I don't suffer from insanity,

I think I need a new dress. I saw a fashion plate, and had a sudden, consuming desire for it to be mine.

If it's cold, though, my new spencer might not look right with this new idea.

Also, I wrecked my house this weekend when I reorganized the computer den, so I have to fix the chaos I created to make order somewhere else...

And I have a house guest until Wednesday.

Maybe it was not meant to be, but... Well, we'll see. I'm not tabling the dress just yet.

Woohoo! I am accessorized! And all from things I had on hand. So that's super cool.

Next up I need to figure out what to do about my spencer. I still haven't chosen the fabric. I'm waffling because the weather is completely crazy right now, hah! Yesterday morning it snowed. Then by the afternoon it was a beautiful sunny 60°F/15°C. Today it's freezing again, and yet next Tuesday it's going to be in the 70s! So, I think I'll pick a very simple design and work on the mock-up, and then we'll see where we are weather-wise. Velveteen or taffeta? We shall see!

So, here are my accessories....

The purse inspiration (thanks, nuranar!):



Complete, from a red silk dupioni, and random trim:



The hat inspiration:



The hat, from electrical fence wire, paperboard, duct tape, black velveteen, feathers and whatnot:





And the muff, from fake fur and white fleece, and pillow stuffing:

So, I've cut out the bodice of my bridesmaid dress. I really do love this color. My question, though, is.... Should I make Vee a dress out of the same stuff, and Morgan a skeleton suit, all for the Georgian picnic this fall? Or is that just way too matchy-matchy? /sigh They would be SO CUTE. I don't have my heart set on it, but I think I have enough fabric.

Or I could make Vee a spencer or sash and Morgan's breeches out of it, so as to break all the blue up a little...

I'm even toying with the idea of making matchy doll clothes, LOL. I'm so terrible.

This fabric has a bonus, that while it is indeed bridal satin (boo), it IS machine washable....

It's this stuff from fabric.com and was *almost* a perfect match to the bride's colors, and had her full approval.

I hate doing mock-ups, but I have a metric ton this sheer window-pane white cotton (I know, I mentioned this before):



However, I also have three $25 noir Waverly curtain panels that I didn't want to ruin with an experiment. So, I combined the two and have been plugging away each evening at my new Regency dress. So far, it's coming along great! In fact, I think I'll have the dress complete tonight, which means I can devote tomorrow evening to accessories. I'll be sewing late, but it'll be worth it.

Just for me, I need to complete:

Attach back skirt to back bodice (already gathered and basted)
Attach side seams of the skirt
Hem
Hem sleeves
Finish neckline

I could also do the accessories on Friday morning in a pinch. Or Saturday morning, even.

Additionally, I located my pink Regency! Woohoo! That thing has been MIA for like three years, and I casually mentioned it to a friend who looked at me guiltily and said, "I think I have that!" ORLY!? HOORAY! It was my first regency dress evar, I think in '07 when I originally made my stays. I literally only ever wore it to one event, an Antique Elegance get together, and I think Dawni was the only one that saw me in it. And for a first Regency, it's really quite pretty (and entirely hand sewn, which was new for me, too). I think the only thing I'd change about it is the color, eventually. Heh. Or not. I could leave it pink. It's a very soft, almost flesh-toned pink. Anyway. I now have that for my back up. Or maybe for my day-time dress. I really need to sort out what I'm going to wear!

Hooray for another find!

So I am kind of hating teal right now, in spite of the fact that I actually like the color. I am having the WORST luck finding a match. I went to Perth Street and went to all the stores today. I found like three color matches, but not in the fabric that I like or need. I even hit the fabric stores on Midway just north of Beltline. Still no luck. I think the next step will be to check online and order swatches. Boohiss.

Good thing I started on my functional mock up for my noir Regency so at least I'll have something new to wear on Saturday. Currently it is white, but I think I might dye it to a pale blue. We'll see.

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So.... If you like the Regency era and you've read all the Jane Austen books you can find, who do you turn to?

May I humbly suggest Georgette Heyer? Her stuff is awesome and aside from Austen herself, the pivotal reason that I love the Regency era So Much! They're all very quick reads, and some are set in the earlier non-"Regency" era, too. Currently only her novel "The Black Moth" is available for free on the Gutenberg Project.

My personal favorites are:

Black Moth (mid-18th c, the unofficial prequel to These Old Shades)
These Old Shades (mid-18th c)
Devil's Cub (late 18th c)
Masqueraders (cross-dressing oh my!)
Faro's Daughter

Now, that said, I've read & re-read her stuff so many times! LOL I know nuranar can back me up on this author, though. ^_~

I realized I never did post about the chemise dress I threw together. It is based on the Elegant Lady's Closet drawstring gown that I've done like five times now. I added a LOT to the fullness in the front to get the look, and I was kind of going for this, not exactly, but the over-all look:



Next time, I definitely need to do the sash, but over all, I think I nailed it. I love this gown. It's from cotton voile. The bodice is completely hand sewn, as I really love having portable projects. The skirts are less portable, so of course they're not hand sewn. ^_~ The hem is, though. For some reason, my hems always look better done by hand. I've never mastered that hem stitch on the machine. Ah, well.

Originally, I toyed with the idea of dying this gown, but I've changed my mind. I'm going to dye the white on white striped gown that I wore to that first Georgian picnic. That will make it look like a "new" dress. I'll also dye a length of it to make Vee another matching dress. Plus some of the white on that striped dress has yellowed with time, so I think dying it might cover that up? Hope so, anyway! Then I can make another dress out of the stripey stuff and have two different dresses there. LOL. Plus, this chemise gown will be a great base under an open front gown, under a spencer, or under just about whatever I want.

The only images I have from it are from our Bastille Day brunch back in July (thanks jenthompson!):



Before I went out, my hair was all nice and tightly curled and slightly frizzy as per appropriate for the era. Heh. By the time I got into the restaurant, though, my hair was all flat because of the rain. Rain in mid-July. Who could have planned for that? It did make for lovely weather to dress up, though. Only three of us dressed up, but another family showed, so we had quite a nice little gathering.



Oh, if you go to Le Madeleine on Bastille Day and tell the clerk "Happy Bastille Day" they give you a free small dessert. I do think "Vive la France!" would be more appropriate, but hey, what do I know?

Alrighty! All done with the maroon Regency except for the sleeve hems. Woot!



I'm wearing it right now, heh. Now to change into street clothes and take my kids to the park.

The picnic to-do list:

Finish the maroon regency
Make Vee's dress
Add maroon ribbons to the brown bonnet and fix pleats
Alter the regency stays
Make a reticule

Ok, I've decided officially I'm doing regency again. I looked at the chemise dress, and while it will be easy enough, there will be a learning curve and mistakes, so I decided to do something I've done before. The drawstring dress Sensibility pattern is so easy and there's no learning curve. Plus I can handsew some while holding the sleeping baby. SO, frantic sewing for the next few days and we'll see what happens. Worse comes to worse, I can wear something I already had, and I'll be ok with that.

I think I'll be able to whip up a dress for Vee, too. Another matching dress, of course. That's one of the lovely parts about having a daugther.

I don't think I'll get anything done for Matt this year, so he'll be stuck in his rigged costume from last year. :-/ I do feel bad about that. I'm pretty sure that some of my other married friends have experienced the same guilt. :P

Next year will be easier to get stuff done with a one year old and a three year old, instead of the newborn and toddler.

Lessee, aside from the normal work stuff and week night relaxing, what has been going on?

On the costuming front, I've almost completed the pink regency. The bodice is completely hand sewn and looks great. The fit is pretty good, although the neckline I'm kind of "eh" about. I think the next regency will not be drawstring, although I do adore the wrinkled front effect - I'm so much more fond of early Regency and Directoire than late Regency. I've been working on the dress during my lunch breaks at the University. One of the hugest benefits of working with an office full of politically correct, truly considerate psychologists and counselors is that although they may look at my hobby with curiosity, they are constrained by habit and profession not to judge me on it. Heh. Ok, at least not vocally. ^_~

Plus, when one actually considers the hobby of costuming, it does have a certain degree of artistic mystique. Which is really odd to me since I've never really considered myself an artist. Probably because I don't really come up with any of it on my own - I pretty much always use a pattern. However, on a college campus, costuming is art. Whee!

After the pink regency I think it will be time for me to work on something Victorian again. Well, and finish up the silver 1878 Victorian. It still needs trim and an over-skirt. The next Victorian will be later, like 1885-ish, I think. I fell in love with my sister's bustle when I saw her in it at Candlelight in December. She looked fabulous. So I need to make a bustle, and then of course an outfit to go with it! I've still got tons of that silver, plus a darker, charcoal gray of the same material, so I'll probably go with that stuff. I love it anyway!

Another amusing thing on the work front is that as an office we're participating in the Live Healthy Dallas 100 Day Challenge. We have too many people that wanted to participate so our office has two teams. The most fun part about it are the names we came up with for the two teams: Pink Freud and Jung at Heart. Hehe. I love puns!

So, over all, the new job is going quite well. There is a certain harmony in this office that is unlike anything I ever expected (or experienced, for that matter), and I really like it. We have been having horrendous problems with the network and our main shared hard drive, so much so that it's finally been escalated to the Big Powers That Be, which says a lot since it's a government bureaucracy, heh.

I don't have as much free time as I did at the shop, but there are slow moments from time to time. The only melancholy part of course is how much I miss Miriam. Luckily I've been able to call her occasionally (and need to again soon!), so that tie hasn't been completely lost. Most of the others from the shop I can at least "see" on World of Warcraft, and I get some chatting with them there.

Matt's been really busy lately with helping re-start the Gaelic League here in Dallas. I'm pretty excited, because some of my most fun memories are of the Irish Immersion Weekends that we went to, and the cielis those evenings. So. Much. Fun. So much so that we had the Denton Celtic Dancers come to the party after we got married and teach my family how to dance. Heh. So, now we go to Irish Classes on Saturdays, or at least every other Saturday, at this charming book store near the Tipperary Inn in Dallas. Like we have so much spare time on Saturdays! But it's worth it! :D Of course, Matt volunteered to do the website, I think it's because he just loves doing them, heh.

And in that vein, the DFW Costuming Guild site is back up and has events posted. It's almost completely back to where it was, with the exception of the fact that I need to recover my own photos so that I can get them back up there.

For those of you interested, the steam punk lecture is February 9th at 2PM at the Dallas Public Library. I'll get directions up as the day draws closer. It should be a really fun lecture! I'm totally looking forward to it. ^_^

Oh, and GURPS on 4th Saturdays at my older brother Rob's house has resumed. Hooray! So I get to see at least three of my five siblings once a month again. Annie, if you want, you could totally come and hang out. We don't game the whole time! Come to our house and I'll drive if you don't want to drive the whole way.

Ok, that's pretty much it for now! It got a lot longer than I expected, as usual. ^_^