No No Kimono - McCalls 7200

Were things getting a bit too serious around here? Was I getting a bit too high on my recent successes?

The target success:failure ratio on this blog is 1:2 so here we go!

Many moons ago, when I was but a sewing novice, I picked out this pattern thinking I'd made a slinky little kimono to swan about my domicile.

McCall's 7200

I thought it'd be easy peasy. Why, you ask?

I'll show you why.

Enhance.

That's right -- False Advertising.

I was led to believe that this pattern would be EASY. Ergo, not hard. Vis a vis, simple. Concordantly, I THOUGHT HOW COULD I POSSIBLY MESS THIS THING UP?

Reader, I messed it up.

How I messed it up:

• First I probably should have made sure the belt was at my natural waist and not at my hip line. Also, it's way too short for a kimono... I want a kimono to be at least below me bum.

• Second, I probably should have known as soon as I opened the directions and saw all the pieces that this was not the pattern for me given my sewing experience level. I think there were like 45. Maybe 7. 8 even. Regardless: too many.

• Third, I should have known that this sleeve style was a no for me. It leaves all the extra fabric in the armpit area. 

• Fourth, the instructions had you HAND SEW. What was the point of the industrial revolution if I have to hand sew things?

• Fifth, big floppy neck band thing. I was supposed to hand sew this down the entire way around.

• Sixth, I probably should have actually matched notches and stuff but either my fabric was too slippery or I just couldn't get all 857 pattern pieces to fit together. It was like handing a 1,000 piece puzzle of snow to a toddler.

Obviously at some point it became apparent that this wasn't going to happen and so I abandoned it before I finished all the hand sewing.

I had some hope of figuring out something to do with the fabric, and then I even went and bought some more of it because I liked the pattern. But guess what? The sheen on the fabric basically makes it unwearable for anything other than a sexy negligee, but the weight of the fabric really wouldn't work for that so I have now tried to make this fabric work twice to no avail.

What have I learned from this experience?

1. Never trust the "Easy" button on a pattern. THEY LIE!
2. I am not the kind of person who is going to start incorporating kimono-style wraps into my wardrobe so let's chalk this one up to "new-to-sewing and basically just grabbing things that look pretty."