Finished painting!

Yay! It's finally done! Here are a few progress pictures before it was at this point

:)

Detail of Shawl

Detail of Face

Original with my version!

 Tada! Now I am able to choose another painting to copy. Anyone have any ideas?

Snow White

This year for the Athens Block Party I dressed up as Snow White!

 I set my hair about 2 hours before with roller pins. I did exaggerated fingerwaves at the front and barrel curls at the back, alternating direction with each row. After I combed through it with my fingers it was extremely easy to put up.

I already had the skirt, which is a corduroy circle skirt, and I made the rest the day before-day of. I wore the costume with my Blue Stays and made the bodice + stomacher out of Navy moleskin upholstery stuff (with a piece of yarn to give the yellow line at the front). The sleeves are tiny little puffs of light blue poly lining fabric and tufts of red chiffon. The Ruff is a piece of stiff curtain lining (from the drapes I used for my Ophelia 1910's bodice) with a small channel sewn in to house wire from a white wire hanger. My apple was a ball of yarn with a scrap of green fabric for the leaf

Silent Star Wars

Ever wondered what Star Wars would be like as a silent film? Well here ya go!

Ophelia Bodice: finished

 Hooray! The time has come to show you the finished pictures of the Ophelia Bodice! After 2.5 weeks of working on lots of beading and tucking the finished product was sent to Santa Fe on Friday to be graded. And here are the pictures from an impromptu photo shoot right before it was sent away. My mom was the photographer and did a fabulous job :)

This pose was mom's idea.

I'm pretty happy that it looks almost identical
to my concept drawing

I thought she was only taking a pic of the bodice, not of
my face with it

 My mom thought it a good idea to take the other curtain and wrap it around as a skirt, so the pictures would look a little better. It did help the photos, but you can still see the creases!

I've got a bit o' giraffe neck goin' on.

I was trying to pose as my drawing, but closed my
eyes at the wrong time :(

 The following pictures are not the correct color, but thought they were fun and should be included in my post XD

Cheese!

I think I saw a fox in the field, which is why I'm squinting...

Close up!!!!

I can't wait to get it back and start the skirt portion! But I need some undergarments first....hmmmm

The Queen of Tucks

I think it should be my new nickname because I have sewn over 350 tucks for the trim of the bodice. That's. A. Lot. Of. Tucks.

Just some of the tucks...

The tucked trim had to be done in 6 pieces to get the length and contour correct. And it took a very long time to do them all. Looking back, I should have done a large rectangle then cut it down into the strips needed, but I did it the other way around; cut a bunch of strips THEN did the tucking. Well, now I know what not to do. Despite the intense labor, after they were pressed and all put together, they look kinda fabulous--I'm not gonna lie.

Aren't they perfect?

Now the scary part... application...There were a couple ideas thrown around on how to apply them. I couldn't think of any other fullproof plan than to simply top stitched them to the bodice. It was nerve-wracking, I'll tell ya, to sew all those tucks to the bodice. The whole time I was consumed by a fear that something utterly terrible would happen.

Pinned and ready to go...

After being stitched.

But it didn't! After all was said and done they look pretty spectacular (I was fully expecting them to look very terrible) I was also nervous that having the tucks the same fabric as the main part of the bodice would be a bad idea, but I think the texture is all it needed. The last pic is taken in natural light, so it's the closest to the real color as you can get. and you can see the texture really well. I'm really excited for the next post. You'll be able to see it finished!

Project: Progress

The project is done, but you all will just have to wait to see it. For now, I'm gonna give you little snippets of it so I can make my posts more detailed!

And now back to the project: After a little bit of tweaking, I got the modesty panel to be just right... I had a really hard time getting the pretend chiffon to work properly... or how I wanted. I had to manually pin each gather where they were supposed to be, instead of the usual, gathering-thread-then-sew method. It was kind of a pain, but I managed.

It is lined with the same hospital sheets I used for my Regency petticoat. It was finished with a chiffon edge.

Panel, not yet attached.

In attempts to make sure the panel was the right shape and fit, I got a little creative.

I don't think I've looked that attractive
in a long time...

Idk.

yeahhhhh....

Well, maybe I got a lot creative. It seemed to look okay though....

So, with the panel now done, I inserted it after the sleeves in; and here's what it looked like:

On my clone.

 Isn't the turquoise-blue gorgeous????

On me and my late 1860's corset XD

I don't have a 1910's corset yet, so I'm improving with the one I do have. Since this is only for the top of the gown, I figured there wouldn't be much of a difference in size or shape.

Next step....TUCKING!

Final Project: 19-teens "Ophelia" Gown Bodice

I'm taking a Specialty Sewing Techniques course, which consists of different couture techniques and finishing methods. This is what I'm making for the final project:

For the project, we have to use at least 4 techniques we have learned in class and apply them to a blouse/shirt type garment. My techniques will be tucking, piping, beading, ruching and hem treatments. I'm going to make the gown in two pieces for now and put the two pieces together to complete the gown... just at a later date.

The turquoise silk cost me a mere 5 bucks for 6.5 yards!
Discounted Drapes. BOOYAAH!

 It's a vest type garment in a powdery turquoise silk with attached sleeves in a nice creme chiffon and ruching in net at the bust. There will be a copious amount of delicate tucking as trim in the blue silk and in the belt part. I'm also planning to have a beaded motif on the sleeves and overlay for the skirt. Look at the the beads I got! They go so prettily with it.

The colors are a little more muted in real life.

I was initially inspired by the actress Miss Lily Elsie. Her gowns and pictures are phenomenal. 

She has Rachel Weisz' profile.

Sigh

How perfect, right?

My second inspiration was the idea of Ophelia. Whenever I think of Ophelia (from Hamlet) I think of water lilies and consequently Lily Elsie.

I don't really care about the title, just the design.

It's so pretty!!!

The project has to be sent to Santa Fe, NM by June 3rd... leaving me 2 weeks to get it finished. Luckily, I only have to send in the bodice :D No sweat!

Randomness.

This has nothing to do with much, but it's cool. I scanned my face and this was the outcome:

It's like I'm stuck under the ice!

My hair looks cool

Ouchies

I've not posted in a while, I realize, since I am still very busy with my classes.

Speaking of classes! I was forced to attend a late night salsa/samba workshop for OU's International Dance and Music Week (which was last week or the week before?) and got this lovely jewel:

THAT is a blood-blister, my friends. It's still deep in the skin, and will probably be there for the next month. Just thought I'd show you what's up ;)

Belated Valentine's Day post

First Date 10/20/07

As you all know, yesterday was Valentine's Day. Though Devin and I weren't able to do anything for Valentine's Day due to conflicting schedules I did make him a giant peanut butter pie with Reeses cups on Sunday and for Valentine's Day I got a surprise email from him that was so adorable it made me cry. I'll spare you the mushiness and just pepper you with some cute...and not so cute pictures :)

Prom 2008

After-Prom 2008

New York ATD Trip 2008

Devin biting my face off
Chicago ATD Trip 2008

Wash. D.C. Trip 2010

Christmas 2010

Me and my Mr Darcy :D