theladyrebecca: (Default)
The body of the hussif dress is now complete, which can be seen in my most recent Youtube video. The apron is also complete, other than incorporating the giant needles. I finished making the needles yesterday, and I just plan to poke holes in the apron with my awl, slide the needles through (possibly fray-checking those holes first, but ideally not needing to do that), and then possibly securing the eye of the needle with some thread so they don't slip out. That way I can potentially close those holes back up if I'm not using the needles, instead of having them sewn open like an eyelet or buttonhole, which was my original idea. 

I also hope to start the applique around the bottom of the skirt today. I've pretty much decided to do the motifs as an applique instead of an embroidery, because it should be less stiff, and I can get them to look exactly right, instead of going with a pre-purchased close-ish design (since I really don't want to digitize my own embroidery designs right now). Beyond that, I just have to make the pincushion hat, and the hussif outfit will be done!

In Elsa news, the cape is now totally complete. I did wind up adding more rhinestones to the outside edge, but I made it so there were less and less rhinestones going from the bottom to the top. I also finally sewed the hooks/thread bars yesterday, which was the final thing I had to do. If the smoke clears up and the weather is decent this weekend, I hope to go get pictures of the whole thing, and then I can start on rhinestoning the diamond pattern around the bottom of the skirt, which is the only thing left for Elsa. 

As far as next projects go, I am really tempted to switch the order I had planned. I am making another Historical Halloween costume -- an 1888 Daisy dress, and I'm also making my version of the Strawberry Dress that is all over the internet. My strawberry fabric arrived last week, and so now I'm very tempted to start on that first, even though I do want to have the Daisy dress done by about the 2nd weekend of Oct... What might happen is that I start on the Strawberry dress, get to a decent point on it, and then start on the Daisy dress and work on them at the same time. Which is probably a bad idea, but that's what my CADD wants. 
theladyrebecca: (Default)
In the last week, I have mostly just worked on the Elsa cape. At this point, it is about 95% done. At least, I think it is. What it for sure needs is for the binding at the top to be stitched down, hooks placed on the binding, and thread bars for those hooks sewn onto the top of the satin part of the bodice. What I'm waffling about is if I want to add more rhinestones. The cape is a faux-watteau pleated thing, and there are vertical rows of rhinestones running down the edges of each of the two pleats, plus another row that runs down the CB seam. Then in between each of those 5 vertical rows, there is another little vertical row that just extends about 15" from the hem (four of those total). What I'm trying to decide is if I want to add rhinestones along the vertical edges of the cape, with another short row in between the vertical edge and the next long vertical line... And also if the 11th pack of clear/purple rhinestones I have purchased would provide me with enough rhinestones to even do that. This cape has probably close to 3400 rhinestones on it already. 

The only other thing that I've worked on since my last post is the very beginnings of the Hussif dress. It is currently in the phase of "the mockup fits if I add horizontal bust darts, but do I actually want horizontal bust darts." Hopefully I'll figure that out by dinnertime tonight, so that I can move onto cutting out the actual fabric. Or cutting a new mockup I guess. 
theladyrebecca: (Default)
I guess I'm back to posting every two weeks...

I finished the teens dress last week, though I think I'm going to have to redo the bars on the bodice, because the slinky fabric is causing a wrinkle just above the bars, and if I re-do them, the wrinkle will fall under the front opening and won't be visible. I even made a hat for it, which may be the quickest hat I've ever made, but I think it looks good. www.instagram.com/p/CD0WTtsgLlM/

I took some pictures in my backyard but I was supposed to go out with a friend to do a shoot at the rose garden, and unfortunately, she wound up waiting for results of a covid test instead (negative, at least). We're supposed to be having a small socially-distanced event at another rose garden this Sunday, so hopefully I'll get more pictures then. 

Elsa's zig-zags are now 3/4 finished, but it's been the hottest weekend all year this weekend, so I haven't made any progress since Friday. I'll be back to her once it cools down in a couple days, hopefully. 

In the meantime, last week, I started on the Bootstrap form. My form is already mostly assembled -- it just needs one armhole cover put on, plus the structure pieces that hold it in place on the pole. I need to pick up the fiberfill for it, and I think I need a plastic pole that makes it stay on the base pole. I will hopefully be acquiring those tomorrow. I'd love to finish the form tomorrow or Wednesday. 

Then I think I'm going to make a few skirts. I've had fabric for a yellow circle skirt that I bought a few weeks ago, and I also found the fabrics for two additional skirts at the thrift store last week, so I think I'd like to knock all those out, since they should all be quite simple. 

In youtube news, I got monetized about 1.5 weeks ago, which was really exciting! The weird flip side of that now is that I no longer have any upcoming milestones for anything on youtube, so it's harder for me to push toward something. I think my next milestones will be 7000 followers on instagram (which will probably be within a couple weeks), earn $100 on youtube (next month, I think), and hit 3000 subscribers (not sure when that will be, since I'm only at 2118). 
theladyrebecca: (Default)
It feels a little silly to post, since I don't feel like I've done much since my last post...

But in any case, my teens dress is getting closer to completion. It has sleeves and a collar now, and about 2/3 of the closures (I think there are something like 23 hooks and eyes on this dress). Besides the remaining closures, it needs a hem, either hems or cuffs on the sleeves (and lace), and I need to make the little section that fills in the neckline. I'm also going to make a belt for it, and I'm debating about making a guimpe as well, though I wouldn't be wearing the giumpe anytime soon. I might do a hat to match, too, though I'm not sure about that yet. 

I also did three more zigzags on Elsa, so they are now 3/8 done. I hope to do more today, since it's supposed to be one of the cooler days this week. 

CoCoVid went really well. My videos were all pretty well received, especially my one from yesterday on How to Get Started in Historical Costuming. In fact, they were all so nicely received that I think I might actually get monetized tomorrow instead of in Sept, so that's really awesome. I'm 79 hours shy, and yesterday, I got 266 hours! Visit youtube.com/c/ladyrebeccafashions to watch any of the videos. 

Whoops

Jul. 28th, 2020 03:44 pm
theladyrebecca: (Default)
I had been doing so well with posting earlier this month, and then... not so much. Sorry!

Anyway, here it is nearly three weeks later, with not much to say for myself it seems. The Elsa bodice rhinestones are long since finished, and I've drawn on all the zig-zag rhinestone placement lines on the skirt. There are 32. I think I've done 9 of them? At this point, I haven't done any in a week. I got kind of sick of them, and then the weather turned really hot these last few days (like, I didn't even go in the sewing room yesterday - the high was 97!). 

Last week, though, when I was tired of Elsa and decided not to take advantage of the cooler weather, I started a new project. I just wanted something quick. I've worked for about two days on it this point, and I think I have maybe 2-3 days left on it, so that's nice. It's a 1910s dress that started with Butterick 6093, and then I almost completely redrafted the pattern to make it more h/a and to make it fit better. I have a sewing vlog on my progress so far here.

Oh, and on that note, yes, I did wind up starting a sewing vlog. It's doing pretty decently so far, and I think having two videos out per week is helping my numbers. I hit 3000 watch hours yesterday, and I need 4000 for monetization. I think it's still looking like that should happen somewhere in September, which is farther off than I had hoped back in June, but still not terrible. 

Other than that, I'm just mostly really missing not going to CoCo right now, and reminiscing about past CoCo outfits on my instagram. Oh, and I'm all prepped and ready for three videos to come out this weekend for CoCoVid. It was a lot to do a couple weeks ago, and unfortunately because of that, I'm running through most of my backlog, and still have at least two videos I have to film and edit (and one of them to script) for mid-August releases. 

As usual, pictures of everything over on my instagram. 
theladyrebecca: (Default)
I really don't feel like I made that much this year. I'm not sure if that's because I just started sewing for the first time in two months, or if it's actually true, though. So here's what I made:

1830s plaid silk dress and yellow bonnet, made for wearing in Oliver, plus the Victorian Festival and Costume College


Blue wool coat, which I basically wear every day


Burgundy and mauve striped silk bustle dress, for the Victorian Festival and Costume College


Burgundy silk Regency dress, as a pattern test for Laughing Moon


Ripaway mermaid tail and Cinderella costume (and some other bits) as costumes for Disenchanted, for which I was Costume Coordinator


1890s Plaid "ice cream parlour" shirtwaist and navy walking skirt for Costume College, but also worn in The Music Man


Yellow 1890s Gala Gown for Costume College, including choker, royal order, bracelet, and petticoat with detachable train


A white cotton Victorian-style robe, which turned out to be the most practical thing I made for Costume College


Elephant dress for my friend's new baby

1910s white cotton and lace dress, worn to Snoqualmie Railroad Days


3 skirts and 3 playdresses through my etsy shop

Dapper Merida for Dapper Day; Also worn in White Christmas and to Christmas tea


Disney-print 1950s jumper dress


Princess Anna Frozen Fever


A bodice and skirt combo for the Silverbells Carolers, plus a few alterations for them

A "Totes Ma Goats" totebag as a secret Santa project


A skirt for my mom

A Marauders Map Fleece Blanket for my dad

The beginnings of an 1883 walking skirt (not finished, though I started cutting out a bodice mockup yesterday)


I guess that's a decent amount of stuff after all. But if I'm going to be on track for CoCo this year, I can't just take a two month break from sewing again!
theladyrebecca: (Default)
Hmm... Apparently I never did any CoCo wrap-up posts this year. I had so many costume events in August that I completely forgot. Whoops!

So here's part one of a brief wrap-up, assuming I can remember everything. 

I arrived Wednesday into Long Beach, met up with a few other ladies (Sarah, Britta, and Patricia), and we drove (in our super fancy Infiniti rental SUV) to the Queen Mary. We changed into our Titanic-era clothing, and spent a few hours there. We dined in the restaurant, then did a self-guided tour all around the ship, taking a ton of pictures as we went (so many pictures, that by the end of it, my phone had died!). It was awesome. We got a lot of stares and complements, of course, and our pictures turned out sooo good! I would love to do something like this again. Here are some pictures:





We changed out of our costumes and left Long Beach around 8:30, I think, stopping for groceries on our way up to Woodland Hills. The next day, DodiRose, Sarah, Britta, and I went off to Burbank to check out the vintage-ish shops in the area. We went to Unique Vintage and Besame, among others, before heading back to Woodland Hills to change for the checking in and the pool party. That evening, I wore my burgundy silk Regency dress. I was pleased with the dress, but I wish I had styled my hair differently, as I don't think the pictures of me look very flattering. 



Friday morning, I took a limited class that they should not have allowed me to sign up for. I signed up for Hand Stitches in Millinery during mid-registration, but it overlapped by 30 mins with the class I was teaching (which I didn't notice until like 2 days before CoCo). Combined with the fact that that class was running waaay behind schedule, I learned about 2-3 stitches. It was a good class otherwise, though. I ran behind in the Making Royal Orders class I taught, too, because I forgot to factor in the time it would take to distribute materials (which was like 20 mins). That said, I saw a bunch of my students wearing their royal orders for the gala, and I got lots of good feedback on it, so I think it was still a success. I watched some of Jennifer's Dressing the Silhouette class before going to grab some lunch, before my shoot with [personal profile] quincy134  (it was so nice that she did that!) and I finished off the class portion of the day with Jenny-Rose and Abby's Pomatum or Hairspray class, which was really cool to watch. During the day, I wore my 1890s Ice Cream Parlour shirtwaist and wool skirt. 



Friday evening was when our Titanic group decided to wear all of our costumes. I loved the turnout on this! All my past costume groups tended to fizzle out, but we had nearly 20 people in this group, and everyone looked wonderful. It did make it really difficult to round everyone up for photos, though, and I know we missed at least one or two people in the big group photo, which is really too bad. Some of us made movie reproductions, others opted for costumes of the era, and we even had one person dress as the iceberg! Naturally, we took a bunch of pictures. After a quick tour of the marketplace, several of us gathered for champagne, cupcakes, and chatter in our room - it was nice to host a small room party!  






I'll do the rest of CoCo in another post, since this is already really picture heavy. 
theladyrebecca: (Default)
Saturday was the Snoqualmie Railroad Days event that I was making the new teens-era dress for. I did finish my dress, though I wound up staying up to 2am the night before in order to finish it! Luckily, I was aiming to be at the event at 11, and it was only 35 mins away, so I still got some sleep. When I arrived there, I wound up being pulled into the fashion show that some of my friends were participating in, because one of their teens-era models had cancelled. So I'm glad I wore the new dress!

Because we participated in the show, the event organizers gave us free tickets for the train ride, and that was neat. We got to ride in a restored car from 1912, which was very fitting, and it was lovely inside. The train ride also included a stop at their train shed, where you can look at other engines and cars that are being restored - I found the most interesting one to be a baptist church on rails, since I had never seen anything like that before. 

After the train ride, we had ice cream at an old ice cream parlour, and checked out a couple history booths. Then we attempted to head to the car, and got stopped by two different photographers asking if we could take a couple pictures with them - of course, the first one didn't tell us he was going to take 20 minutes! Hopefully they'll at least email me the pictures they took.  

Anyway, it was mostly a town festival, and the only people dressed up were those of us in the fashion show, plus 2-3 people working the history booths, but at least riding the train in costume was fun. I've been wanting to do that for a while. My dress turned out to be very comfortable, era-appropriate, and easy to wear, though I do wish I had had time to procure non-poly lace, since I don't love the look. But after all the alterations I mentioned in my previous post, it was quite an easy dress to make, even though I added extra embellishments.

Here's some pictures! The rest of them are on Facebook. 




(We were recreating the picture above us.)


That was my last historical event this month, though next Saturday, I'll be participating in the Geeks Who Drink Disney quiz, and I plan to wear my Jane bustle outfit. I hope to start sewing tomorrow, but next up will be a present for someone, and doing lots of mending of costumes that I've been putting off for quite a while. Then probably a dapper dress out of the awesome villains fabric I found at Joanns, and then I should probably figure out what I'm making for Halloween. And or start new 18th c stays or put together the s-bend corset whose mockup I had forgotten that I already cut out!
theladyrebecca: (Default)
I started sewing again on Sunday! We were chatting during the Colonial Festival about our plans for this weekend's Railroad Days. Originally, I had wanted to wear a bustle dress, since that's my favorite, but as of last Sat, the weather for this Sat was supposed to be 87 degrees and sunny. Way too hot for any of my bustle dresses. (Of course, now that forecast has gone down to 81 and mostly sunny, so maybe I could have done a bustle anyway. Oh well.) So anyway, I decided last weekend that I would try the new teens-era Butterick pattern - the one that looks quite off because her shoulder trim is ridiculously huge, and the waist seam seems wrong. This one. 

So anyway, I've been working bit by bit since Sunday evening on this pattern. I had to go to three different Joanns before I found one with enough of the fabric I wanted, which is that white-on-white 100% cotton dobby stripe from the shirting section, but I did finally find it. (PS - pretty sure Joanns is closing out this fabric, so if you can still find it, you might want to do what I did and buy all 10 yards they had. I've been eyeing it for about a year, but had never pulled the plug on purchasing it, and it was almost too late!) I'm mostly using lace from the stash, which unfortunately isn't insertion, but then again, the pattern also doesn't call for insertion lace. I'm going to see if I can get more of a similar lace so that I can put some on the skirt as well, since otherwise it looks really plain. 

A few notes on this pattern in case anyone wants to try it.
  • For one, it's huge. Naturally, I didn't make a full mockup, though I did mock up the paper, which led me to increasing the length of both the bodice and skirt, changing the armseye (it was so far off the shoulder!), and tweaking the neckline a bit. Luckily, it's really the back that is huge, and for some reason, the pattern calls for it to meet edge to edge and close with hooks and eyes. Weird. So mine is now overlapping and closing with buttons, at least down to the waist. I'd say it was about 4-5" too big, and that was with using the size down from what I normally am anyway. So, like, super huge. 
  • The skirt unfortunately is also way too big, but it also calls for a weird continuous lap closure thing. Which I didn't want to undo. So now I have a little bit of gathers in the CB of my skirt, which are uneven on either side. Hopefully it's not crazy obvious. The skirt is not as ginormous as the bodice - I'd say maybe 2.5-3" too big. That said, it does seem to me that the skirt is also a bit on the slim side for a white summer dress - I think those usually were less fitted. 
  • We already all know that the trim goes way too far off the shoulder. I'm using much narrower lace trim (I think it's about 4-5" instead of 6 or 7"), and it goes over the edge of the shoulder seam by about 1". Then again, I also took the shoulder seam up a couple inches, because it was so far off the shoulder. 
  • I'm completely redoing the sleeve on this. A) It's too short, by a long shot. The sleeve should hit just above the elbow. B) It's huge. Like, probably at least a few inches bigger around than my arms (and I usually have to widen a fitted sleeve pattern). It's like a men's t-shirt. I'll hopefully be redrafting new sleeves tomorrow. 
  • I'm putting lace around the waist as well. It just looks wrong otherwise. 
  • The yardage requirements for this pattern are very overblown. I added 4" of length to the skirt pieces, plus about 1.5" (I think) to the bodice, and though I have not yet cut out the sleeves, everything else has so far used up 2.5 yards of 54" fabric. Pretty sure those sleeves aren't going to take up an extra yard of fabric... 
All that said, I think it's still a relatively quick project, despite all the complications I'm adding to it. If I had more time, it would probably be a fun one to play around with insertion lace on, but alas, mine will have ugly modern lace. I probably don't have time to sew today, but I would like to get the buttons/buttonholes up the back tomorrow. That will leave me all day Friday to do the sleeves and the hem. Everything else is already done!
theladyrebecca: (Default)
I didn't make it home till after 8pm last night, so not only did I not do the hem, I didn't even get to do anything more than cut out the etsy order. I'm hoping maybe I can get it done this evening to run it to the post office by 5, but if not, it will go out tomorrow. 

So in lieu of sewing content, here's a few pictures of the deck dress that I took the other day. 

theladyrebecca: (Default)
I've been really terrible about posting to here with Titanic progress since it takes so long to do pictures on here, but I have been posting pretty regularly on instagram and on facebook. Basically, at this point, the entire project is complete except for the dress hem, sourcing that darn buckle, and acquiring the right jewelry and hair comb (I should probably get on that).

I was playing around with my hair yesterday to try to get the right look (I swear that simple-looking Edwardian hair is somehow one of the hardest hairstyles for me to achieve), and decided to take some pictures while wearing the full outfit. Of course, at that point, I still hadn't finished all of the closures, and I have since also tweaked the pickup in the back in the attempt to get a little more hem length, so these pictures are not ideal. They're also not edited yet, so while I will be posting them soon, I'm really just teasing them now. If you want to see the pictures I've already shared, you can click the link above for my instagram. 

But in any case, I plan to put it all on again today and somehow figure out where I need to mark the hem length in the back so that I can get the whole thing finished tonight. I also have an etsy order for a tiny Cinderella dress, so that needs to be done tonight, too. After that, I have a Victorian commission I'll be starting work on as soon as I get the contract back, and that will likely be followed by another commission, so I'm not sure when exactly I'll be getting back to the bustle gown. Still, the commissions are good, since they will help me pay for Europe next year!
theladyrebecca: (Default)
I didn't have time to do too much sewing on Monday, but I did finish the sleeve embroidery on the kimono sleeve portion. And then yesterday I played around with the collar, settled on a length/height/slope that worked well, and then moved on to the under-blouse. I used a basic blouse pattern with no opening, so that I could just pull it on over my head, and altered it to be a scoop neck. Then I patterned out a fairly-fitted one-piece sleeve. I'm doing the bodice part of the blouse out of muslin since it doesn't show at all, with the sleeve out of the poly crepe that I used for the kimono sleeve section (that section is flat-lined with muslin). The end of the sleeve will be lined with muslin to prevent the embroidery from bugging my wrist. I'm probably going to put a little triangle of the crepe at the CF of the neckline of the under-blouse, too, since a couple inches of that will show. 

Then I hooped up the sleeve ends and the collar for embroidery, and set about putting together my embroidery patterns to the right fit and look. I was really hoping to get both cuffs in at once, but my hoop was about 1" of width short, so I had to do two hoopings. I left the first one (one sleeve and collar) going while I went to sleep, since it was a 63 minute stitch-out, and then this morning I flipped the design over and had the machine do the other cuff while I got ready for work. So now the embroidery is all done for this project!

I do have rehearsal tonight, but I'm hoping to maybe have a little time to work on it between work and rehearsal. I'd like to get the collar attached to the kimono sleeve portion and start on binding all the edges of that. It's getting close, though. I should almost certainly have the whole project done by Friday night.

Oh, and also, my satin shoes arrived (the parisxox ones that everyone has been buying on etsy). They're definitely tight in the toes, to the point where you can kind of see the shape of my foot in the shoe. (That said, in the pictures of Kate Winslet, you can see the shape of her foot in the shoes as well). Also, the weird diagonal side seam makes my foot look crazy wide. So I don't know if I'm going to keep them. I think I'm going to try wearing them around the house for a little bit and see if they stretch out. Otherwise, I'll have to find alternatives somewhere, and so far I'm coming up empty, since the only other dyeable pumps I've found are pretty clunky looking, and $55-60. 

So far no luck on finding the appropriate buckle, though. If anyone has any leads to a 2.5" tall (interior measurement) oval buckle, either antique gold colored and textured or not (since I can always paint/add texture), please let me know! I've been all over ebay and aliexpress with no luck. 

 

 

theladyrebecca: (Default)
I've been playing around with research/patterning/draping the yellow deck dress from Titanic, and I've come to a conclusion - it's impossible. Not sure if it's that Kate Winslet was just that small, or if they were working with extra wide fabric, but I would need a piece of fabric approximately 74x72" for the skirt portion, because THERE IS ONLY ONE SEAM. 

Like seriously, I'm not even sure how that skirt works with the only seam being the center front, but that's just what it was. I still haven't concluded if the original was one piece from the top of the yellow to the hem. I'm leaning towards it having been two pieces, because it's a dogleg closure up the front, and that seems like it would be easier to do if the bodice was a separate piece from the skirt.

So anyway, my version is going to have a seam at the waist, as well as a curved seam up either side, because my fabric is 55" including the selvage. Then again, I suppose I shouldn't be stressing, since although the dress appears as a butter yellow on screen, it is actually a gold fabric with a leaf spray pattern. And mine is taffeta instead of satin. I did, however, find that I have an embroidery pattern that will be pretty darn close to the embroidery on the kimono sleeves. I just have to figure out what fabric to make the sleeves out of, and I'm really not sure what it's supposed to be... (any ideas?)

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