Managed to April Fool Myself

 I have had fun playing with layering the spiderweb lace slip, and it made me say...hey...why not make a slip dress from something sturdier and just wear it like a jumper...

(Which, yes, layering slip dresses was absolutely a trend in the 1990s, but, as mentioned, I never wore slip dresses in any way back then.)

I'm going to put the main picture here, then ramble a lot before getting to any other pictures 

I thought it would be fun to make it from something more jumper-like than slip-like, and turned to a subtly plaid thin wool that I got from the creative re-use thrift store last July.  I hesitated to use it, though, because the pattern called for two yards of fabric, but there were three yards of the fabric, and I really do prefer to use up all the fabric in one project.  I stopped second-guessing myself and went with the chosen fabric

and immediately discovered its many moth holes.

So, the need to avoid those meant I used more fabric than I expected.  Which is good!  There's not a lot of the fabric left.  

I expected I'd make some bias tape from the thin wool, and apply it to the upper edges and make the straps from it, the same way I did on the spiderweb slip.  The thin wool fabric had different ideas.  OK, make some bias tape from cotton?  No color matches in the stash.  Satin?  Nope.

So I slept on it and realized: facings!  (The pattern just wants you to turn the upper edges under.  Ew, no.)  And then I could use the bias strips I'd already cut to make straps.

I used the top of the cut-out front and back to cut the facing pieces, because I had swung the front and back pattern pieces out to make the slip roomier. 

Then I thought...since this is a jumper...maybe it should be lined?  So I used the cut-out front and back pieces to cut the full pieces from lining fabric, then laid the facings over those and traced their bottom edges, then drew cutting lines 1¼" above the traced lines.

 I sewed the facings to the lining, serged and top stitched the seams, sewed the side seams, and was preparing to sew the top edge of the lining to the top edge of the shell (with the fronts of the straps pinned in place) when I realized I hadn't interfaced the facings.

After a bit of thought, I folded the lining in half at the front and back, then laid it over the interfacing so I'd cut two halves.  I ironed the tops of the interfacing to the tops of the facings, then cut the bottom of the interfacings to reflect the bottoms of the facings, and then finished fusing everything.  Things didn't completely align and I went back and patched in gaps with more fusible interfacing.  It's not pretty, but it's very much in a place it will never be seen.

So then I sewed the lining to the shell, leaving a small section unsewn where the straps would be attached in the back.  I tucked the ends of the straps into the gaps, made sure they were even, pinned and sewed.

I managed to completely resist top stitching

100% wool is so cooperative.

I had decided to add pockets, too, keeping in line with the idea of being more jumper than slip.

I pressed up a 2½" hem and machine blind stitched it.

Again, because this wool was so cooperative, I was able to easily press out the fullness of the bottom edge and have no problems with the stitched edge being wider than the area being stitched to.

The polyester lining fabric was not so accommodating.

I pressed it up 2", then 2" again before stitching.  It didn't fight me too much, but I did have to make some little tucks where it wanted to be wider than what it was being sewn to.

Because it's bias, I let the front and back pieces hang overnight before I started sewing, then let the sewn shell and lining hang another night before assembling and hemming.

Then I tried it on, and the facings--which were cut on the straight of the grain--are too snug, and the pockets are too low, and the fabric against my arms reminded me that it is indeed wool. Which...may not sound bad enough to merit calling this an accidental April Fool's prank on myself, but, for how much more work this was to make than I expected it to be, it does feel, at the moment, like a joke.

(I've already decided: if I don't like it as a jumper, it's becoming a skirt.)