Frankenstitch

This pattern is simply not playing along. I don't know how to explain it - nothing is tremendously difficult - but it's all going sideways at every turn. To wit:

• It's too short. Now this isn't my fault - when it's 2 inches above the knee, pre-hem, and you're 5'3", there's someone else to blame. But everyone said it was short. Why didn't I cut an extra 2 inches at the end?
• The topstitched folds (the curved lines you see on the front of the dress) are a dog's breakfast. Look, I'm not all high on me, but top stitching is one of my sewing strengths. As is sewing with knits. Why my seams look like a toddler helped me is beyond me.
• Which brings me to my next point. For fuck's sake, start by making the back of the dress. Why the Vogue people don't advise this is beyond me. I was much less crappy (though not great) by the time I made it to the back stitching.
• The way this works, you have to sew the darts under the folds. This is pretty impossible to explain unless you look at it - and unless you sew, really. That process is much less smooth than you'd imagine. In some of my folds, you can see the dart ends wonking out a millimetre from the right side. Can you say "screams amateur"??
  
• Now we get to the real disaster - of serger proportions! I ended up cutting some of my fabric off (mangling it really) because - freakin' stupidly - I serged without lowering the presser foot. OMG. Thankfully, I did some mega-fixups which saved the day from the front (more or less). But it looks like botched plastic surgery on the inside. I loathe messy work.
• No doubt, this is the messiest thing I've made in a year. If not ever.

Here's my stern warning. Do not go down a size. There isn't a lot of extra ease and if you end up having to take 2 inches off one side of your dress because you cut the skirt by horrible accident when serging, you're going to need it.

At this point I've just about made a sausage case.

But wait! I'm not even done with this thing - and I'm on hour 16! I estimate I have another 3 hours. I mean, there are sleeves and hemming (the kind where one somehow manages not to shorten the dress further). Oh, and somehow I will have to rip out half of the facing under stitches because I did a crap job there too.

The thing is, this could be a gorgeous dress. I can see it in the lines. It works awesomely with a curvy frame - and a narrow one, I might add.

I just don't think I care to wear it enough to go through the work of making it again. So let's hope I somehow pull a rabbit out of a hat. As long as you don't look inside.