Monday Progress Update: May 28

A day late and a dollar short!  I've been at Anime North this weekend, so your weekly update comes a bit late.  It does, however, come with documentation for my Historical Cinderella that won "Most Historical" at the con this weekend, as well as documentation for my Chevalier D'Eon and Reinette dresses.  I hope to upload a bit more as the weeks go on, I think it's really helpful to have documentation available to look at when you're just starting to make your own style.  I make my documentation in Comic Life with a liberal dose of help from Irfanview.

Also, got these pictures of my Looking Glass Wars costume group from my mom:

And here's a little bit of photo evidence of Thing 1 wearing Alvis:

More after Dress U this week!

Monday Progress Update: Apr 16

I got a lot of stuff into finished stages this week.  I'm so excited!  If Costume Con were to happen tomorrow all of my competition pieces would be able to go onstage (not that I'd be happy with them, but they could do it).

 I finished grommeting my SF/F bodice and made a modesty panel with a peplum to match the bodice.

I also replaced all the LEDs in the skirt that I blew out last fall.  I'm in the process of figuring out resistors in order to not blow them out again.  I also spent 2 days looking for my pink EL wire, but it has gone AWOL after DragonCon.  I don't know where it is, so I guess I'm gonna work without it.

Thing 1's SF/F sleeves got cut out on tissue paper stabilizer,

And sewn to her dress  . . .

And then the dress hem was dyed light green,

And then stiffened with horsehair, lined and finished!  I may add a hook and eye to the top of the zipper, but otherwise this dress is done!

I also wired her heart . . .

And got it painted!

I finished painting all the petals for the flower dress, and I sewed them on the skirt then sewed the skirt to the top, added a zipper, put lace on the neckline, and put the lining in at the neck.  I still need to finish the lining to the zipper and waist, and finish the sleeves and trim them, add a sash, and finish her headpiece and tights (whew!).

And finally I got a good fitting mock-up of my Cinderella bodice.  It's ready to get cut out!

Monday Progress Update: Apr 9

I've been making lots of videos!  I've got a few other irons in the fire too, though:

Thing 1's competition dress for the F/SF is coming together.  I put in the most beautiful invisible zipper yesterday!  I think the key is putting it in before you sew the back pieces together.  Hope I can get something half as pretty on her fairy dress.

The flower dress is coming together nicely too.  I'm edging each of the petals in fabric paint, which is the longest part of doing this.  The first row of petals was a little hard to sew on, but I figured out to use my teflon foot to go over the fabric paint and now they sew like a dream.  Only 4 more rows to go!  Thank goodness there are fewer and fewer petals on each row :P

I cut the skirt of the Cinderella Historical . . .

and I made the bodice mock-up.  I've got to figure out how to fit it on myself, since it's back-closing :(  I'm using these two patterns:

The skirt is TV247:  1865 Elliptical Skirt and the bodice is TV442: 1860s Ballgown Bodice.  I'm going to wing it on the puffs of the skirt.  I tried dying the stripey over fabric and failed miserably (it's as plastic as plastic can get, but, unfortunately, it's the only thing I could find in a narrow enough stripe).  I guess it's just gonna stay white and hope the under taffeta shades it enough for pictures because I don't have the money, time or energy to airbrush paint the entire 10 yards blue.


Finally, since it was Easter yesterday here's a picture of Thing 1, Thing 2, and Monkey in their Easter outfits:

Monday Progress Update: Apr 2

I took all these pics yesterday and then forgot to post them!  Silly me!

This is Thing 2's sailor outfit.  All it needs is buttons and a hem on the shirt.

Thing 1's F/SF dress for CC30 got cut out.  I love how the lace just barely shows through the chiffon.  Making this dress up is hopefully going to be all done this week.

I also drafted up the massive sleeves for the dress.  Seriously, they're as big as my head!

I finished the sleeves on the green fairy dress, too.  Trying to figure out the trim situation.  Just on top, like this?

Or down the bodice seams, like this?  Or both, like this one?


Finally, I over-dyed the petals for the flower lolita dress:

They were almost saturated so they're barely darker than the second ones, but it's just enough that it'll be noticeable in all but pictures I think.  We'll see, in this shot they look awful similar.  I may overdye them again and try to get a bit darker.