New dress for me

I finished a dress for myself and wore it for church today.  It is Burda 7254.  I am fairly happy with it, though it does have a few issues.  First, a picture of what it looked like when finished.  I hate the angle of this picture but oh well, Adam doesn't understand why I don't like pictures taken with the camera angling upward.

 This is what it looked like after a day of wearing it--sheath becomes a-line! Apparently a little stretchage happened around the hem. I wonder if it will change back when washed?

 Wow, I have some lovely expressions in these photos.

 My mother-in-law helped me pin it, because I think I made it at least one size too large, so she helped figure out where to take it in, and then I had to take it in even more on the shoulders.  I also lengthened the sleeves with a band around the cuff.  It's supposed to have a zipper and a slit in the bottom, but it's stretchy enough that it doesn't need a zipper, and I cut off 5 inches from the bottom (this pattern is made for someone who is 5'6" and I am 5'1"), so I did away with the slit.

Hello demanding child hand.  You can kind of see in this picture what the main problem is of this dress--the neckline.  It gapes horribly.  It doesn't expose anything, so that's not a problem, it just perpetually hangs down in a gape.  I think it's because I stretched the fabric while attaching the facing at the neckline, or something.  It's really irritating.  Other than that, I like the dress well enough.  I dislike my own body in these pictures, but gaining 15-20 pounds in a year does that.  Ugh.  Let's not talk about that though. Ugh.