green_martha

It's official, I'm not trying to finish the Directoire outfit for Saturday. I could not possibly get it to a stage I'd be happy with it. So... I tried on what's in my closet. In short : I need to alter the stirped pierrot, the redingote-dress, the casaque. I probably need a new pair of stays as well, as my waist now sits a good two inches higher than pre-Toadette. But the plum caraco, which was jsut a tad shortwaisted, now seems to fit fine ! I just had to cut of the sleeve above the elbows as they were too tight, but that's pretty much it. Bonus point, I now wear them over underwear from the same period (aka the plum jumps). I feel pretty good, looking at my first serious attempt at historical costuming and thinking it's still totally serviceable and nothing I should be shamed of - in fact, the sleeves are some of the best sleeves I ever constructec, dammit.
I still have a few things to do before Saturday :
- make two tiny stitches to hold the pants legs of the skeleton suit folded up inside (they're a bit too long, as I feared, but the jacket fits fine)
- find white socks for Heimlich
- find white narrow tape and sew it on - to close Toadette's frock
- hem and add lace to her shirt's neckline
- change the bows on my hat
- bake a cake
- buy some othe rcakes
- wrap the birthday girl's present
- repair cartridge pleats on muslin skirt
- iron everything
- DO NOT forget period correct glasses !!!!
I do have pictures, pictures of the kids (OMG this girl truly IS growing like a mushroom, she's bigger and heaier now than her brother was one month older !), pictures of Toadette in her almost finished outfit (no time for a cap, yet, and OMG again, she barely fits into it now !), pictures of the state of the blue directoire two-piece... but !i got a new computer. And this nifty brand new mini-PC only sees the first picture on my DSLR. So, no pictures. Here's hoping that the HG will fix it soon enough...

(Am I turning into a wordl cup supporter ? uuuh)

The skirt now has a waistband and just needs to be levelled and hemmed. Or, if worse comes worse, just zogzagged, but I think I'll be able to do the hemming.

I love my machine, the little darling sewed right through the 7mm of cartridge pleated fabric without moaning or setting her timing off !

I forgot to mention in my previous post I have a new sewing buddy, in the person of Buzz (whom I know I mentionned in this LJ like a year ago). Poor boy offered his help to organize our next LARP, and since I know he can sew, and I've got plenty of costumes to sew 'til september, he got to help yesterday evening.
Thus I noticed, not only are his semas much neater and straighter than mine with the machine, his work at scaling patterns is also much neater than mine. At least he didn't know til yesterday what a french seam is, so I'm not overly jealous ^^
He got some work done on Murder Costume #1, and scaled the pattern for a chemise for another costume, I'm not sure which one, since the persona for Murder Costume #2 could wear a combination rather than a chemise and drawers, andit would be fun to have a combination...

I've just been trying on my outfit, it's actually pretty cool here, and I'm hot. I'm going to melt on Sunday ! Let me not forget my fan !!!

BTW, heileen and de_ravenne, if either of you is in need of one, I have a rather large collection of them, they're not very period correct for the 18th century, but still better than nothing, so if you want me to bring one for you, let me know.
I'll be arriving at the Gare de Lyon at 10 and some minutes, and leaving from the same station at 20. And I have to go across the street today to get my tickets and a new 12-25 train card (probably my last one, btw... weird, huh ?)

What has been done and what still needs to be done
- roll hem left side of the center opening
- cut down the sleeves, trim them with a small ruffle, hem etc...
- gather and attach the front  - to be more precise : unpick the shoulder seam, take off the pleating at the shoulder, move the fullness to the front area, gather, trim down the excess fabric, attach the gathered fabric to the lining, re-stitch the shoulder seam and upper neckline
- flatline the belt, attach a ruffle to hide the jonction between skirt and bodice
- either bind the neckline or make a small ruffle for it

I managed to make some progress, although there's been more going backwards than coming forward...

Yep, I'm still working on Plummy. But verrry slowly. I granted myself a kind of break and have been spending a lot of time doing nothing, sleeping and watching Lost with thte Home Geek. Oh, and playing Supertux - Supertux *is* important, after all, isn't it ?

Let's see... The back of the bodice is finished, I'm in the process of gathering the front and attaching it to the lining, then I'll have to attach the belt - which I'll probably flatline with twill or organdi.

I've attached the front of the petticoat to the waist tape, I meant to do the same for the back on my lunchbreak, except I had forgotten said waisttape at home, how clever of me...

I've done a little of pinning on my murder costume, too, but so little it's hardly worth mentioning it. Well, but it just gives you the impression I've been almost productive...

About Vaux : I got my saturday off !!! My manager really is a sweetheart ! ^^ So the plan is to take the Home Geek with me on Saturday, or even friday night, take the train to Paris, stay at his prents' place, see friends on Saturday, and let him do whatever he wants on Sunday, since he doesn't want to come to Vaux, and get back to Grenoble on Sunday evening, preferably before midnight.

About Plummy : I have the right length of pleated fabric for my petticoat back, I had originally cut it about è0cm too long. And I just took some time to backstitch through every second pleat, after my thread broke on two places after I had finished the pleating process. I need to buy more thread anyhow, which I'll do this afternoon.

Time to breakfast, he ?

You can find all my progress pictures of Plummy here. I really don't feel like putting all the pictures on my LJ now, and the Home Geek did a good job on making this storage folder into a usable gallery (isn't that sweet of him ? ^^). The 01 pictures show the lining (which wasn't as perfectly fitted as I thought, sigh...), the 02 the jacket before and while putting the sleeves on, and the 03 the current state (before fiwing the back gaping issue). The front part and the belt are just pinned on to get an idea of the look. And I'll revamp those sleeves pretty soon. Oh, the Liotard picture ? My original idea... as you see, the design has changed a lot since then ^^

About Vaux : all the info are on the castle's page, but here's a little sum-up. The best way to get there is from the Garde de Lyon, taking a train (or RER) to Melun, and then the "chataubus". The schedules for said bus are on the castle's site, too.

I think I've got the gaping problem fixed. I'll need to try it on again but there's no way I'm lacing myself into my corset before 6AM.
I also have cut down and bound the front edges of the lining, and unpicked the elbow seams. I'm not sure yet whether I'll just redo them a little further below or just make the sleeves shorter.

On a side note, I love slipstitching :)

What ? I have less than a month till Vaux-le Vicomte ? Oh homy cow, I need to leave my murder plans on hold for now (sounds very psychotic, doesn't it ? :D ) for now, and go back to the 18th century.
I've decided that, once again, handsewing doesn't work for me. I noticed I wasn't sewing anything *because* I didn't want to handsew. So my caraco will be partly machine sewn. Actually, the sleeves are almost set in, and there's a good chance that I make big progress before the day is over. It would be nice to have the caraco done by monday, then I could work on the petticoat and skirt. And trim the hat.

heilee, how's your française going ?

As a note for myself as well as for my fellow costume geeks, the "Journée Grand Siècle" this year will be held on the 18th of June, see here for all the info.
And unless there's some big problem by then, I should be able to go, probably by car, which means I could pick you up and bring you along, heileen.

The outfit looks good this far. The costuming bug has totally struck and I'm handsewing most of it. I'm going nuts, I tell ya !

And another good piece of news : I should get to wear it twice this year, I'm going to Hannover in July to visit a friend, stitch and bitch and go with her to a rococo event in Neustadt. I'm happy and bouncing !

But... yeah, there's a but !
Summer means sun (I don't want to know what could happen to my muslin skirt if it rainder, to it won't rain), sun means I need some kind of protection for my head and my eyes (Vaux-le-Vicomte has a very *french* 18th century garden, so practically no shade). I'll try to hunt for some not-too-obvious-plastic sunglasses (I really don't think I can survive a sunny day without them), but I'll also need some head covering. My outfit will be roughly 1795. I stumbled upon two options:
- a *big* hat, like this
- a *big* charlotte cap, like this

Any advice on which would be easier to make/more comfortable to wear, and on how to make it ?