Yet another version of McCall's 6886

Have you seen enough of this pattern yet?  

Please say no, as I feel like I am just getting started!  It's such a blank canvas to let your imagination run wild! 

This is such a simple, simple design that is really well drafted.  Every version I've seen looks great!  This is also a great pattern to hack to your heart's content, which is what I am going to experiment with in the future.  

Here's what I did with it this time.  

I am sort of obsessed with Alabama Chanin's embellishing lately land this time, I wanted to add some 'stripes' to my fabric.  When I talked to DH about this, he was skeptical and thought the dress would look like something made in a weekend craft shop.  Tsk, tsk! I hoped he was wrong, but wondered the same thing.  Since both pieces of the fabric I was planning on using were left overs from other projects, I decided to give it a whirl anyway!

Here is what I came up with: 

What do you think?  

Of course you can see I hacked the pattern to color block it.  

Of course you can see where I added the hand embroidery to the strips of fabric to make my 'stripes'.  

I used Chanin's embroidery book,The Geometry of Hand Sewing.    It has very clear illustrations and a helpful plastic template to assist you in marking where your stitches will go in order to create symmetrical designs.  

For my embroidery, I knew I wanted a contrast color and I love this mustard-yellow with the gray and white.  This is just plain ol' embroidery floss from Hobby Lobby.  I separated it into three strands and just went to town!  

For the hacking part, I cut the bodice and skirt separately and sewed them together.  I pinned the lower and upper half together and manipulated the length of each until I was happy.  

I am really in love with this dress!  When I showed it to DH, he was so very pleasantly surprised that he simply stopped what he was doing, smiled his little half-smile and said, "Wow!"  Isn't that one of the best compliments of all???

Thanks for reading!  What is inspiring you lately?  Do tell!

Sue