#maxisewalong2016 – My Maxi Dress (5 Out Of 4 Patterns – Journey Dress)

I debated on whether or not I should post my maxi dress early or just post it during the big reveal. I decided on early, two reasons: 1. I’m excited about it and 2. I didn’t want to take attention away from the other maxi’s in the reveal. So here is my maxi dress!

This is the Journey Tank and Dress by 5 Out Of 4 Patterns. This is my first time posting one of their patterns but actually the second garment I’ve made by them. My first pattern was the Riptide Reversible Shorties, which I will blog about soon. Anyways, enough about the shorties, lets get onto the maxi review!

The pattern itself has a ton of different options. I went with the cross-back maxi dress. Now, you’ll see this has a nursing option and you know how much I love nursing clothing, but I think the time has come to start weaning the little one. So on that subject, I would typically cut the bra portion at a C/D cup but I ended up trimming it to the A/B line. There is a guide to show you which one to cut and I was in-between. If you’re in-between, consider the smaller cup… unless you want to be conservative, then go with the larger. You may also notice I didn’t do the ruching. While I like it, I just didn’t want to have it on this dress. I actually really liked the little sports bra this pattern offers. I think I’ll end up making a few tops from this, the sports bra and tank top being next.

At the time of making this my measurements were 36-31-40 which put me at a Small-Small-Medium. I just went with the small throughout since the hip portion is a dress and I was at the low end of the Medium. This was a good idea – the fit is great. Like I said above, I ended up cutting the A/B for the bust. For the back I went with the criss-cross. This is always worrisome because of bras, but my bra apparently had that option – so score! I also put 1/4″ elastic in the seams of the straps. For the skirt I added 3″ and didn’t hem it because of how the fabric curls. Between this pattern and my shorties, I’d have to say the sizing for 5oo4 is spot on.

If you look closely above, you’ll see a seam down the middle of the top in the back. There’s not supposed to be a seam there. I printed my pattern and traced the pieces to medical paper but wrote the fold on the wrong size of the back. I was so confused when trying to put the cut out pieces together and then it dawned on me that maybe I screwed something up. I checked the original pattern and YEP! This isn’t anything new, I do this sort of thing all the time because my brain is 100 different places at once. So I just cut it in the middle and serged it together with a 1/4″ seam. I serged the sides with the 1/4″ seam instead of the suggested 3/8″ seam. I know that mathematically doesn’t add up to be correct, but close enough because I wasn’t going to re-cut the pieces – matching stripes is not super fun! Either way, you can’t tell and it looks/fits good 🙂

Onto the fabric. This is from Girl Charlee and I originally ordered it to make Gwen Stefani’s jailbird outfit from The Sweet Escape video to wear to her concert. I rush ordered this and when it came I was so disappointed. While yes the fabric said heathered, this was what I consider defective. The white looks like it has dirty lines throughout it, as if maybe the dye leaked. I went back and forth with GC and finally came to an agreement that they would discount the fabric as if I were buying defective. I know what heathered looks like and this was far from it. I was validated because I posted the pictures in the GC Facebook group and other people showed me pictures of theirs and they didn’t have the line. Also, I washed mine on hot and half of the markings came off (thank goodness). The thing is, I love the feel and weight of the fabric. The stretch is perfect, basically everything is perfect except for the damn line through it! While you can’t see it from afar, you can see it close up. I did try to alter the contrast on the pictures above, so you can’t tell either. (I want to note that I’ve ordered from GC numerous times and this was my first issue. It did take some back and forth stern emails, but the problem was resolved.)

Lastly, I was really debating on the bottom portion. I was worried I would look like a referee in the stripes and thought maybe I should do a solid black. In the end, I figured I’d be bold and go ahead with the stripes all over. I did choose to do the skirt in vertical because horizontal stripes make my already wide hips look extra super wide! I’m happy with the outcome and my final choice!

BONUS:
I actually made 2 maxi dresses! Here is the other one: Patterns For Pirates: Sunshine Dress. This post is part of the Minerva Crafts Blogger Network. Check it out for the full details.

I can’t wait to see what everyone has made!! Be sure to e-mail me your final dresses, post them in the Facebook group or use #maxisewalong2016 on social media! Tomorrow is the last day and I’ll be showcasing and picking a winner of the free 5 Out Of 4 pattern early next week!