My biggest problem

Sometimes I can't do the simplest of tasks correctly. It all started when I was born...

Many years ago, many more years than I want to admit to, a little baby girl was born with blue eyes and dark hair. The eyes changed to a more greeny grey, and the hair...well...the hair went lighter. This lightness is the cause of most of all my problems in life. You see...

I'm blond. Not the dumb blond kind of blond. More the lacking in common sense, do stupid things other people don't do, put my foot in my mouth loudly in a very public place while amongst lots of people who don't know me, kind of blond. Even though my hair darkened over time, the problem remained.

What has this got to do with sewing, you might ask? Well, I never managed to get round to sewing yesterday, mostly because I felt really rough and pretty tired. So today I finished off the seminar work I needed to get done for tomorrow, and just a few hours ago I sat down at my machine and got down to finishing the bodice of my dress.

And there the problem began. I followed the instructions correctly. It took me a little while to work out what some of them meant, but I expected that. I'm a beginner, I'm not supposed to understand it all. But, for some reason, as I pinned the facing to the bodice (I am learning new terminology all the time!), something just wasn't right. The sleeves didn't quite match, the back didn't quite fit properly.

It then dawned on me...I'd gone wrong in the sewing of the facing. However, this only dawned on me AFTER I'd sewn most of the facing onto the bodice...I had to get out my trusty seam ripper (best £ I've spent in a long time) and start ripping.

Turns out what I had done was this: when the instructions said sew back pieces 6 together, and then front pieces 5 to the back pieces (not attaching at the front), my simple brain decided to do this:

Sew piece 5 to piece 6 (correct so far). Sew piece 5 to first piece 6 and then the second piece 6 to the second piece five. So instead of the facing going like this: piece 5, piece 6, piece 6, piece 5, it went like this: 5,6,5,6.

I didn't get angry with myself. After all, that's what this ugly piece of curtain was for, to make mistakes like this. In fact, I was very philosophical about it all, the more mistakes I make now, the fewer mistakes I will make on my dress, right? So I ripped the seams and got ready to start again.

I then sewed the piece 5's together instead of the piece 6. You would have thought, having made the mistake the first time, I would remember which pieces should be sewed together...

Anyway, long story short, I FINALLY followed instructions correctly, and the bodice is now done. I am onto the final stages of the dress!

P.S. you are definitely not seeing any pictures of the first mock up. What with the mess I have made of the buttons, and the mess I have now made with the seams, this piece shall never be seen by anyone.