Tessuti Lisa Dress

 

Hey there! How is everyone doing? I am here today to show you the dress I made for myself for Easter.  I am in this awkward postpartum phase that I really don’t remember so much from my first two pregnancies.  I seem to have stalled on the weight loss progress and only about 5% of my clothes fit me right now. (I arrived at that number quite unscientifically. Essentially nothing fits except for the few things I’ve made for myself since having Caroline.)  I’ve got sort of an unintentional capsule wardrobe going on right now.  I keep rotating through my three Linden sweatshirts, my Marianne top, and my Extraordinary Girl top (which I took in so it’s not so maternity any more.) I have two pairs of Hudson pants and one pair of jean in the rotation for bottoms. 

I had been thinking about what to wear on Easter, since a Linden sweatshirt and Hudson pants seemed a little too casual for church.  I’d worn my Marianne maxi dress the week before and really wanted something different. Enter the Tessuti patterns Lisa dress! I bought, assembled, and traced the pattern when I was still pregnant, after seeing this top version on Instagram. I love that white linen so much! (So much that I am in the process of making a Lisa top from white linen!) I thought this would be a good silhouette for my current body stage since it’s got that nice flowy skirt to cover all my lumps and bumps.

I wasn’t sure what fabric to use until I stumbled upon this great rayon challis that was buried in my stash. I bought it with a Washi dress in mind and now I’m really glad I never got to that Washi dress! I love wearing rayon but it’s not my favorite to cut and sew. Cutting the dress took almost as long as sewing it since the fabric was slippery and I was trying to get the patterns matched on the front and back bodice.

Have you sewn a Tessuti pattern before? This was my first and I was surprised that the pattern was hand drawn. The PDF went together easily and the directions were really thorough. I love the way this dress is designed with the high-low empire waist. I raised the armholes by about an inch since they were cut pretty low and I raised the dart about 3/4 of an inch. This is a great everyday dress for me.  I like that the neckline is high and the skirt is long enough for all of my mom duties.

I feel really good in this dress and I’m excited to get my top finished. I am feeling a little disappointed that I am still pretty far from fitting into all of the clothes that I made last year, especially since Me Made May is coming so quickly. I am going to participate again this year, but I know I will be repeating items quite a bit. Last year I don’t think I repeated any outfits, but I have to give myself grace since I am in a different stage of life than I was last year at this time. And who knows, maybe toward the end of May some of my clothes from last year will be closer to fitting.

I think that next I am going to make the Tessuti Ruby top/dress and the Alice top/dress. I’ve seen some great versions of both of these patterns and I think they’ll be good styles for me right now.  I hope I can get one or both made by the beginning of May! Are you participating in Me Made May this year?

~Teri