Lengthening a Dress with Lace // DIY

I have been off of work the past two days and I got to enjoy a quick little road trip up to Indianapolis with my parents. It was short, but still very fun and it was great to see them again. It was sad to see them go! 

You may have noticed (or you may not), but I have made a few more cosmetic changes to the blog! I'm pretty excited about it.

My mom and I hit some antique malls on the drive up to Indy, which is always exciting. It's rare to find cheap old clothing at antique stores, but I ended up snagging a dress for a refashion project at a good price! I'll be sure to post that tutorial another time. But as for today, we have another awesome project!

Finally, you guys get to look at a new face! 

This is my friend Lauren; isn't she beautiful?

So here's the story: Lauren had a dress that she loved, but after shrinking in the laundry a few too many times, it became too short. She told me the problem and I knew that together we could create a great solution!

We headed out to Hobby Lobby and found this really pretty lace trim that would make the dress a better length. After sewing it on the bottom, we had our finished product and she was thrilled with her new dress! It's amazing what a little lace and sewing can accomplish.

There are tons of pictures for this tutorial since I had a helper! Read on for instructions!

Here's what you'll need:

-Dress or skirt to be lengthened (you could also do shorts!)

-Lace trim (many different kinds available at various crafting stores - ours was from Hobby Lobby)

-sewing machine/thread/pins/tailor's chalk, etc.

Here's what you do:

*I'll be referring to the bottom half of the dress that we'll be working on as the skirt of the dress.

1. Lay the skirt part of the dress out as flat as you can. This one was gathered so make sure you lay it out so that it is completely flat. We had gotten a yard and a half of the lace trim but since the material was gathered at the waist so much, we didn't have enough. To solve this problem, we took in the sides of the bottom half of the dress; details below.

(Steps 2-3 involve taking in the skirt's circumference to adjust for insufficient lace; skip if you don't have this problem)

2. Lay the lace (folded in half) at the bottom of the skirt part where you'll be attaching it. Mark with tailor's chalk where you need to take the skirt in so that the lace will fit all the way around. Make a mark that tapers up to the waistline so that you aren't taking in any of the waistline which should already fit. (It should be a diagonal line to the edge of the skirt).

3. Once you have it marked, pin all the way up to the waist and sew. Try it on to make sure that it isn't too tight and then cut away the excess material (but not too close to the seam).

4. Now is the time for sewing on the lace! Line the ends of the folded over lace with one of the seams on the side of the skirt. Then, pin in place and sew.

Like my ring? It's made out of a quarter! Check it out here if you missed it.

5. Once you have sewn the lace all the way around the bottom of the skirt, cut off the excess and pin the two edges together. Then, sew.

And you're done! Look at how nicely it turned out:

The only cost of this project was the lace since Lauren already had the dress.

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"He has made everything beautiful in its time."

Ecclesiastes 3:11