A lot of stuff on the slightly random side

First, my latest creation:



It's loosely based on the 1550's Italian styles. It did look rather cute with my beaded belt I got at Pennsic a couple of years ago. The bodice is one of my own patterns (I forgot it's a Venetian styled bodice pattern so there is a gap in the upper back - whoops!), and the skirt is nothing more than your typical rectangle (I did the hem funny so it would lay straight), and the sleeves are trapezoids.

However, I did try something new with the sleeves. I added ribbon loops that are sewn into the top of the sleeve so I could have buttons on the bodice straps rather than ties.



It worked pretty well, actually. I need to fix one loop since it's too big but the look was rather nice. Or I think, at least!

The dress itself is out of uncut corduroy - you can get it at Joanns for about $6 a yard if you have a coupon, if not cheaper. It has the look of suede or velveteen which is nice. It's also warm! The forepart is out of poly taffeta flocked with black velvet damask - not my typical type of fabric but it looked pretty. :-) The actual skirt is out of a dark gray/black linen I got at Wally World for $1.50 a yard! Woohoo! And I still have a lot more.

With that project done, I'm on to the next. I'm working on a Robe a La Francaise that I'm not excited about after finding some great trim this weekend.



The color is off but you can see the bolt of silk taffeta (it's really a lovely shade of teal; just like Madame Pompadour's famous gown) and the gold lace with mauve trim. I need to find some matching ribbon for the stomacher.

Last night, I fixed my stays (sorry, no photos yet!) since I had ripped them at 12th Night. We went over a speed bump and the thread broke loose on one side. It was an easy fix and I re-enforced that seam now. I also re-enforced a lot of the other seams to prevent that from happening again.

I cut out the pocket hoops using the Period Impressions pattern. The pocket hoops are out of this cotton:


It's really sort of a sea green color. I have plenty of hoop boning to hammer out these hoops. I can then, at least, start on the petticoat. I plan on doing a mockup of the gown in the next couple of days.

In preparation for the trim of this Francaise, I found a pair of pinking shears! Ones that aren't sawtooth!

I really hope these work on fabric well. The edge they are supposed to do looks awesome and should be cool for the 18th Century. The one review looks promising and they are cheap enough that I won't cry if they don't work. We'll see!

Williamsburg 12th Night

My new stays! Since last time I posted, I've been slowly, painfully, working on a new pair of stays. My old ones really, really ripped beyond repair. Do not make bias tape out of lightweight silk. It doesn't do well.

This time, I used blue canvas, lavender cotton bias tape, and lavender thread. It didn't take long after I was wearing this that the lavender thread broke along one of the seams. Luckily, it's a clean break and I can just double up on thread and add more bias tape to the seam.

Each piece of the stays is bound in bias tape and then stitched together using a whip stitch. I then cover that with either hem tape or single fold bias tape.



My dress was the same as last year, just with a different trim arrangement. The trim is actually red silk strips that I ironed the edges of under and then pleated the strips to the skirt and neckline. I hand sewed those to the gown (covering a lot of the machine sewing). I hope to add more of the red silk to the petticoat later on and to maybe make this dress polonaise.



12th Night itself was a lot of fun. The outfits were amazing and the food was scrumptious.



Each of these lemony shortbread cookies were created using reproduction 17th, 18th, and 19th century stamps. They were delicious as were the ginger butterscotch cookies.



This is Barbee with her daughter, Anne. I think her husband was holding their twin son, William, at this point. I apologize for the blurriness of the photos. I didn't like using flash given that it detracted far more from the atmosphere of the 18th c than my pink camera hidden on a table or in my hand did. :-)



Late in the evening, we had this visitor. He was actually a pretty big cat (I ended up holding him at one point because he wanted to go into the bedroom of someone who was allergic to him - of course!) but very friendly.

Overall, the party was good. There was only one obnoxious drunk (which, given about 50 or 60 people, all of whom are drinking wine and punch, really isn't bad at all). The dancing was fabulous and I loved the music. One lady and gentleman did a wonderful duet for our delight. I found some cabernet sauvignon that had cinnamon and nutmeg in it. It was good! I also found lemonade which was very popular. Mostly, I sat around and took pictures because me and dancing do not mix. I did have fun talking with people and I saw a ton of lovely gowns and outfits.

The next day (I crashed the moment we got back to the hotel), Steph, her mom Linda, Betty, and I went to a couple of antique stores before parting ways. There are a ton of antique stores around Williamsburg that all look really good. However, I really wanted to get out into town and take some pictures like this:



The gate to the governor's Palace!

The day was *gorgeous*. It was about 48 but it felt about 55 in the sun. There were a lot of people out walking their dogs because it was such a mild day. I had fun just going into the stores - snarking with a re-enactor, an older fashionable lady, and myself. (Thou shalt not wear spandex if you are over 200lbs and/or 45!) A lady came into one shop after me with her two children. The "shopkeeper" asked where they were from and she said "Washington DC". Curious, I asked which part. She said Chevy Chase. I smiled and told her where my parents lived and she smiled back. She lives almost exactly a mile and a half away! Yet another small world moment.



I went into the jail, which I haven't had the chance to do before. It was actually pretty interesting. It's also sad that the jail cells are bigger than my entire first floor. I guess they kept them crowded though...



This is the back of one of my favorite extant 18th C garments. It's black for one thing -something that seems rare in the 18th C- and it's colorful! Very polychrome.




This dollhouse was amazing! See the little mouse near the back sofa leg? There were tons of details like that in this HUGE dollhouse. (By huge, I mean I think this thing was about 4 feet high by 10 feet long. Huge.)



18th Century Turkish Lady print inside the dollhouse.

I have a LOT more photos of everything (the party, Williamsburg, ect) up at http://www.flickr.com/photos/jubileel/sets/72157628793155305/

The photos aren't all the best but hopefully y'all will enjoy them. Feel free to ask questions or comment!

Dress University Plans

Hello!   Rather than post pictures of a finished product (by Friday night I *should* have a new dress to post!), I figured I'd post my semi-finalized Dress U 2012 plans.

For the Welcome Party, rather than go 18th C, I figured I'd do something a bit different.  Ever since I heard of the upcoming movie "Mirror Mirror" a couple of months ago, I fell in love with this outfit Snow White wears:





I know where to get the silk for the bodice and I have the pattern for the outfit since the bodice looks to be a pseudo Elizabethan, but the silk for the skirt is going to be $$$.  It looks to be a Kravet Lampas Silk pattern.  I'm probably just going to go with something similar rather than exact since the cheapest price I've found is still $75 a yard.  Eeck!

I'm not sure about the Gibson Girl Pool Party other than I do want to make a turn of the century (if not earlier) swimdress.  I need to do more research on it as of right now. I know my colors will be red wool and probably black trim.

For the Mad Hatter Tea Party, I've decided to go with a somewhat Lolita 18th C styled dress to match the hat I want to make.  The hat (it is a Mad Hatter tea party after all, I need a hat!) is going to be styled after a cake.  For right now, I really like this cat as my inspiration:


...but that may change. BTW, click on the photo. The lady who made this cake has a ton of jaw droppingly gorgeous cakes and cupcakes up on her flickr page.

I'm keeping what I'm doing for the Titanic Party at Dress U a secret because I really want to see the reaction when I get there. Yes, it will be that different. :-)

For the "Let them eat crepes", I'm doing an 18th Century Turkish outfit. I have a pair of green, pink, and gold shoes that are perfect for a Turkish outfit so I'm planning around those.



The above is one of the many paintings I'm using for inspiration.

And now for the Tiaras and Jampagne. I was debating for a while on whether to go as Empress Sissi or as Buttercup from the Princess Bride. I scratched both after watching Van Helsing a couple of nights ago. I need Anna's red ball gown instead. Now, to find a tiara with red stars all over it... hmm... and way too many yards of red silk taffeta....


I'll bring a few more dresses -probably my pink 18th Century gown with the green trim and maybe an Elizabethan if not the 18th C Sack Back that will be done by then. However, I need to get all this done, plus three more projects by June.

In Jan, I need to finish an 18th C Jacket and the Catherine Parr gown (I have the materials for both, they are just in the need to be cut phase). For the beginning of Feb, I need the sack back gown. March, I might just be silly and not wear one of my four or five green gowns I already have for the Saint Paddy's Day party but make yet another one. April...we aren't even going into everything I need to do for April. And then...May. Which will be slowish costuming wise but I'll be gearing up for June! So, a lot of outfits will be posted over the next few months.

Oh, and for those that are not on my LJ blog as well, this is Jasper.


He adopted me the Friday before Thanksgiving. Poor darling was stuck in the crawlspace beneath my townhouse! Since it was 24 F out, I let him in and he's stayed ever since. (I did contact the local animal shelter/animal control but no one reported a cat missing so....he's mine! Ha!) Miss Ginsie is delighted at having a cat in the home.


As you can see, they get along perfectly fine. :-) Poor Jazz, he doesn't know what he's gotten himself into!

The Regency Rainbow: Green!

I decided earlier this year to complete a Regency styled gown in every color of the rainbow. I already had an orange gown and had completed a red gown. Next should be yellow on my list but I haven't found the perfect silk yet to do the gown I want. Instead, I went with something a bit more silly. I went with green and decided to play up the colors of a watermelon.


The main body of the gown is a dark green dupoini silk I got from Fabric.com for $1.95 a yard a couple of years ago. The pink is a shantung that I got from my local Joanns. Although the colors are period, the silk isn't. Since this was supposed to be a fun quick gown, I machine sewed almost all of it.


However, this was the gown that broke my last sewing machine. I started this gown way back in the spring/early summer. The skirt is a block of four yards of fabric. I made a growth tuck right below the knees and then slipped a long strip of the pink silk beneath it. I've seen this done in period gowns of the time to give the effect of multiple ruffles when it's really just one ruffle with a growth strip sewn above ti.


The bodice came out beautifully. It's a pattern I created last year and I've been using ever since. It's actually only a elongated front with a small back piece. I think it's in Patterns of Fashion where one gown is cut like that.


It was the sleeves that were my downfall with this dress. Originally, the pink trim you see along the neckline was the "puffy" sleeve for a pair of short panned sleeves that were to go on the dress. However, my sewing machine died and the silk frayed and I just didn't feel like fixing all the issues I had with the sleeves to begin with. So! I noticed how wide and how long the puffy sleeves were, sewed them together and then cut out two stripes. I sewed those strips together and then folded the very long strip in half to sew that. Once I had a very long tube of pink silk out of the former puffy sleeves, I pleated the thing to the neckline and that's how the trim ended up there.


I cut out the sleeves from the same green silk but I also cut out linen lining since I knew it might get cold and the silk is rather thin. My chemise sleeves only go down so far to keep me warm. They actually came out rather well but are a bit tight at the elbows. Something to work on next time!


Another issue I had was the sewing machine needle hit a pin that was holding a pleat on the trim. This caused the needle to go about as dull as a dried spaghetti noodle. Which, in turn, caused the needle to pull at the light weight silk and cause some minor "pulls" in the fabric. I can just buy more of the silk and re do the trim but it's slightly annoying.


Other than that, I'm actually rather pleased with the way the dress came out. I've dubbed it my watermelon gown and I might have to make a very silly hat in a Regency style to match!

Christening Bonnet

This is cross posted from my LJ account.

I used the February Baby Bonnet pattern for my nephew's Christening bonnet today. I made it last night and it took a full five hours to get the entire thing done. I used your basic acrylic soft white yarn from Wally World since my brother and sister in law (and everyone else in the family) just wanted something to cover the kid's head that would keep him warm. It didn't have to be any of the fancy yarns. :-)



As you can see, my nephew liked it. :-) I didn't want to do anything too lacy -he is a boy- but I wanted something that would look special. The pattern I chose was simple, used needles I have used in the past without crying, and still looked nice. yay! Still, I messed it up. It was one of those things of reading directions at 10 pm and realizing that what you thought the directions said aren't even close to what they said. I basically was doing increases when I shouldn't have been doing increases. Rather than take it apart, I just did a few rows of decreases knowing that it would give that bonnet bump towards the back of the cap. It came out looking like a bonnet -just not the bonnet in the pattern.

The back of the bonnet. I have no idea what there is that "bump" there on the back circle. I think I added one stitch somewhere and I really don't know where. I didn't notice it until the bonnet was finished.


Top view looking down. You can see a bit here where I had to switch yarns. It wasn't obvious until you get it out in the sunlight. The back is a different yarn than the sides are.


Side view. There is no real pattern to the design since I really messed it up. I ended up just being impressed it fit in the end.

More of my nephew wearing his new christening cap! :-)

The Great Pumpkin!

Yesterday, I asked my oldest nephew if he could be anything he wanted for Halloween, what would he be?   His answer?  A pumpkin!

I didn't have the time to make him really look like a pumpkin (the whole sphere thing were you can't move your arms) but I did want him to wear something warm for Halloween.  (My sister in law wanted the kids to go around in their Renaissance outfits I made them, which is awesome, but they were made for 60+F temps.  I didn't want the poor kids to wear their winter coats over their Halloween costumes.  Where's the fun in that?)  My idea was to make him a cloak in green and orange that looked vaguely pumpkin-ish.





The cloak overall is very simple.   I cut out one BIG orange circle, cut out a neckhole and then a slit down the front.  The cowl is a smaller circle that I cut up a bit to make it look sort of like leaves around the edges.  The hood is a large rectangle that I attached to the cowl first.  I then sewed the cowl wrong side to the cloak right side so the seam would be tucked inside.   I also used a "pumpkin seed" shaped button for the front of his cloak.  (It's really a walnut shaped button but he doesn't know that)

His 1 year old brother's cloak is out of the green and has a green and orange tassel on the back of the hood but the 1 year old was asleep when I dropped the cloaks off at my brother's.  My nephew seemed to love it and he can say he's a pumpkin for Halloween while still being warm!   The cloak is fleece and will also work when I get to drag the poor kid and his mom to an SCA event.   My sister in law already has a lovely surcote to go with her Italian gown. 

Dress up the siblings!!!!

This past Sunday, I took my middle brother, my sister in law, and my two nephews to the Renaissance Festival. Of course, since they were coming with me, they had to dress up. This means I made an outfit for each of them. I wasn't able to do a lot of mock up which was disappointing. However, I think they came out okay for the most part.

I wasn't going for 100% accurate, by any means. What I did want was something my brother and his family could wear to the Renn Fest or to an SCA event without looking out of place. More of a generic medieval or Renaissance look.


First, my wonderful 3 year old nephew!

He's sporting a Turkish style coat with a simple shift beneath it. I probably should make him a different shift because it was on the small side and looked a bit girly by itself. (Not that he cared. He's three. Such things aren't that important yet.)

Next, my 1 year old nephew!

He's wearing a basic blue linen shift with black velvet trim. I was going to go all out and make a Prince Edward outfit for him but I cut it wrong and did this as a back up.

Next, my sister in law!

:-) She LOVED her dress. It's a basic 1550's Venetian in style with a generic mop cap. She loves green so I make a lot of her garb and clothing in that color. People stopped her to ask where she got her dress which made both of us very happy.

My brother! (And the back of my sister in law's dress)

My brother said "Robin hood" and so I made him a basic green linen t-tunic. He's swinging back in this picture so you can see the fullness of the tunic. He wants a doublet and shirt for next year. :-)

So, see? I made stuff this month!