Dress Makeover

Yesterday I made over a dress that's been in my closet for six years!  

That is a post picture, btw.  Previously, it had fit me something like a garbage sack, so I added in a sash in the back, seen in these two pictures:

Oh yeah, taking pictures of your back in a mirror is SUPER HARD!!!!  Anyways, I made each side of the sash out of a long thin piece of fabric.  I folded it in half, right sides together, and stitched it with a reverse seam allowance (is this a thing? I want it to be a thing) of 3/4" (aka, there were 3/4" that would actually make up the sash, and the rest I trimmed as close to the seam as possible.  I then stitched one end shut and turned it right side out with the help of a plastic stick from an Edible Arrangements thing and a lot of hope.  Finally I top-stitched with the tiniest possible seam allowance to make the whole thing flat instead of tubular.  Result can be seen here:

I inserted it by opening two seams in the back of the dress just a little and sewing the open end of each sash piece into the seam.

I also replaced this elastic, because the elastic it came with was DEAD.  I used reclaimed elastic from an old pair of underpants FTW!

Adorable picture of dog's nose in corner is adorable.

The final major addition I made was pockets!

pockets out, like a hobo -- see how huge they are?

hand in a pocket

The dress had two layers, so I drafted in line pockets and sewed them into the inner layer as seen here.

I then ripped part of the matching seam on the outer layer and re-hemmed it so I can access the pockets!

All in all, I'm very pleased with myself for making a previously useless dress into something I'll wear over and over again all summer long!  And all for free, with stuff from my stash.