Plus Size to Yes Size: A Patterned Dress Refashion

I know that many women are told to be wary of horizontal stripes.  Something like this dress may be the reason why.

Truly shudder worthy at this point

This was a lot of dress to tackle, but tackle it I did!

I'm No Cartoon Character: The Most Surprising "Before" that I've Refashioned

I bought this at the shop because of the fun button arrangement and bright color red (I've been told I look good in red, who am I to argue?).

Good bones: pockets and fun buttons!

My husband remarked that I looked like Raggedy Ann.  I am of the opinion he never owned or saw a proper Raggedy Ann doll since I do not see the similarity.  This reminded me more of Olive Oyl, Popeye's fervid love interest.

Any similarity to a cartoon character or doll is not the icing on top of this fashion confection, however.  It is this...

Imagine my surprise!

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this was not in fact a dress, but a romper!  I'm just going to let that sink in for a second.  Somehow, someone thought this dress needed legs to be complete.  Well, I beg to differ.  Let's turn this into the dress it is meant to be!

Never Ruffled:Shirt to Skirt Refashion

I got this plus-sized shirt because of the colors and silky material.  Problem? Its size and huge ruffle down the center!

No, I haven't been using self-tanner, weird lighting

After a little experimentation, I was inspired to turn this into a comfy summer skirt!

Dye Hard: A Bejeweled Ill-fitting Dress Refashion

I got this overly large and blingy white dress at the shop for a couple buckaroos.  White is not my color, and I generally try to avoid bedazzling my chest in any way.

Blindingly white

Here's a closeup of the jewel action.  I started by removing those (sure to be used someday later).  You can also see here the cool detail on the fabric, which is totally lost in the sea of whiteness.

Flashy chestal region!

What else did this dress have in store?

The Hunt is Coming for You: A Patterned Shirt Refashion

I found this shirt at a Goodwill and fell in love with the pattern.

Hello floppy hands

 Here is a close-up of the fabric.   It is a fun hunting-themed shirt with foxes, pheasant, and dogs.  We are big fans of cute furry things in our house (our three cats and foxy looking dog are proof of that), so this was a total winner with the hubs.

Run away!

What to do with this?

Rolling on the High Seas:A Nautical-Inspired Dress

I found this one at the shop on the dollar rack, and I can see why.  I thought the stripes were a bit nautical (always in season it seems), so I decided to give it a try!

Yikes buttons!  Yikes length!

First thing to address were the non-functioning buttons.  Yep, this dress doesn't even have a panel that necessitates those buttons!  It's just folded over!

Dastardly Dilapidated Buttons!

I took my handy dandy seam ripper and removed their souls! Or rather, I removed the buttons.

Buttons Be Gone!

The top fit me well, so the next thing to tackle was the length.  I chopped off a good 10 inches to bring it up to knee level (most flattering on me).  I hemmed that and did a little "Finished!" jig when I noticed something unfortunate .  When I removed the buttons, I had that fold on one side of the front, and there was a dart on the other side.  Asymmetry can be nice sometimes, but not on the front of a black skirt, ladies and gentlemen.  

Jig, Interrupted! :( 

To fix it, I measured the distance of each to the center of the dress and pinched and folded and darted to make it even.

Picture me darting around the room.  That's not what I did, it's just fun to picture.

I thought of those cool rope-looking buttons I took off the Asian-style jacket here and thought they would make a nice addition to the ensemble.  

Remember us?!

Here is the final result! I added my thrifted Ralph Lauren belt to highlight the red in the stripes.

Naughty-cal?

It's a bit hard to see, but I strung the rope beads on some plain silver chain and layered with a slightly chunkier chain for the whole "sea-going lots of rope and chains around" look.  I wore this to hang out with some Navy people (appropriate, no?), and we were introduced to the card game Cards Against Humanity.  It was hilariously funny and resulted in a good time overall.  Happy Sailing!

Ready for a night of hilarity!

Dye Job: Skirt to Dress Refashion

My mother-in-law gave me this skirt thinking I could do something with it.  And do something with it I did!  This was a contender for the wedding refashion, but lost to the muumuu.  As a skirt, it's at an unflattering length for me and it is too tight across the hips.  

Hippy!

The white and brown looked a little too country for me, so I thought it would be a good time to break out some dye! I used Rit Lemon Yellow (about half the container), mixed it with some salt (to make the color vivid) and boiling water to dissolve and threw it into my washing machine to do its thing.  I put the washer on the longest cycle (Bulky for mine) and use the hot water option.  After it finished, I put it through a short cold water cycle with some detergent to set the color and clean the washer a bit.  Easy peasy!

Dye kit!

I pulled the skirt up to use as a strapless dress and belted it.  Now the dress hits at a flattering knee-length and is a fun, summery color!

Glass room pic!

This dress served me well (pun intended) as we went to BB's on Hendrick's Avenue, our favorite place for a nice lunch to commemorate something.  In this case, we celebrated (lamented?) the beginning of school for me!  Happy schooling!

Matching the Florida sunshine!

Blue Wonder:An 80's Dress in a 40's Style Refashion

This one is a doozy.  And not one of those double-doozy cookie sandwiches (yum!).  This dress is ginormous on me with puffed sleeves.  The fabric, though, is uber cool and it has some cool pleating on top.  

Time to get started!

Where's Allison?

I started by removing the sleeves and along with them, these mini-shoulder pads used to add poof.

You are not needed here!

 Here are the two sleeves with poofs and those hanger strap things (why do you need those when the dress has sleeves?).

Bye bye sleevies!

 I may or may not have arranged them so they make two faces.

Meet Mrs. and Mr. Sleevies!

 With the sleeves taken care of, I needed to take it in a bit.  I put it on my dress form and pinned the sides near the bust, waist and hip to give me a line to follow for the new seam.

Mini wings! 

With the size fixed, the length was the next item on the agenda.  Slightly below the knee/mid-shin is pretty universally unflattering, so I was going to bring it up a bit.  This was also a good reason...

Burned spots!  Ack!

 I cut right above the burns and sewed a new hem.  Here is the final product!

Don't mind the huge head...odd perspective.

 I paired it with a pair of black flats and a homemade gold tassel necklace.

See the pleating? Cute!

My husband took my new dress and me (I know it sounds weird, but it's grammatically correct) to the movies to see The Wolverine.  

Can't rain on my Hugh Jackman parade!

 We followed up the action-packed flick based in Japan with some sushi! This dress is definitely becoming a staple in my closet!

Another ad-fashion: Lace Embellishments for Heels

This is a quick one.  I wanted something to embellish some heels (and maybe make them a bit more comfortable).  This is what I found to start with.  I found the padded toe sock thingies at Target for $5 for two pair and the lace at Joann's.   

Sewed the lace around the edge of the sock to show how much lace I wanted and voila!  

From the front

It gives a pair of heels a totally different look, and it's not a permanent change.  Black ones next on the agenda for sure!

It's like shoe jewelry!