The Crepe!

It's been quiet on the sewing front. Too much else going on lately. However, for those who follow Gertie, I'm going to participate in her sew-along-blog of the Crepe Dress. It's a really cute, little bit 50s, sweetheart neck, wrap dress, perfect for summer, assuming I finish it in time to catch the end of Summer...

My pattern has just arrived in today's mail and I found myself in Spotlight on Friday evening buying some cute kids fabric which I know will work.

I'm only going to give you the link to the most recent of Gertie's sew-along updates which outlines the schedule we will (attempt) to follow - here: http://www.blogforbettersewing.com/2010/12/revised-sew-along-schedule-and-link-for.html

Photos of fabric tomorrow perhaps... I did buy a lot of fabric as I had a special deal :)

Two updates in a row!

When you're hot, you're procrastinating...

I have some other stuff that I have to focus on at night, so naturally that means I finish sewing on all the pearls on my cap right?


So tomorrow night there is no sewing until I finish the other stuff which is hugely more pressing with a deadline of Wednesday.

Then I can work on the cap and aim to finish it for Saturday. That'll be a good turn around for me, starting and finishing something in under a week.

It's that time again... Stitching up a Glitz!

I haven't been over here much. Lots of plans brewing, waiting for a time for sewing frenzy.

The last thing you really saw from me here was a costume I made last year for the Burlesque Ball, which I just loved and from which a serious crush on all things Burlesque and vintage took its hold over me. Needless to say a number of my brewing plans are vintage inspired. But! the project I have been working on, is of course, my new costume for:

click for all the glamour

Last year I stuck to the dress code/theme of Red, Black or Burlesque. This year I detected a real 'Air' theme in the style and marketing. The headline act is the fantastic Julie Atlas Muz who I looking forward to seeing (and hopefully having a moment to meet!). I was supposed to meet her on my trip to New York last year, but the world intervened and it just never happened. She is the face of this year's Ball and that glorious wind-sweeping hair just captured my imagination and I knew I wanted to make my costume as 'airy' as could.

I raided my stash and found some left over banner silk from a previous project, and I'm not sure where from, but a costume concept just barged in to my head!

I'm making it all up as I go along, which is half the fun. But the concept revolved around a tutu, frilly knickers and a corset... my problem is I owned none of these things. But I started on the skirt anyway.

With a white base, I had to pick blue as the accompanying colour, plus I know blue suits me. I wanted a short circle skirt style that in my crazy vision, sits horizontally out from my hips supported by a mega tutu. I started out by cutting out the skirt pieces from the lengths of left over silk and then stretched them on my silk painting frame (which I realised afterwards while taking the photos I should have done in the reverse order, talk about rusty brain!). I'd drawn swirly designs in an effort to be airy and had gutta-d the outlines in silver then took to the patterns with a fabulous azure.



I'm not even going to pretend it's perfect, and I'm not going to care it's not. I've thought about a number of ways to construct a tutu that will sit right, be comfortable for the night and have the right shape for my crazy vision. But I might leave that for the next post...

In the meantime I asked some of my fabulous burlesque performing friends about where to find the divine frilly knickers so many of them wear - Target and Cotton on Body for those out there about to go and find the same. I'm now the proud owner of not one but three pairs of frilly knickers, between which I can't decide! But I guess a girl can never have too many pairs eh?

I also wanted to track down a corset and would you believe my luck, a friend was in fact selling a bright blue corset which turned out to fit me and be the perfect colour (it must be a sign from the burlesque goddesses). So, while I have to finish the skirt and tutu, I'm also thinking about a set of pasties and fascinator to make. This costume just keeps growing and growing, and I'm really excited to see how it turns out! Let's not think about the fact that the ball is only 3 weekends away.

So next post, I'll have to tell you about how I went about starting my tutu and sewing together my skirt. I'll try to keep up regular posts so you can see how it all comes together in time for 20th February. Look out Luna Park, you won't know what hit you!

It's been a while - But I'm SEWING!

Well folks, it has been a Loooong time since I've been over here. But I am finally here to show you what I've been working on!

SO Miss Charlie, Miss Marina, Miss Mel and I (ok and some others probably) have tickets to The Burlesque Ball which is next Saturday night. The dress code is Black, Red or Burlesque. We all had a million ideas about what to wear - some being very expensive, and some being reasonably easy. We made a couple of visits to Gallery Serpentine and got ideas, but couldn't really afford to buy any new pretties.

I did some searching on eBay and google and came up with some cool ideas. I have some fabric left over from another project which is really cool, and I've wanted to make a rockabilly style dress with ever since. Burlesque is a close second and a worthy runner up!

I wanted to make a 'frou frou' skirt - y'know ruffles and such. Miss Charlie found a 'Ra-Ra' skirt dead cheap somewhere and grabbed it for me. I had some left over fabric to use, and I went out and bought 50 buttons.

I already have an underbust corset I have borrowd from a friend (thanks Kath! I <3 You) So I came back home and proceeded to add the majority of the 10m of red lace to the skirt. I still had some of the button fabric left over so I decided to make a bit of a bustle to add a bit of pizaz. I lined the left over button fabric with the new red satin. I also had left over sating so that became a second bustle layer to try and break up the button pattern a little. I added the bustle tonight and it worked quite well (like I surprised myself!) I did take some of the button fabric to put on the singlet on the boobies! y'know, tie it all together.

Now I just need to make some straps for the singlet. I had a really cool idea to thread buttons on to ribbon as fake straps. I tried it on the train to Newcastle the other weekend and I like it, I think it will work out well.





I put it all on tonight and I quite like it. I am looking forward to finishing it all off and wearing it out next weekend.

OK, sure, I'd like to win the best dressed competition, but I don't expect to.

It is nice to be enjoying sewing, probably for the first time ever. There hasn't been any swearing, no manic sewing the night before (though there's still a week for me to suddenly realise something...) and I'm making it all up as I go along and it's usually working well and matching what's in my head.

Projects

Man I'm slack.

I'm nearly finished the last set of 'from scratch' shirts and will take and post photos probably on the weekend once they have left the building!

Tonight I started a banner which I need to finish by Friday, again I'll take photos and post after the weekend when my brain has returned. 

I forsee a lot of late nights - if only the gutta would dry quick!

I was going to say more but I'm tired and may still go sew more buttons on before heading to bed.

More after the weekend.

Festival Crush and Productivity

So I've surprised myself. Here it is 6.40pm and I'm packing for Festival with only a few small hand sewing jobs to be done which I can do in the car and at site!

Banners in a weekend. I'm nuts, I decided to make a silk banner for Dez but discovered the silk I had was quite wide so it would be appropriate to make 2 smaller banners than 1 large. So UI made one for Cairnfell too.

I made them with silk paint (iron setting). I traced Dez's design on and had a device on acetate which I projected onto the silk at work before I finishes on Friday. I'd spoken with Art and took on her safety pin and rubber band stretching technique.

I guttered up the lot and got painting. Dez's design is quite simple and was done in a flash. It' looks great and he's now sewn on his tokens and tassles he's won (he's so cute like that!


Then I got started on the Cairnfell one, infinitely more complex, infinitely more opportunity to f**k it up... which I did.





Looks pretty good I hear you say... Well, I neede to make the gutta thicker in some places. Also I need to use some smaller, skinnier brushes and to remove stray
bristles earlier!










So you can see there's some serious bleeding from green to yellow. I think the yellow was still a little damp when I did the green so it bled a lot more. I waited longer before doing the black and it didn't bleed nearly as much.

Lessons learned: More gutta, more waiting between colours, iron fixing is goood!

Also today I made a fighting shirt for Dez with padding at the kidneys and elbow (lots of swearing at that one), 2 coifs for Dez, and I made a red surcoat for me to wear which will match him. No pics as the camera's packed already.

Still need to hand stitch the necklines of 2 underdresses... actually I could just go sewing machine them now, and their cuffs. Also hand stitch the tops of the over sleeves for the blue dress of disasters. Then I think I'm done.

Better go do it all! See you all at Festival

Nope, Can't Do It

Well not on my own anyway.

To summarise what I've been up to:

Mostly finished, as best I can, Dez's cloak. I do need to fold over the neck and stitch it down so it's not just a raw zig zagged edge.

Had many major screaming fits at the sewing machine. Only after days of frustration, late nights and giving up (repeatedly) did I notice the thread had jumped of the uppy downy bit of the sewing machine. Also I had loosened the tension on the bobbin when I should have tightened it. But hell, I can't even comprehend getting the tension right on my $10 sewing machine so why should I care

Whipped up 2 very basic under dresses/ shift type things out of some white fabric I had.

Big chat to Art about the disaster that is my sleeves on the blue dress of disasters. She suggested I hadn't rotated them enough when attaching them. So I unpicked the hours of hand stitching I had used to attach them :( and tacked them on rotated. They sit better now but I still have minimal movement. I tried moving them up so there's less curve in the top of the shoulder (another of Art's fab suggestions) and tried letting the back of the dress out a bit. I can't let it out too much in some parts as I've already cut away some of the seam allowance (as I'd stitched it all down nicely believing that was a smart plan). Plus if I let it out too much it won't hold my boobs up.

So tonight, after some fiddling, I gave up and took the damn things off. I can't do sleeves. Well, I can't do fitted sleeves. So I will make some over sleeves (essentially big trapazoids) and pin them on instead of having sewn on sleeves. It'll do plus this picture seems to suggest I'm allowed to.


I have also been making Baldrics for Cairnfell which are mostly finished. I learned how to have a crisp ironed fold in fabric (so as not to lose width when a tube is turned inside out and ironed flat) which was good. cheated somewhat on the badges. I printed up some transparencies of the Canton's device and Rich cut them out quite well. Rosie and I stenciled the design on to the badges, Rosie was far more patient and attentive to this than I was and some of mine had blotchy roots (well when you're painting trees with fiddly roots who really cares if their perfect right? Plus I used Vleisofex (?) to iron them on instead of stitching them. If people want them stitched, they can do it themselves. I have vague plans of couching the edges of my one... may while at Festival...

But sadly tonight I have come to remember how much I dislike sewing. How impatient I am with my lack of skill and how difficult this whole sewing thing is. I think I need to not sew impressive things when I can't go over to someone's house and say "Oh god what have I done, why am I so stupid?'

And don't say I'm not stupid. Tonight (on a fabric pattern thankfully) I started cutting out the over sleeve without any seam allowance.

I have also had the stupid idea (oh yea, it is stupid) to make myself an outfit to match Dez on the field for his Combat of the Thirty entry. I'm only planning to make a red surcoat and pop on a white badge with his black eagle on it, but I plan to do this in time for Festival? MAD!

Oh and the other things I was planning to do before Festival? Paint him a banner, bought the silk paint at spotlight yesterday... already have the silk... yeah, we'll see how that goes...

Also, I forgot to mention in my last post some other plans/ goals. I'm going to give Oil Painting a go. I think I would be more adept at painting as I have done much painting in the past. Plus Mum's an oil painter so I plan to visit and go through all the 'what I need to know's' of it all. And if I get my shit together I'll have a drawing or at least a sketch of my planned painting to go over with her. I want to make it a Flemish painting (as they're mainly in oil and is very appropriate) so I've told Miss D that she will be my subject, I just have to get a good pic of her in her Hollandish outfits to work off. I'm quite excited about that project, I just have to start it. It will be a long project I'm sure.

Oh well, time for bed... perhaps sewing should be put off to days and nights when I'm not working in the morning. Or maybe I just shouldn't sew at night after working all day... yeah, I might be on to something there.