The Ministrations of the Brown Day Dress: An Hour by Hour Accounting.

With an influx of new clothing orders, sewing time for personal items has become even more limited. What's another option? Lunch hour: I already take projects to work on a regular basis, why not attempt a full completion?

Advantages:

- Force myself away from the desk for an hour everyday.
-The conference room is very quiet with good lighting and room to work

Challenge:

- 90% of the work must be completed by hand 
-Not draw undo attention to myself (folks are always ready to ask about my projects or why I am hiding in the conference room)

The Rules:  

-Cannot go over allotted 60 minutes for lunch
-Cannot starve myself; boss is flexible about eating while I do regular work, then taking the full hour for errands or a longer walk.
-Must keep accurate record of progress

The Cheats:

-The dress is already cut out and the skirt panels sewn together by machine

Description of dress:
-Originally of printed wool, recreate from a reproduction cotton print
-Gathered bodice with waistband
-Coat sleeves
-Oddly flounced skirt gauged onto the bodice waistband.

• Image of original here: http://www.thegracefullady.com/civilwargowns/images/originalgarments/cottonwool_daydresses/cwcalico.jpg

Will make a few changes/additions:

-Skirt: Hem Tape; there is no evidence of hem tape in the images. The black line visible at the hem is a shadow.
-Sleeves: Will keep the shape of the coat sleeves but instead gather the cuff into a self fabric band to create a pseudo-bishop sleeve.  
This eliminates the need to line the sleeves.
-Finish with collar cuffs and a robins egg blue ribbon necktie

Progress:

January 2, 2013: Brought the lower portion of the skirt to work. After 12 days of sewing over Christmas break I refused to touch it and read A Storm of Swords instead.

January 11, 2013: Took the skirt home thinking I'd work on it there.

January 14, 2013: No time to work on it over the weekend; brought it back with me to work this morning. Took it to the conference room at 11:35 and worked until 12:30. Completed hemming the top edge and in the quiet, determined to complete this project as described above.