Hi, my name is Elie. I live on a small island in Shetland. I am starting this blog to document my progress as I learn to sew my own clothing. My love of sewing began, aptly, when I bought ‘Love at First Stitch’, the excellent book by Tilly and the Buttons a few months ago. I worked my way through the book, making each of the patterns in turn, until I came to my favourite pattern, which I will be writing about today. This is my attempt at the ‘Lilou’ dress. The fabric is 100% cotton and was from modes4u. It is, by no means, perfect, but I am really proud of this dress. Despite being quite a challenging make for a beginner, the excellent instructions provided in the book helped me through. I don’t have much to say about construction, as mostly, I followed the instructions to the letter. I did have a bit of trouble with the invisible zip insertion, think I need more practice on that front and I caused myself a bit of a headache with the fit, as I tried to grade between sizes in the bodice. My thinking behind this was to give a looser fit in the bust, but the end result was just too big. As a novice sewer, with no fitting or altering experience, I decided to rectify this by cutting some length out of the straps, to try and reduce the excess length in the bodice.  It worked to some degree, but there is still excess fabric in the back. Next time I will skip the grading entirely. I think the fit would have been better if I had stuck to one size. Despite the fitting issues, I am really pleased with the end result. I think, as this was one of the first things I made, I will always have a soft spot for it, flaws and all. Follow my blog with Bloglovin © [www.attieanddora.com], [2015]. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to [www.attieanddora.com] with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.