#but I guess I really should start putting some of my historical sewing projects and like. knit tricolors and stuff here.

[shitpostingfromthebarricade]

So hey I told myself I wanted this quote embroidered on a jacket with flowers around it and

There is no backward flow of ideas any more than there is of rivers.

But those who do not want the future should think it over. In saying no to progress, it is not the future that they condemn, but themselves. They are giving themselves a melancholy disease; they are inoculating themselves with the past. There is only one way of refusing tomorrow, and that is to die.

— Les Misérables (FMA), 4.7.4

[montmartre-parapluie]

Elizabeth Swann Project:  Peach Gown Progress!

Hello again, friends! 

Welp, this is an incredibly weird feeling. Back when I started the Elizabeth Swann Project in early March 2020, I never thought I’d actually finish my insane goal of making all the pretty dresses in the first movie - but it’s done. And it’s a very surreal feeling staring at my wardrobe hoard. 

Well, not DONE, per se. Strictly speaking, there should be a golden taffeta petticoat with a quilted hem to match this gown. But the brocade petticoat from the gold gown looked really good with this when making the over-gown - to the point I decided to re-use it  - and it looks pretty nice as an ensemble!

Here we have the bodice half-way done, over my stays. One of the things that meant this was an easier job than the gold or plum gown was the trim - super simple level of trimming here - minimal braid around the waistline, neckline and sleeve edges. No frills or ruchings or pleated trim. the 18-20 decorative buttons were time-consuming but not terrible to sew.

The straw hat was another re-do. I simply retrimmed an old plain straw hat I had from my re-enacting days with some spare lace and re-arranged the artificial flowers. I’m still waiting on the ribbon for the ties.

Beneath the Surface:The Foundations

lurks a wonderful, ridonkulous piece of late 18th century foundation wear - the 1780s split rump. I’ve had my eye on this insane piece of underwear for a while now, because it gives the wonderful rounded curve of the overgown when you put on your petticoats. Here’s a fuzzy picture of mine.

I bought mine, very reasonably, from a wonderful UK Etsy seller called Perfect Little Parcel. Any UK-based historical costumers should definitely check her out - she makes really nice foundation garments! 

I mean, look at it here in the  American Duchess Dressmaking book:

I hesitate to use the words ‘dummy thicc’ , but - this is 18th century ass celebration at its finest, and it just gives a GREAT silhouette once all the petticoats and gown is over it. 

The Shoes

I was tempted to order the American Duchess Ivory Kensingtons, but my UK supplier doesn’t stock them right now - and post Brexit ordering direct got a LOT more complicated. So, I improvised with some modern suede 18th century-(ish) shaped shoes, some glue and some rayon binding in approximately the right colour. They still need either buckles or a nice rosette, I think - especially on that right shoe where the ends of the binding show. But they’re comfy and they have the right look.

I’m honestly a little bit sad to finish up the project, it was so enjoyable! I learned a lot, and it’s kept me going through the lockdown blues. Having something to plan and research and work on has been really fun, even when I’ve cut things out wrong or driven pins into my fingers by accident. I now have a hell of a dress-up wardrobe to make use of.

Just the Victorian UFOs (Unfinished Projects)  to work on now, I guess... and only 2 of them to go.

Many thanks for enjoying the Elizabeth Swann journey with me, everyone! As soon as the sun re-appears I’ll try for a photoshoot of me actually in the costume.

[crystaltokyometgala]

Questions and Answers!

I did some canvasing and read a few comments, and hopefully have some decent answers for you. If you have any additional questions, the ask box is open with anon on for now.

What is the deadline for this project? 

It is the last day of December for the year. I really hope this can be an annual thing and will have a new theme ready in January of every year. However if you want to create for a past theme you can! Just make sure it is clearly indicated in your post you are creating for a previous theme so it can be archived correctly here.

What is the Met Gala?

It is actually a fundraising event for the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. They pick a theme for the gala based on the exhibit they’re presenting that year. This project will focus on the fashioned themed gala of the event.

I don’t think I can participate because my skills aren’t good enough or I can’t draw.

This one is really, really important to me to clarify because yes your skills are good enough to participate! It is okay if you don’t feel confident-- maybe you’re a beginner or maybe this is outside your wheelhouse. Whatever the reason, please don’t let it stop you from participating and having a great time in fandom.

Personally this is outside of my wheelhouse, I’m excited to use this opportunity to learn something new. With that in mind, for new and aspiring artists-- drawing is a skill. It does take time and practice, but that’s like any other skill. If you chose to use this project to start your art journey our fandom will be better for it!

That said, this isn’t for artists only. All mediums are accepted.

Writing, paper craft, sewing, doll making, cosplay-- anything you can make is acceptable. Want to make a playlist of music you think would be heard at the gala? Maybe you saw an actual dress you think Neo Queen Serenity would wear and put together a playlist of music inspired by that dress. Write about the venue, the night of, descriptions of the fashion, or maybe what a report would say the following day about the event and what went on.

I still don’t feel confident in participating, but I have ideas to share! Where can I share them?

There is now a separate tumblr just for inspiration submissions: https://ctmg-inspiration.tumblr.com/

(It’s super bare bones right now, please excuse!)

Do I need to create a brand new piece of work to participate? In short, yes. Your work should be unique to the theme and in the spirit of being a (hopefully) annual fan project, please create something just for this project. ♥ Can I create works with my OCs, or is it canon Sailor Moon characters only?

At this time the project is for canon Sailor Moon characters only. Since there are so many characters available hopefully one of them will inspire you to create for the theme! That said, you are more than welcome to use the theme for your OCs, however they will not be collected on this tumblr.

Help, I’m stumped on the theme!

Definitely check out https://ctmg-inspiration.tumblr.com/! That said, you can think of the theme in terms of Sailor Moon or more in general sense. Think about how the theme applies literally to Sailor Moon as a series (for example, 2021 theme was Dreams and Eternity, drawing a Pegasus inspired outfit would fit the theme). You may also use symbolism for colors and items, or use mythology and historical clothing to shape your ideas.

Do I have to explain how my design fits the theme?

No! You can even make it a guessing game if you want. But personally I would love to hear your thoughts on your design!

Can I create for a previous theme? Yes you can! Just make sure to tag or write somewhere on your post which theme you’re creating for so it can be properly archived here. 2021 - Dreams and Eternity 2022 - Pearls and Diamonds 2023 - Cosmos

[starsbegantofall]

events and how they have been... eventing

Something I have been trying to keep in mind since 2021 started and I realized, “we’re not getting out of this pandemic, not truly,” I wanted to live my best life. Obviously my 2020 efforts to make true and lasting change in this country amounted to almost nothing in the end, but hey, I tried my best to help others beyond my career during the pandemic, that must count for something.

This year, I imagined that every 2 weeks is my last 2 weeks to live, that I contracted the deadly variant of coronavirus on top of some other illness, therefore I need to live for myself (living for others did not work out lol) so I can leave this mortal coil with no regrets. I put together a bucket list of the simpler things I felt I could easily accomplish, and used social media to try to keep myself accountable and on track.

If ya really nosy, read below

1. aesthetic design journey - I wanted to spruce up where I live so that I’m happy living and sleeping in it, hence I am making monthly blog posts to help motivate me. Work from home depends on a clean and pleasant environment, very important. Related, I am also reading books on gardening and konmari and attempting a few things. Am I making much progress? No, but at least it was better than the totally ugly mess before.

2. sewing projects - I dug out a gifted notebook from decades ago I never used and listed all of my sewing projects so that if I died, at least that notebook was loved, and I made some progress on my sewing. there’s mending and cosplay and lolita on the list, but I also want to make some normie wearable clothing to give a personal flair to my closet that isn’t from a corporation. Like pajamas and blouses or shorts/skirts.

2a. historical costuming - some lolitas I followed moved onto historical costuming (I guess so they can go to ultra fancy balls that lolitas would not normally go to , pre-pandemic of course), and I wanted to try my hand at one to test my sewing skills. currently working on an 18th century court gown wearable test muslin, not sure if I want to invest in real silk for a final gown until I know I can handle sewing it.

2b. use up fabric and materials that needs using up - as I began reorganizing my old costumes, I decided to do my best to sew up from my fabric stash before moving on and buying more fabric. I already failed at this (twice this year lol) but those are the last two times, I promise!

3. other hobbies - over the years I accumulated a lot of random craft materials that I never really used. no more! I did some cross stitch embroidery, badge rosettes, resin crafting, pressed flowers, and paper clay sculpting this year.  Would like to work on painting and calligraphy, markers and multimedia, more clay sculpting, plastic crafts, floral arrangements, book making, leather work, as well as graphic design and programming for my own video games.

4. cooking - a carry over from 2020, trying new recipes regularly, both Asian cuisine and whatever ingredients are in season. This is my favorite past time, even if some of the recipes turn out mediocre, many of them are better (taste and nutrition-wise) than the fast food I would be getting otherwise, and also don’t give me (as much) food poisoning.

5. finishing any of my several unfinished fics that are literally on the last chapter but haven’t been touched in years and ppl keep asking me about them. I think about them constantly but the words do not appear on the document. Every weekend I tell myself I’ll work on them but I don’t. I don’t.

6. rework my website... not sure if I really want to do this at all lol. but I bought the domain, so I really should migrate my blogs over for archival sake.

7. 2 pieces of “finished” art a month, one of them related to videogames so that my yearly art survey won’t have holes in it - I somehow failed to finish 2 this month, but technically I drew more than 2 drawings, just one of them was a comic and not post-worthy. Really, I need to stop procrastinating until the 25th lol

8. learn Chinese and Vietnamese - aka make use of the Rosetta account I paid money for

9. use up the “good stuff” - wear that new nail polish, light those fancy candles you never light, bring out those shoes that are uncomfortable but look awesome, drink that wine or eat that candy, take selfies just because. life is short and miserable.

This is a lot of stuff, but I’ve made a fair amount of progress halfway through 2021. I would say almost every 2 weeks and definitely every month I’ve checked something off my list that I could be proud of should I die from coronavirus complications the next day. And that’s what is important to me.

Whether or not you found this list entertaining, I will try to make wrap-up posts every other month for anyone wanting to go on this journey with me. Otherwise, I hope people at least stay healthy and take care of themselves as best as they can.

[bixbythemartian]

If you’ve been moderately following my semi lucid blogging of my sewing adventures of the last week or so, you will know that I have a big long list of projects to work on right now. I’ve been making masks, I have a messenger bag to make for 7 year old, and those are just the most urgent things, there’s like a dozen things that I need to/want to make.

I may not have mentioned that this newer surge of this type of creativity is not new. I’ve been sewing most of my life, it’s just recently that I’ve been able to set up a more permanent space for my sewing stuff. I don’t really have a sewing or crafting room but I have a cutting table in the kitchen area and I have a sewing table in my room and having access to both has made it so much more natural for me to be working on sewing things in general, because apparently if I have a setup that lets me sew then I just sort of do that when I’m not doing other stuff (and sometimes when I should be). Before I would do sewing projects and then put all the stuff away because we needed the space for other things, but we don’t need this space for other things so I can just claim it for me and apparently it means that I sew like at a pretty steady clip. Even if I’m not using those surfaces, just knowing I have access to a cutting table and a sewing machine makes me more likely to do sewing projects even if they won’t involve either for some reason.

at any rate, I have several projects that are somewhat urgent and should be working on, but I was talking to a friend about an ancient project that I still had around and had gone... poorly, and -

okay the other thing is that I’ve been watching all of these historical sewing/costume youtubers in my free time. and I’ve been telling myself that like oh I’m not going to get into historical costuming and oh I’m not going to hand sew anything, that takes so much time and I have this nice sewing machine I don’t see the point. I cannot remember if I mentioned this in some of my previous sewing posts, but it’s worth stating here because if you understand people in general or know me at all you will probably get to the punchline well before I do.

the project that I was reminded of is well over 7 years old in inception. Before I moved to California in 2013 at some point I picked up a long green kind of sheath dress made out of a heavy stretch spandex polyester knit kind of fabric. I have no idea what this fabric is technically called, I’m sure it has a specific name, it’s especially prevalent in plus size clothing for some reason. It has a really lovely stretch and drapes fairly nicely and has a nice weighty sensation when you wear it breathes about as well as plastic ever breathes, which is to say that it does not

anyway, it’s a deep emerald green that’s a very lovely color but it was absolutely shapeless and I do not like clothing items which are shapeless, but it was cheap and mostly fit me and was a beautiful color, so I picked it up resolving to do something with it.

I believe when I was living in California is when I attempted to split the seams up the side so it’s like a maxi length side split tank top thing, with the vague idea of making it part of some kind of fairy/fantasy costume piece. Oh I also removed the sleeves because just in general I don’t like wearing short sleeves. I either want long sleeves or tank tops and I don’t really have much of a middle ground.

(If you remember my long list of things you may recall that one of my projects is to remove sleeves and collars from most of my t-shirts, so this is fairly on brand for me)

anyway, sometime in 2013 or 2014 (I think? I’m fairly certain it was relatively early in my brief stay in California) I attempted to finish the seams for the split and hem the arm holes, but I did it on a machine with white thread.

Using a thick stretchy material in a sewing machine is a hell of a gamble, it didn’t turn out well, and because I used white thread and not, like, black or a matching dark green it was really obvious that I had made at least two massive errors in judgement. it’s really kind of embarrassing and I just put it in the back of my closet where it has lingered for years when I could have just been wearing it around because it’s a really fun thing to wear if I can get over the embarrassment of how abysmal the sewing is.

so now, instead of all the things I should be doing, I am laboriously picking out all of the stitches (difficult due to the stretch material, I’ve probably put 10+ hours in and I’m still not done) and then I’m going to hand stitch the hem because I think there’s a technique I can use that will perhaps be messy as I learn it (on a stretch material, no less) but will at least be less obvious from the outside.

the humor of me going ‘I’m not going to get into historical dress and not going to hand sew things’ is probably not lost on you by this point, but I do want to further clarify that I have in fact made historical clothing before.

yeah, I drafted patterns from diagrams I found on the internet (probably more of an SCA thing than a historical thing) and made an apron skirt (which I still have) and a shift (which was probably much more historically accurate, sans the machine sewing, based on what I remember of the pattern drafting, though since then the material was sacrificed to some other project that i don’t recall)

it is absolutely an interest of mine, and has been, and I have dipped my toe in this before, and for some reason I have been pretending that it isn’t and won’t be and never will be because????????????

I honestly don’t know but clearly I have been lying to myself about multiple aspects of this

anyway I think I am almost done with the first part of this project (picking out the seams) and can start the sewing, which I believe will go much faster even if I don’t know what I’m doing (I kinda think I do, which is not the same thing) and trying to combat being mildly embarrassed about fooling myself into somehow genuinely believing that I was just watching the videos because they were relaxing and not like squarely within several spheres of interest of mine that I was starting to get back into.

Perhaps, sometimes, you need to trick yourself into remembering the things you’re interested in, I guess.

I mostly typed this up to give my hands a bit of a break from the seam picking because even with my fancy ergonomic seam ripper, spending hours and hours at this has definitely caused some aching and cramping.

[this-lioness]

Daily life nonsense

Work has been slow all week, although my weekly mailing is probably due in this afternoon or tomorrow, which will mean a busier finish to the balance of the week.

I spent Monday blowing through our transition from a GoogleSheet file of all our usernames and passwords to a higher-security password cataloging system. So many passwords ugh.  But it’s done now!

Over the weekend I started putting together a budget for us, using historical banking data and the “fixed expenses” spreadsheets I’ve been keeping for... Jesus, like probably 10 years now?  I took one of the many pretty but unused folders I’ve been collecting from every “back to school” sale for just as long and started a record log of our spending.  This is to help line up what I think we’re spending with what we actually spend, although this is an exercise that will require a lot of refining as time goes on.

If the quarantine has taught us anything it’s that we were definitely spending money to entertain ourselves, and on shit we just didn’t need.  We chatted about it for awhile, and our long term goals, and even after things resume a sense of normalcy (whatever that ends up meaning), we’re going to try keeping to quarantine spending moving forward.  So to speak.

Some of the little blank notebooks I ordered off AliExpress on my bank-busting $24 spending spree arrived as well, and I started a little weight, diet and exercise log for myself. I’m not back to using MyFitnessPal and calorie counting just yet, but that will be the next step.  I’m creating small short-term goals for myself, and once I hit my first goal I’m going to crack down more and try to tackle the next hurdle.

Which brings me to my next point, exercise.

Just as we quit the gym and Maggie went to live with my Mom we decided to sheetrock the cat room and turn it into a workout room, and then the sheetrock went up but never got finished, and we took in two fosters, and now with the quarantine things have been in a frustrating limbo since before the first of the year.

Now that the fosters are spending more time out and about (we’re going to let them out with our cats tonight, and with any luck start integrating them into full-time cohabitation) I want to take the room back.  Talked to Marc about finishing the sheetrock this weekend (or at least getting a good jump on it) at which point we can get back on the treadmill and I can finally use the barre I bought at thrift last fucking summer.

The fosters have done well with our cats so far.  Rosie is a little bit all up in their business, but once she’s had more time to relax and get to know them I think she’ll chill out.  She’s not aggressive, just super intensely fascinated.  They’re remarkably good with our cats -- they seem enamored with Spencer, and of course he’s just happy to make some new friends.  Bones is largely avoidant, but honestly that’s all he has to be.

Bought a gas-powered pressure washer online which should arrive Friday.  We have an electric one that’s been... okayish, but even cleaning the back patio took much longer than it ever should have.  The outside of the house needs a good wash, and our parents are required to have theirs washed as well.  They fork out $150 twice a year to have it done, so at that rate the thing has already paid for itself.  I cannot wait to clean our back patio, it’s so gross.

In anticipation of future food storage / preparation needs I also ordered a vacuum sealer.  We had one ages ago, in the old house.  When we ate meat we’d typically buy it in bulk, separate, seal and freeze it, but as vegetarians it never really seemed necessary.  Things being how they are, however, and especially with me doing more and more bulk / freezer cooking, I plan to prepare more things like portioned, roasted veggies that we can have kind of flat-packed and ready to go in the chest freezer. 

I also dipped a bit deeper into my bonus money and treated myself to a sewing machine.

I will be frank, this is like the third sewing machine I will have owned.  The first one met an untimely fate in the basement of our old house (I took it out to use it and found it covered in mold.)  The second one was so frustrating to thread that I ended up never using it, and swearing myself off of its use.

I’ve been wanting to sew more stuff, however, and hand sewing is just... look, it’s a fanciful notion that is never actually going to work out in reality.  I don’t want to sew my own clothes, I just want to be able to do things like finish the edges of reusable washcloths and napkins, make masks for us to wear, and basic stuff like that.  Small, quick projects.

So after a bit of poking around I ordered a Singer model that is branded specifically for total novices, and is apparently very easy to thread, which until now has always been the biggest headache for me. (My guess is that if I use it more than once a year it will become easier, but I’ve got to put the effort in to actually use it.)

We have exhausted our copy paper supply here at home, and after two weeks my office still has been unable to get anyone to successfully deliver paper to me, so Marc and I are going to make a Walmart in a short while to pick some up.  I’ve got a very short list of other items to grab while we’re out, so hopefully it will be a quick and entirely uneventful trip.

And what are you up to?