chaos’.

I’ve also added a fine ruffle along the top edge (you can just see some above the first button, on the left).

I have yet to

• put the dress on inside out, and then pin and sew it to my shape, to give it a better fit
• decide whether it still needs a tie back after that
• add these to the top of the dress, on either side of the top few buttons :

These beaded and wire leaves were a magnificent find on Etsy ($20, but I thought they were worth it). They are very heavy, and the reflections from the bigger beads means you can’t really see the detail of all the smaller beads in the interior of the leaves. They are very vintage. (a wonderful phrase in my book!)

• consider replacing the cotton shoulder straps with the wide rose trim (a statement!), or at least some wide satin ribbon, which would match the tie back if I use one.

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Now – I’ve dropped out of the Masterclass. I’m just too ill. Instead, I’ll look forward to doing “Mermaid in the Grotto” next year.

It was an agonizing decision, but at my current level of ability (which has been going on since last May) the Uni would be more pressure than anything else.

This means that when I’m ready, I’ll be able to continue with my own Elizabethan sampler. I’m glad about that. I was a bit worried that it’d become a UFO, because I’d want to move onto a new project rather than ‘going backwards’ to an old project after the Uni course. I’ve already put six months into that Sampler and I really want to finish it.

I might not be able to teach myself as many new stitches as I planned, since I am a bit wobbly, but at least I have detached buttonhole down, and raised work, and several methods of goldwork. I have yet to conquer Trellis Stitch and Spiral Trellis Stitch, which will be my challenge.

I’m contemplating doing the background of the Sampler in silver in Gobelin or Tent stitch, like a sweet bag. Not only will it add zing, but it’s something simple to stitch on my less good days – pretty brainless, as opposed to the motifs which take a bit more concentration.

We last saw the Sampler at http://elmsleyrose.blogspot.com/2009/06/historical-sampler-some-vine.html