It’s back to the drawing board for Laurel’s Christmas dress. The day after it was ordered, the luscious black velveteen arrived from The Sewing Studio. I was already working, full steam ahead, on the ivory Swiss batiste pinafore bib to slip over the black dress (see previous post), when it arrived.  Then disaster struck.
But let me back up a minute. I like to stitch the shoulder seams before inserting laces, so the lace is a continuous piece, from bottom of the front yoke to the bottom of the back yoke. By doing so, there is no break in the lace pattern and no fudging to get the laces to match up absolutely perfectly at the shoulder.
So after inserting one row of Swiss beading from front to back, nearly 20″, I discovered it was defective.
There was a gap between the fabric and one of the eyelets for the ribbon. It had never occurred to me to check for flaws. Imported trims are expensive and thus, perfect, I foolishly thought. WRONG!  I stand corrected. Okay, so nothing is perfect, right? Well, except for my grandchildren, of course.
Enlarge to see the defects/gaps beside ribbon carrier eyelets.
Ever so carefully, I removed the tiny zig zag stitches, removed the beading and pulled out another length of this lovely stuff.  Half way through that application, I was heartsick to see not just one but several such defects. I unrolled the entire 10 yard bold and saw defects no less frequently than every 10″. I cannot even remember where, several years ago,  I purchased this and the matching insertion.   So I’ve put it away and will have to use it in short lengths. The partially finished pinafore bib goes in the scrap bag. Maybe I will make a doll dress to match. But for now,  I was back to square one for Laurel’s pinafore bib.
Even a trip to the drawing board had to wait. All three grandchildren here for a fun filled, glorious weekend with pumpkin carving, tractor riding, tree house climbing and football watching.   So no designing or sewing went on. Saturday, we put 6 year old Laurel in charge of entertaining 19 month old Alastair on the back porch, gave an iPad to 5 year old computer guru Robert and then bit our nails, grinned, moaned, groaned and cheered while we watched the Florida/Georgia game. After the 34-31 Gator win, I decided that flawed Swiss beading wasn’t the the end of the world.
Trying to find a silver lining to this untimely delay to my holiday sewing, I thought “oh well.” I think I prefer lace beading and insertion anyway, rather than the heavier Swiss trims. Another substitution is regular, sheer Nelona, more suitable to the lighter laces than the heavier weight Swiss batiste.   And because the Nelona champagne color is lighter, I’ve chosen to use ecru laces. So the new bib will be different in every way except for the graceful Sugar Plum Fairy embroidery from A Bit of Stitch.
I’m a positive person. I’ve decided that I am glad the Swiss trim was bad, glad to have a second chance to get this just right. Yeah, sure I am……
Back to the machine.
