Maxi Dress Tutorial Revisited

I recently completed a dress that was 3 years in the making...and several different things. I picked up this knit print in Arizona a few years ago at a large fabric warehouse. I tried to make it into a maxi dress early in my sewing clothes days and it didn't work out well. Then I attempted to turn it in to a high waisted maxi skirt with elastic thread around the top section, but I wasn't thrilled with the outcome. So, I turned to my Maxi Skirt Tutorial and combined the top of the dress with the elastic waist skirt to create a maxi.

The Original Maxi Dress Tutorial

After I combined the top to the skirt, the finished dress was too short, so I added a band of navy knit around the bottom and it is now finally completed. This maxi is one of my favorites. I love the comfort of the dress and the way the elastic waist allows it to be worn with no belt or sash.

 To add the elastic shirring at the waist you just need to add elastic thread to your bobbin and sew as usual. You do have to hand wind the bobbin with the thread and rethread often if you are making this many rows. This dress has about 12 rows of shirring, each about 1/4 inch apart. Use the side of your sewing foot to guide you. This stitching should be much straighter than mine, but like I said, most of this was in my early days of sewing...so I worked with it :) And it hasn't really bothered me when I have worn it. The thing that does bother me is the fabric is piling...what am I doing wrong? I wash it inside out, hang dry and it is already looking really worn. Guess I need to research that side a bit and try to fix it.

I am currently working on another maxi using my peplum top as a base...I hope to have the pattern and tutorial done soon! It seems to be taking me forever to get anything completely done these days.

Shannon