Who's Afraid of the (Invisible) Zipper?

Did you know if you Google "afraid of sewing a zipper" you get 27,100 hits? I'm comforted by the fact that I'm not alone in my fear of these tricky little devils. I'm pretty new to sewing garmets-- but after making my first pair of baby pants last summer, I'm totally hooked. And there's nothing like promising the sweet and very pregnant Mommy who is relying on you to provide the perfect birthday/Easter dress that you are all finished with it to really get the adrenaline pumping. So between a trip to my awesome local sewing shop, copious study of the little instructions printed on the zipper package and (thank GOD for!) Youtube, I got it. This one took about 5 hours to get in there. The second one I set-- about 30 minutes. Yeah.

And here's this sweet frock all finished up! I'm so in love with these zaggy stripes on the inset panel-- I spend a good portion of my (very limited!) free time trying to dream up new patterns where I can insert just one more placket or panel. Yum. Yum. Yum.