Sew Bossy Challenge reveal..

After a little bit of delay from my side (anyone else have chronic deadline problems?) Hannah from Made With Hugs and Kisses and I are finally ready for the Sew Bossy Challenge reveal!
Hannah has already posted part 1 of her challenge, and I'm super excited to see what she comes up with next, it has to be a blouse! Why? Because I told her to make one!

Bossy me

The challenge that Hannah had in mind for me was the following:
"I challenge you to experiment with the fabric I have sent you and to create a really girly, possibly even vintage style dress that really utilises both the floral and plain elements of the fabric I have sent you... oh and to try out self covered buttons (obviously only if your chosen pattern calls for buttons :D )"

The fabric I was sent was a beautiful floral print bedsheet, blogged about in this post. The pattern I used for this challenge is the Deer and Doe Bleuet dress. Since this dress needs a lot of small buttons I wasn't able to use the fabric covered ones, but I'm hoping Hannah won't mind this..

Beautiful earrings that Hannah made!

I tried to play around with the border print, I've been wanting to make something with a border print for a while now and this fabric was great for that. Maybe I should have tried to match the print a bit better, but I could hardly squeeze the dress out of the printed part of the fabric as it was, so no matching prints this time. I didn't really love the back right panel as the flower ends quite abruptly but my boyfriend liked it, he said that it accentuates the bow, so I'm leaving it like this :)

The pattern was lovely to work with, it was my first time sewing it and I traced a size 37, next time I'll trace a size 38 as it was too tight in the bust area, and with a shirtdress this really shows. Also the sleeves were a bit too tight. The construction was very straightforward and the instructions were easy to follow. I had to look twice before sewing the sleeve bands, because I wasn't sure which side was the right side.. But I figured it out and it wasn't too hard!

I had minor problems with the collar stand not matching up at the ends and therefore it wrinkles when I close the top button.

See the wrinkle under the top button? And the gaping?

Oops

The buttons are small mother of pearl buttons which I'm really happy with!

Ohh and I learned something else from Hannah: bedsheets can be an awesome fabric source! So when I was in one of our local design shops and saw Hay bedsheets on sale I didn't think twice and took them home with me. They are super soft en have a great abstract print on them. The backside is solid in colour. I've already thought about skirts or dresses that I can make from them :)

The solid colour is a yellow/green lime colour

So thanks Hannah for making me try something new fabric and pattern wise!

What do you guys think about my make? Any tips for my collar stand next time?
I'm super curious to see what Hannah has made, if you're too, check out her blog!