Dreaming of Warmer Weather

Goshu ponders my creation.

No sooner did I finish this dress, then the weather dropped.   As in, remember the floaty dress?  I finished this the next day and I am currently in polar fleece.    I know I'll miss the cool weather as soon as I start to sweat, but I want to take pictures! ::grumps around::

Anyhow.  I found myself between projects (don't get me wrong, there are any number of UFOs watching me from the sewing closet.   Crying, yearning and generally flailing about for my attention)  so I decided to actually plug a gap in my wardrobe and make a dress appropriate for fancy-pants events at work in the summer when I don't want to wear a suit.   (context: This happens *maybe* once a year.  I do R&D and they usually keep us far away from the outside world and upper management)

I'm not usually much of a sheath dress person, but the princess seams attracted me in a way darts never do.   I also really liked the raglan sleeves (straps?)   I'm hoping the result will be very elegant while still being comfortable.   I don't want it to be so fitted it ends up as a wiggle dress.

The fabric itself is a woven, and based on a burn test, appears to be wool. It is comprised of many different shades of blue and white weft with a very thin black thread for the warp.   (Warp threads are the ones that go the long way through the fabric and are put on the loom first.  Weft goes back and forth the short way and is the material added through the weaving process.   How so I know?   I use to warp giant barn looms when I worked at summer camp.  It takes hours.)

winding the warp onto the loom -- I'm the one on the right.

Random and only vaguely related story - the arts and crafts lodge is a hand built structure from the '30s on the top of a tall hill in a mountain gorge.   Thunderstorms are a crazy experience.   Every week, the current crops of kids each made a rug, so we were constantly re-warping the looms to keep up with demand.   One evening I was up there on my own, and of course, a thunderstorm was raging - I had some kind of intense music going and right at a crescendo, as the thunder boomed, the door burst open and a giant form appeared, bringing wind and rain in with him.

I nearly had a heart attack.

Inevitably, the result is anti-climactic.  It was the guy who worked in the office- he had heard I was up there alone and came to keep me company and bring up yogurt.  So much for ghost stories.