totchipanda

The trim for my silk sack arrived, and I excitedly pinned some in place with the stomacher ruffles. I don't love-love it, but I don't hate it either. And it's hard to fully judge something from only two small pieces rather than the entire outfit. So on it goes. I'm going to need to find a way to keep the petticoat ruffle upright, as it is already falling over without the added weight of trim. I suspect the answer will be "tack it strategically".

Most of the weekend was spent either watching the roomies play LEGO Star Wars while stitching hems and trimming on top, or watching The Sandman on Netflix while stitching hems and trimming on top. Roomie J asked if I could sew it on with the machine, and while I could, I'm not going to. I have no deadline for this, I fully expect to spend the next four months on it.

Sunday morning, I got all kitted up in chemise, stays, two petticoats and a split rump to measure myself for the Angelica gown, and later in the day took laundry down and traced/cut/sewed a mock-up. I did try it on, though not over any of the underlayers, but like, my measurements were more or less the same. I had at least a hand-span's worth of extra room at the back waist, which seems excessive. I even traced a smaller upper-half size (knowing that it's almost certainly drafted off a modern B-cup block) and did most of the waist-size grading at the front only, and like. What? I'll have to get kitted up again to do the fitting, but this doesn't seem right.

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On the home front, roomies discovered Friday night that some enterprising wasps have decided to make a part of our home into theirs, accessing a space between the outer wall and the basement window well for their nest. We are confident it's a fairly new development as it is not far from our AC unit and water spigot, and I was out there near both of those perhaps a week earlier. We aren't sure if it's something the condo board deals with or if we do, but Roomie M is potentially allergic (as her mom is, but she has never been stung and we don't intend to ever have that be the way to find out) and also none of us want wasps in our house regardless! She reached out to an exterminator for a quote, but of course it's the weekend and it's not urgent... yet. They have not yet accessed the house itself, but we will be on this this week to get it taken care of ASAP. Our neighbours across the lane had a wasp nest under their stairs, and the condo board's solution was to put spray foam in the gaps. Which did precisely nothing.

In a rental or an outright ownership situation, the solution is obvious. Condo is great most of the time, but this is a little more serious than "who mows the lawn".

Which, you may recall, is part of the Internet Archive, which is currently under attack from select publishers for stealing their profits, or something. But first, a story:

I did indeed have more energy last night, but instead of doing the thing I "should" be doing (making shorts) I took down a couple things to make modifications to. I pinned up 2" on last year's cropped Pietra pants, because the finished length of the full version required shortening, and hmm maybe I should do the cropped ones too, because 25.5" inseam doesn't mean it's a good length for me. I've got it to 23.5 now and I like it better but I think I need to lower it JUST a touch because with every movement it tries to pull up my calf. Then I pinned in the excess fullness in the hip because... their plus size is still drafted for a more even distribution of flesh than I have.

THEN I cut the bodice off a dress I made in 2009 to turn it into a skirt. I never liked the bodice, I added to the pattern bc according to the measurements it should have been way too small, but then it ended up being way too large and I had to take it in in a hurry. It was a halter top, that never fit my chest well, and the neck straps were just... it was all weird, yo! But the skirt is delightfully fluffy and it has POCKETS. So after I cut it, I added a petersham ribbon for waist stability (bc of course I didn't use interfacing or anything when I made it), folded and stitched the facing back on, and then -- THEN -- I added 2 hook and eye.

That's how badly I am avoiding making shorts. Yikes.

Anyway, I tried it on just to see, and while I love it (more now that I can wear it without worrying about the bodice), it's really really flat. So I thought, I should make a petticoat. Even a plain one made from a light cotton or something, rather than more traditional skirt-floofing materials, will add some body. And I remembered a really great tutorial for a short gathered petticoat from my loli days.

Y'all. The tutorial is gone. The blog has been removed and purged and it's gone.

OMG what am I to do?? I tried to locate a couple others, but being too impatient to wait until I get home to find my remaining lolita books, I suddenly remembered the Wayback Machine. And IT STILL EXISTS!! HURRAY!!!

I have also copied this and saved it as a doc for my own use. Angry publishers want to take this away from us. I fucking hate business people who only see profits and not much farther than the ends of their own noses.

I have adulted like a BOSS this weekend!

Saturday: took roomie to work bc she started at 8:30, and entirely bc then I could do stuff on the way home. So I grocery shopped, and then went to the registry to get my important docs replaced (ID, car registration and health care card).

Sunday: laundry. It's a whole day affair, really.

Sewing wise, I finished the drawers, and my fixes were great. I just wish I could replicate them on the other side! So one leg has nicely finished seams with no raw edges anywhere, and the other has raw edges under the lace, and I haven't decided how to finish the lace egde yet. And guess what, the side I did wrong was the side i ended up liking more lol.

Then I decided to work on the blouse, but I lost the front pieces somewhere. So I did the bum pad instead. I'd made a center back piece some weeks back, but hadn't decided on how to do the hips yet. I went with a patent of the Scott hip pad that was registered in 1907. It's super cute and at least on my dress form, it fills in the back as it's meant to.

Today I was tidying up the table and I found the shirt pieces I was missing under a length of fabric I washed a couple weeks ago lol. So I'm working on that, but am taking a break for lunch and to watch The Expanse with my fandom friends.

Dog sitting is over! I am so happy to sleep in my own bed again. It doesn't shift back and forth every time someone moves (one dog shifts by throwing his weight around, another has to lick her paws for 10 mins) (the spare bed is one that sits on rails with ovoid wheels, it's horrible for motion transfer), i don't have puppies sticking their faces and paws and butts in my face, i can roll around and kick my legs as much as I want, I can lay in bed and talk to my German friend on discord when it's late for me but early for her, and not have to listen to anything (like aforementioned licking)

But I miss them still. It was nice to be around fur babies again.

Sewing weekend was, I think, a success. I finished the petticoat except for one more layer of lace that I didn't have with me (it took foreverrrrrrrrrrrrr bc of gathering 2 ruffles. What was I thinking!) and the drawstring. Then I laid out and cut the Fantail skirt, although I had a total brain fart and cut it on the wrong grainlines. Too late now, and I only had 3 yards which was just enough if I cut it just so. It's all sewn together too, except the hem and closures. I need to hang it to stretch the seams first. And hilariously, including cutting it took like 3 hours to make, whereas the petticoat was like triple that!

Then, I taped together Black Snail's flat-fronted Edwardian corset pattern, cut it out and made a mock-up of a straight size 46. Fit good through the bust and waist, definitely needed more room on the hip. I feel confident to go ahead with a 48/50 to allow room for padding.

Speaking of padding, I definitely need some, the skirt is VERY heavy and it pulls at the back. Gonna need a small pad to help take the weight of it.

Tonight I said I would go grocery shopping, and then... we shall see. I'd like to get more sewing done, but I am very tired lol. I was exhausted at like 7pm and purposely waited to go to bed so that I wouldn't be up at 1am, but then I didn't sleep right away anyway. Perhaps I will just plan and do nothing instead haha.

I got a little bit of sewing completed on Monday while recovering from the migraine. I pulled out the elastic on the pants and reworked the channels, stitched it all down. Then it was time to finish up the inseam and hem it and it would be complete.

Guido and I noticed the centipede at the same time. He gave it a good sniff and walked away. I called it a night. Both him and my basement spider Eustace are USELESS.

Then I wasn't sleepy until VERY late, so I basically had a 2 hour nap before work on Tuesday, and I had no brains for anything. Yesterday was Loki finale, but I had about a 1 hour window between the time I got home and when my roommates did, so I quickly did up the final bits, and it took perhaps 45 mins to stitch, serge, press, and stitch lol. I even trimmed a bunch of threads! They are DONE and they have POCKETS big enough to stick kittens in. I'm going to wear them to work tomorrow.

This morning I thought my next to-do should be hem up the blue pants and pink skirt but... that's hardly fun! (I will still do it) What shall I create next? I bought a couple Deer and Doe patterns that still need printing, I have a skirt to make up, I need to find a jacket pattern to go with my new pants to make a suit... I have also been seeing loose dresses with tiered skirts everywhere (starting with a black one in a store window in the spring, the kind of store where a plain t-shirt sells for $70) and I want one. I have some patterns at home I can swing without needing to buy a specialty one, then it's just picking out the fabric.

GASP a post about sewing. Well it's very slow here at work sooooo.

I have no major events planned for next year. Travel is really not feasible for long distances so the majority of events are going to be local and semi-local. My birthday has a 0 after it this upcoming year so I would like to plan something in the flavour of a costume picnic. The usual con circuit is anime and pop culture focused, but they are possibilities. Esp the pop culture one, it'd be great to have an obvious Outlander-themed one so I could get away with wearing it there heehee.

The Revamps and the UFOs

While writing the blog posts, I sort of sorted out my thoughts about some older pieces, namely the yellow and pink 1830s gown. I really need to revisit that one, as the fit was so bad when I wore it. I'm not convinced the pattern is correct about closures, I need to redo them anyway, figure out if the shoulders falling off is the neckline or the sleeves, and what the heck is up with my darts.

I also need true sleeve puffers. My little ones didn't really work, and also I forgot about them and ran them through the wash. Oops.

I would REALLY like to get the swallowtail jacket finished, as it is coming up on 6 years since I started it. I don't have enough fabric to remake the sleeves so... piecing it is. They definitely need a gusset.

Perhaps I can get my tea gown trimmed up and actually wear that again.

Finish up the pieces that are literally just waiting for finishing touches before I can get them out of my house. 2 zippers, a handful of buttons, and a hem. GONE.

The New Stuffs

My "fancy bitches" crew would like to make English gowns, so that's on my radar. I have three, but I want MORE!! I especially want a "fashionable" one with lots of trim on it, fitted over pocket hoops. The challenge there is of course fabric. I bought some silk in LA with no plan, but its really only enough for the gown itself and maybe some trim. Definitely no matching petticoat. Alternatively, I have a bunch of polyester that would certainly be enough for a full dress so I might do that too. A part of me doesn't want to, BUT I have it and it's going to collect dust for the next 10k years anyway.

Maybe use some of that same poly for a dressing gown. I have at least 2 colours.

Perhaps this is the year for the petticoat and pet-en-l'air? All of that fabric is just waiting for me to begin. I am reasonably certain the green of the embroidered fabric and the green silk from the year before are a very close match, so I could possibly use the petticoat for both. Maybe.

I have also decided I want to do another Italian gown, with the Williamsburg fabric. That will also need a contrast petticoat.

Get my red Regency gown made. I'm stuck on design. I'm trying to recreate one from the 2005 P&P, but I can't decide if I want a true recreaction or an "inspired by". The movie dress is a true wrap front gown, with an open side all the way down the left front. The few cross-front extants I've seen are apron fronts that are pinned into place. Do I want to do a crossover gown at all, or have more of a round-gown look. I'm sure I have more than enough fabric for whatever I decide, and I'm hoping to have enough left over for a petticoat for a different gown... or maybe a whole other dress. SIGH decisions.

Perhaps get started on a little overtunic to zhus up my white gown for the next round of balls.

I still want to revisit my Victorian roots, especially if I can get "Local CoCo" launched. We want to do a skating event this winter, so there's an option. I Have SO MANY OUTFITS I want to build out of the Fashions of the Gilded Age books. I have coutil and a spoon busk for a new corset.

The Challenges

Following along from an Instagram story I saw this past week, I'm going to do a few things that scare me. First, it's time for welted pockets to become my subservient. Second, I want to practice with the vintage buttonholer. Third, I want to (deep breath) drape a pattern.

Since the one dress form is close to me-sized and shaped, I'd like to attempt to drape up an Italian gown bodice pattern. While making the English gown in June, I laid out my cobbled-together pattern from RH on top of the L&S pattern and it was really similar, but a bit too small. So, I need a proper pattern, and draping one will be a right proper challenge too.

I also have plans for a wool-faced set of stays. Like I need another pair BUUUT WOOL STAYS.

Modern Thoughts, Redux

I joined a sewing group on my knitting forum (we're crafty like that), and one of the things I still want to revisit is my modern wardrobe. Now that I'm starting to publicly come out as non-binary, I really want to start getting myself headed in that direction. That was a large part of why I joined the thread, just to have a place that's active and also very accepting of a person's stated identity. I will probably think on that over the next month or three.

"Local CoCo"

Local CoCo, what? We (the fancy bitches) have mostly decided that we aren't going to CoCo this year, buuuut... why don't we get together anyway? We had a good laugh over themes and mini-events we could host, and mostly we were all excited we could go home to our own beds at a reasonable hour. It didn't go any further because it was so early in November, but now that I'm done all my non-sewing stuff for the year, it's on my mind again.

Thursday night pool party: we could possibly have a dinner at a restaurant (in costume, naturally), on the patio. There's only a handful of outdoor pools and none of them are attached to a hotel but a patio would be a good stand-in. Weather permitting.

Friday night Ice Cream Social (because we're in Canada and can do what we want): There are MANY pop-up ice cream stands throughout the city, or perhaps we could go to the fancy creamery on the southside. At least two of our people are dairy-sensitive (or outright allergic), so another option is just go out for dessert.

Saturday Gala: This was especially hilarious, and the biggest moment of "we can be in bed at a reasonable hour!". Have a picnic, with a red carpet, in our fanciest attire, maybe play some tunes, go home by sunset (at the end of July, which is still well after 9pm, if any of us even made it that long). Another option would be an afternoon thing, with everyone taking turns to talk about something for like, 20 minutes. Red carpet and fanciness was a must.

Sunday tea: have tea. If we were feeling extra fancy and like our wallets were too full, we could do high tea at the hotel we have the balls in. Then we'd all say BYYYYEEEEE and go home lol.

Even if no one else comes with me, I might do these things anyway, just for the Instagram opportunities XD I get the giggles every time I picture it.

I made my pattern, cut and sewed a mock-up, then had to re-make the fronts and try again. I think the back looks great!



But the front (version 2) needs a little work...



I left the gray cover up to show where my stays show, the horizontal pin towards the bottom is where my stays end, and the horizontal pin up near the waist is where I think the curve should be, this one is just too wide and shallow. Josephine isn't the same size or shape as me, of course, and her waist is smaller than mine, though she is close. I find only a half inch or so off the bottom ought to be sufficient.

I'm also wondering if I should really spend some time on a different set of stays. The ones I have are an earlier style with a removable stomacher that frankly hurt my boobs today (maybe because I am wearing a sundress with a somewhat compressed bustline), and also a later style may change the shape of my torso that I want to account for.

I'm off to the sportsball game, will return to sewing tomorrow. Thoughts and opinions welcome!

(I so need to rehem that petticoat. It puddles on the floor. I need shoes but not that tall of ones!)

While digging in a pile of fabric for something else, I found the bits and pieces to a petticoat I'd started at least 4 years ago. I definitely remember starting it while I still lived with my dad, and it was partially constructed. I was at the point of joining and hemming the lower ruffle - something like 480" of fabric. UGH. But, I really should be cleaning out my "almost finished" box, so I put it near my machine. Then tonight, I did a quick poll of what I should sew tonight, either the petticoat or the corset mock-up, and most responders voted for petticoat. That's what I worked on for about 2 hours before calling it a night (I got home around 7:30 as it was lol)

I had made it out of what I thought was a nice linen/cotton blend, from TV 170 View 2 (I think! My pattern is at Nicole's, I believe, and like I mentioned, it was at least 4 years ago!), but I didn't realize until now that it has some width-wise stretch to it :/ That made some of the sewing tricksy where the fabric wanted to stretch out, especially when I ruffled the top edge with the ruffler foot. I had some tensioning issues with my serger too, so there's a few puckers along the hem as well. Oh well. It's an under piece. I've been trying to use up old thread bobbins, so I used dark grey in 2 places, the light pink, and then finally wound a new bobbin with my top-stitching thread (a purple on the periwinkle end of the spectrum), which then ran out in the middle of topstitching. By then it was 10pm, so I gave it up. Someday I will have a sewing room that does not share walls with neighbours and I can sew until midnight or later if I want to :)

Then of course I had to pin its unfinishedness to Josephine and try it out under the skirts I made in May, just for funsies. It's too long for those skirts, which were made to be walking-length, and this petticoat is going to end up being closer to gown-length, I think, though I could fudge it still since it's not on a waistband yet. Or add a couple more tucks to the upper part of the skirt. The fabric is really too heavy to be an appropriate petticoat, but I'm still pretty excited to have it done so I can try it out! If nothing else, I can make that fancy NF "hoop" petticoat in Fashions of the Gilded Age (the same one that jenthompson made) to help hold it out. And poor Josephine fell over the other day, so now her hips are all out of whack. I'll have to undress her to reset them.

Wooo progress!

I am so close! I finished the eyelets the other day and the cording last night, so today I could trim all the cord ends and stitch the last seams, and the (drum roll) try it on (so I could mark the straps. In retrospect I should have included them in the mock-up). And damn y'all, my Regency boobs look amazing, if completely scandalous without the chemise on too. Mwahahah!

Eta: pictures are of the fronts and backs, corded and ready to go lol. Boobs were too scandalous to photograph!

( Pictures! )

Finished the trimming on my dress and HAD to get dressed up :D :D :D

( le pictures! )

Not shown, the massive (?) amount of blood my finger left all over the inside of the bodice and front of the skirt after I stabbed pins into it trying to pin the dress closed... (I started the dress about a year ago, used a bodice pattern that fit then, but it's been a year and also late at night...)

Ladies wot do 18th century... how do you keep your shift sleeves from bunching up into your armpits? I could NOT get them down, very uncomfortable. (Also reminded myself why you do socks and shoes BEFORE corset/stays. Eesh, self, really?)

Still need to rehem the petticoat, and hem the gown, (and clean up the blood) but then it is DONE.