"I Love Lucy" Dress

We have been seeing many full skirted dresses with fitted bodices this season, and I thought it would be a good school dress for the new teacher in my life.

So when I was in NYC in June, I took a little side trip to Mood fabrics and looked around with Kathryn, Austin, and the 2 cute little ones (not that the parents aren't cute, but ...)

We found a couple of fun light weight fabrics to use for dresses and skirts and this is one of them.

It is a light blue and white stripe and I lined it with plain old white cotton. 

 Pictures got lost from my beautiful camera that I just left under my airplane seat and walked away from, so my DD was kind enough to take a few and send them my way.

 It looks like it needs a belt. Maybe I'll make a belt out of the fabric.

Steph must've thought it needed a belt too. I think a skinny one would be good. Maybe I need to move the waistline up just a bit too. Oh, the joys of sewing long distance. I'll just make the waist seam bigger and adjust the zipper out of necessity while I'm at it. (Next time I'm in the same time zone with it.) But only if it is long enough to afford taking it up an inch and a half.

                              

I do like the tie at the neck. Finishes it off nicely.

Also notice the piping at the middle and princess seams. The stripes that are in a sort of herringbone pattern meeting at the middle and going up from there and then meeting at the princess seam and going down to the side seam then up, then down all the way around the bodice. The skirt has big pleats in the front and then they are smaller all the way around to the back. The fabric on the skirt is on grain and the stripes run up and down.

So this is my attempt at making a dress that I think Lucy Ricardo and my mother would have worn for everyday type clothes in the 1950's. 

Happy 100th (belated) birthday to Lucy.