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Jul. 8th, 2024 09:06 amRepairs to the bathroom were completed, and then I discovered that the curtain I put up has already been rendered next to useless thanks to the kittens. I've scooped it up and over the rail to hopefully discourage them from playing with it.
Temperatures are soaring here, which, while nothing like the US south and eastern heat dome, is still very unpleasant. My bedroom is on the south side where it gets blasted with sun pretty much all day. I don't leave my windows open much because I worry about the kittens climbing the screens and/or tearing them loose and escaping, not that open windows on the sunny side help that much. Thankfully the other major windows are south but covered, and north so I can get some cross-breeze. It's gonna be a week of managing windows and laying low, sometimes quite literally.
Weekend of doing absolutely nothing. On Saturday I mostly played video games and looked at my Regency patterns. Sunday was more of the same, with slightly more energy spent on stays, fabric hunting, and a quick jaunt partway across the city for more fabric. My aunt's former landlady had received a bunch of fabrics and I wasn't going to look at them, given that I am trying to downsize my stash, but then she said the magic words: wool-silk. NYYEERRRROOOOOOOM! They are a lovely green and red (separate pieces), both with pale gray pin stripes and utterly delightful to touch.
The only real sewing/crafting related anything that I did was to start by pulling out my regency patterns and Carolyn's book Stitching La Mode. I THINK I can get away with her 1794 apron gown and open robe (though not exactly, it's a good starting point). Comparing pieces, Laughing Moon's chemise gown is a good base for that gown. I looked at their stays as well but couldn't really decide on anything, plus Calcifer was SO HELPFUL and attacked both the instruction book and the pattern itself.
"Why do you have to bite everything??" I asked her. "Bite bite bite!" while poking her with my fingers. Reader, she bit me.
On Sunday I pulled out the projector and the old laptop and loaded up the Bernhardt stays pattern, view C. I had to put the projector on a stool and back it up pretty far to get the square to the right scale (kittens again helped, naturally). Hot damn (literally), that thing puts out of a lot of heat! I have exactly two walls best suited to pattern tracing, both of which are blocked by the table, but it was too hot to want to do it anyway! Then I squared up the lines and cut it out. Holding it up to my body, it seems OK to start, but too small in the back. I futzed the lines to include 2" more on each side. It might be too much but. I also will need to move the hip dart or add another one entirely. "B" seems well placed but very unsure about C.
Then I let the kittens have a ball of yarn while I fished out some fabric to make the mock up. IN doing so, I found the silk organza strip I started to roll hem as a ruffle for my Williamsburg Angelica gown, and the yardage of black silk organza left from the brain hat. Stays were not cut out or mocked up, and in fact all I did after that was nap, eat dinner, watch a movie, play some more video games, and finish that one side of the strip.
Definitely going to take it easy this week. I have some library books to read that I really ought to get started on. Another hold is ready, but I sent it to the south library and when I drove by yesterday, their parking lot is entirely ripped up and being replaced, forcing people to park in the next lot over. I really should have sucked it up and gone yesterday bc my brain said it was easier to train down after work and walk, completely disregarding that's just going to get hotter all week until AFTER my hold expires. Alas.
Temperatures are soaring here, which, while nothing like the US south and eastern heat dome, is still very unpleasant. My bedroom is on the south side where it gets blasted with sun pretty much all day. I don't leave my windows open much because I worry about the kittens climbing the screens and/or tearing them loose and escaping, not that open windows on the sunny side help that much. Thankfully the other major windows are south but covered, and north so I can get some cross-breeze. It's gonna be a week of managing windows and laying low, sometimes quite literally.
Weekend of doing absolutely nothing. On Saturday I mostly played video games and looked at my Regency patterns. Sunday was more of the same, with slightly more energy spent on stays, fabric hunting, and a quick jaunt partway across the city for more fabric. My aunt's former landlady had received a bunch of fabrics and I wasn't going to look at them, given that I am trying to downsize my stash, but then she said the magic words: wool-silk. NYYEERRRROOOOOOOM! They are a lovely green and red (separate pieces), both with pale gray pin stripes and utterly delightful to touch.
The only real sewing/crafting related anything that I did was to start by pulling out my regency patterns and Carolyn's book Stitching La Mode. I THINK I can get away with her 1794 apron gown and open robe (though not exactly, it's a good starting point). Comparing pieces, Laughing Moon's chemise gown is a good base for that gown. I looked at their stays as well but couldn't really decide on anything, plus Calcifer was SO HELPFUL and attacked both the instruction book and the pattern itself.
"Why do you have to bite everything??" I asked her. "Bite bite bite!" while poking her with my fingers. Reader, she bit me.
On Sunday I pulled out the projector and the old laptop and loaded up the Bernhardt stays pattern, view C. I had to put the projector on a stool and back it up pretty far to get the square to the right scale (kittens again helped, naturally). Hot damn (literally), that thing puts out of a lot of heat! I have exactly two walls best suited to pattern tracing, both of which are blocked by the table, but it was too hot to want to do it anyway! Then I squared up the lines and cut it out. Holding it up to my body, it seems OK to start, but too small in the back. I futzed the lines to include 2" more on each side. It might be too much but. I also will need to move the hip dart or add another one entirely. "B" seems well placed but very unsure about C.
Then I let the kittens have a ball of yarn while I fished out some fabric to make the mock up. IN doing so, I found the silk organza strip I started to roll hem as a ruffle for my Williamsburg Angelica gown, and the yardage of black silk organza left from the brain hat. Stays were not cut out or mocked up, and in fact all I did after that was nap, eat dinner, watch a movie, play some more video games, and finish that one side of the strip.
Definitely going to take it easy this week. I have some library books to read that I really ought to get started on. Another hold is ready, but I sent it to the south library and when I drove by yesterday, their parking lot is entirely ripped up and being replaced, forcing people to park in the next lot over. I really should have sucked it up and gone yesterday bc my brain said it was easier to train down after work and walk, completely disregarding that's just going to get hotter all week until AFTER my hold expires. Alas.
