Making a dress part 2

Let me make clear if I haven’t done so already that I am not a dress maker and I’m not attempting here to tell anyone how to make a dress. I’m just planning to make myself a long summer dress because I like long summer dresses but I can’t afford to buy any first of all, and secondly the ones I’ve seen in stores, catalogs and online are all sleeveless or they have very short sleeves and I prefer dresses with sleeves that fall to my elbows or a few inches above.

So I decided why not try to make my own long summer dress with sleeves? I’ve made my own clothes before and actually wore the pieces out in public. They didn’t come out half bad even for being hand sewn. And I’ve been remembering as I’ve been going through this process that when I was a little girl I used to love to cut out designs for clothes using paper and I also used to love to draw figures of females and draw stylish clothes on them. Maybe making a dress will prove to be therapeutic for me, helping me to rediscover my true self.

I have no illusions about pursuing dress-making as a business although I did at one point last year entertain thoughts about starting my own clothing line. I feel that a person should accept their limitations and pursue whatever it is they are best at doing and love most. In all honesty I can’t say that I know what I am best at and love most. Because I have so many interests I have tended jump from idea to idea. But I am determined to figure things out once and for all and soon before my whole life passes me by.

In the meantime, I am keeping myself occupied managing a handful of websites because this is where I have made my income for the last 10 years, working in one way or another in web development and computer programming; and when things are as they are now, slow slow and scarily fruitless money wise, I still try to stay busy.

Today I have kept myself occupied by working on the design for the summer dress I want to make. I drew out a design this morning (the design from this morning) and I’ve just finished digitally painting it in Embroidered Voile Tangerine/Yellow with white eyelet trim. I’m pretty much just trying to find the fabric I want to use to make the dress; but I’m thinking the Embroidered Voile Tangerine/Yellow dress with white eyelet trim looks like something made for grandma. What do you think? It looks like the dress would look heavy even if it doesn’t feel heavy. And it looks kind of like it was made out of drapes. So I’ll keep looking; but not today.

It’s raining outside and I think this is the perfect time to start working on the novel I’ve been meaning to re-write but have kept putting off. It’s a novel I wrote when I was 18 and tried to get published; but it got rejected by everyone I submitted it to. I’ve tried rewriting it pretty much every year since. Maybe I’ll get the effort to take this time around.