Finding Sanity

Well, guys, convention season is over for the year, and I have to say I'm pretty relieved.  There's one more I could technically go to, but having just survived two cons in one month, no thank you. 

That said, my costumes were a  rousing success:

Right: Me, as Codex from The Guild

Left: Felicia Day, the real Codex from The Guild

I'm in ur base.

Both costumes posed their own unique sewing challenges.  Codex involved my first corset, and was patterned completely from scratch.  The X-Wing pilot should have been pretty straightforward, as it is ground that many have tread before, and 34 of the people who have tread said ground live in southern California.  However, and this is the ongoing problem with pieces I'm still trying to acquire, everything about the costume is too big for me.  I tailored that suit down substantially so it would not be a gigantic baggy mess, the flak vest is  2/3 the size of a standard flak vest, I'm not even wearing the compad I purchased because it curves too wide and makes my beautifully tailored sleeve poof out in really strange ways... yeah.  I'm really proud of how what I've finished has come out, but I've still got a ways to go.

So, back to normal clothing sewing right?  Well, yes, sort of.  I certainly want to put these costumes down for a little while, though the X-Wing might get a weekend where I just pound the last details out.  But any sewing this month has to be worked around National Novel Writing Month.  I'm on track after day 1, may likely get way off track, but could still come around for a big finish.  I definitely wrote 10k in a day once last year, so anything is possible.

On the docket for the next couple of weeks, though, are my Clover pants mockup, and a Sorbetto top.  I'm getting bias binding and maybe some buttons for the top this weekend, so we'll see how that goes.  I expect the top, at least, will be quick and easy.  The pants are going to require a muslin and adjustments, so that will be an exciting new adventure. :)

Fall palette challenge: green cropped jacket

The project that started me off was actually planned before I took this challenge on, but I'm working with it anyway.  It's a simple cropped green jacket, which I made to wear over the very yellow bridesmaid dress that I wore to my dear friends Catharine and Alex's wedding last weekend.  I'll admit, the yellow worried me.  It was a lot of yellow to pull out of the box when the dress arrived, and it's not the best colour on me in general.  So I plotted to make this jacket, which would break up the yellow for at least part of the day, and keep me warmer during the reception.  This ended up being the best part of the plan, as the  yellow wasn't nearly as scary as I feared it would be when put in the context of the entire wedding party.  Plus, I got to wear pretty awesome shoes.

I don't have good close up pictures of it right now, but I only just got my internet back so I'm kind of on an updating spree.  So here's what I have on my phone from the reception!

From Instant Upload

Decorating the happy couple's car: a time honoured tradition.

That's how it looked in the full context of the outfit, and I was pretty happy with it.  It's a wool blend, lined with a cotton that has a dotted weave to it.  It's pretty subtle; I'll have to get some good photos of it.  I'm using more of the same cotton in the Macaron dress I have planned, so you'll get a closer look.  I'm pretty happy with the outcome, overall.  There was only one thing that didn't happen on time.

From 10/4/11

Classy.

I'll be honest, I knew in the back of my head it wasn't done.  A normal person would have taken out the straight pins before wearing it in public.  But we were running from the church to the reception, and I had to get things out of there as quickly as possible, and we were all pretty chilly from standing outside taking photos.  California or no, it gets chilly in October when you're standing around in a strapless dress.  So as a little girl at the wedding complimented my jacket, I said, "Thank you!  I made it myself... you can tell because it isn't finished, and I have pins where my buttons should be."

Thankfully, two of the groom's friends were also stitchers, and they applauded my choice to rock the straight pins.

Overall, I'm a fan.  It's a really easy jacket to make, and while I'd enjoy an industrial press to really flatten those collar seams, it's still a pretty clean look.  And a great length for that dress, which I shall deconstruct and use to pattern another dress in some fabric that is NOT polyester satin.  But that's another project for another day.  And another month.  Right now, I have a costume to finish before New York Comic Con, and then I can dive into the Clover sewalong for Colette.  I'm making them in a lovely charcoal pinstripe, so here's hoping for the best!

New project: Colette Fall Palette Challenge

So, after making as many costumes as I have, in the last year I've decided more and more that I want to try making more of my own clothing.  Fit can be a real issue, and it's easier to fit things to yourself than to expect someone else to fit exactly to your proportions.  Jeans have been giving me nightmares in the last few years- they're always too tight somewhere and too loose somewhere else, so it's time to just say screw it, and try making some of my own.  My first pants will be Colette's Clover pants, as they are doing a sewalong and I can use all the help learning to fit pants as possible.

This is my full palette:


Color by COLOURlovers

I already have a coat from McCall's I'm working on from the green and ivory, and I intend to use the remaining ivory and a navy wool suiting to make a Macaron dress from Colette.  The Clover pants will likely be in the grey, and I have no idea what I'm doing with the red/salmon-ish colour; I just wanted something for contrast in there.  Maybe a top?  Or possibly as an accent colour on a skirt.  We'll see!

I'll be posting progress as I finish things.  There will definitely be updates as this project goes on, though few until I get internet back at my apartment.  That's out until the 7th of October.  However, I'll definitely have a jacket by then, though other real clothing sewing will be curtailed by preparations for New York Comic Con.  I have a looooot of sewing to do before then, so I've got my work cut out for me.  But in any case, I'm looking forward to it. :)

Busy busy busy

See that title? That is why nobody has really heard from me much in the last several weeks.  I'm still alive, but as I have mentioned before, right about now we're in the middle of our final push to finish the movie I've been working on for a year and a half now.

The good news is, I haven't shown up to work in pajamas yet, though when I roll out of bed in the morning the temptation is frequently strong.  I mean, I do have some pretty stylin' PJs, but I can do slightly better for work. 

Things that have changed in my wardrobe: not much.  My birkenstocks are my staple shoes, I've acquired one maxi dress that I really love, and today I am wearing the shortest pair of shorts I have owned in years and I don't think it looks terrible.  Of course, my day has mostly involved hanging around home, and now some sewing, so it's not exactly a rigorous day of getting out and doing things.

As for the curtains I mentioned in my last post?  I gave up after the third time I ordered the fabric, it just didn't come.  Sadness swept over the land, folks.  So I got myself a set of 96" burgundy blackout curtains, and one of them came in the mail today. :/  I am not having the best of luck with curtains- three tries and no luck on the fabric I wanted, and now only half my curtain set is mailed out?  I mean, how do you even do that?  Fortunately, the customer support folks at Overstock.com were very helpful, and will be shipping me the other half of my curtains sometime this week.  Also on its way is a slipcover for my comfy, but rather blah couch.  so, in the next week or so, my living room should look a whole lot better!

I've been sewing a lot lately, which is a good thing.  No new costumes yet, though I need to have one of those done by Friday (ha... ahahaha...), but I did try my hand at making real clothes!  It needs a few fixes, but here's my first attempt:

It's based on the Crepe pattern from Colette, which is my new favourite pattern and sewing site.  They have lots of tutorials, tips, and tricks, as well as a few free patterns.  They've got a set of mini bloomers there I have my eye on making when I can catch a breath, and their pattern shop is just full of so many amazing vintage inspired things, I just want them all. 

Next on the sewing docket: a 1920's flapper style dress.  I'm making it to wear to a party at work next week, and I have all the supplies.  I'm patterning it all myself, which is a first (yikes!).  All I have is a sketch on a post-it, my dress form, and a whole bunch of tailor's marking tools.  I'm working on the muslin tonight. which will probably double as the lining.  So far, I have a skirt, which I am so happy actually fit when I put it on.  Breathe one huge sigh of relief there.  Now I just have to do the top, which shouldn't be too hard.  I say this now, before I've started, of course.  But I do have a fair amount of confidence that I can get a workable muslin done tonight, which means I can get my actual silk cut and potentially even sewn tomorrow.  I did my best to keep it simple, but we'll see how that goes.  At least my accessories are done, and I broke down and got a wig because I realized I have waaay too much hair for a 1920's do.

So that's what I'm up to in the world of clothing lately.  I doubt I'll be back in any sort of regular fashion until sometime in October, after this project has finished, but I'll try to be less absent than I have been.

So, curtains.

Friends, I have a problem.  My problem is that my windows are large and sad and bare.

Now, most people would shell out for some store-bought curtains and be done with it.  I could go to Target and solve all my problems.  But unfortunately, I have the kind of mind that says, "dude, you make your own Star Wars costumes in your free time.  You can certainly make your own curtains."

I've been trying to make this happen for a few weeks now.  I mean, I could go to JoAnn's at any time and buy fabric, but they tend to be a little pricey.  And I do live in Los Angeles, home to an amazingsauce fabric district, but they tend to only be open when I'm at work.  I took a day off to explore when my sister came to visit, but I really can't do that otherwise. So I turned to my fabric website of choice, Fashion Fabrics Club. They have a great selection of discounted fabrics, and when it takes 6 yards to make one window, every discount helps.  The only drawback is that apparently they don't keep very good track of what has sold, and if you order near the end of a bolt and are ordering a lot, well, it's a crap shoot as to whether or not you'll get the fabric you wanted.

Right now I'm on my third attempt to order. I've ordered 9 yards of this lovely fabric:

It's a wine cotton gauze.  Rich colour, but nice and lightweight for the summer.  I'm thinking about getting some ribbon to experiment with trim towards the bottom, too.  Probably in blues and greens- my colour inspiration for the common space is my Alice in Wonderland poster:

As you can tell from the picture, I've got a lot of beige to contend with.  The walls are cream, the carpet is a very drab blue, and I've got a large, squishy couch that is super comfy but boooooring.  There's also a blue futon that will be leaving with my roommate when she gets married in October, as well as a coffee table that is probably too large for the space- also leaving with my roommate.

I clearly have my work cut out for me.  But hey, it'll be fun.  If, you know, my curtain fabric ever exists.  Third time's the charm, right?

Follow Up: Feminism and the Slave Leia Costume

So, I wrote a post for FFB a while back on why I won't be making the Slave Leia costume.  Not long after that, I suddenly found myself being asked about it more often.  And it wasn't by people who read the post, I guess I just started doing more events, and as a non-slave Leia, and one who could carry off the costume, I get asked a lot why I'm not doing it.

I've been impressed, for the most part, with the acceptance of my views on this one.  The reaction I get the most is, "Wow, you've really thought this through.  I don't think most people think about it that much."  And it's true, they don't.  And especially now that convention season is upon us, lots of Slave Leias will be coming out of the woodwork.  It's a costume anyone with enough money and comfort with one's own body can do- $300 for the hard parts, and the sewing is minimal.  And it's a big attention-getter at cons.  Everybody loves Princess Leia, but you'll get a lot more fanboys stopping you if you're dressed in the metal bikini.

This leads me to two interesting stories from Wizard World Anaheim.  Sunday, I dressed in the classic dress with the hair buns.

Fantastically fun and comfortable costume.  Absolutely love it.  I can't believe it took me this long to do it.  Anyway, I was sitting at the Rebel Legion table, minding the shop, when a random guy walked by and asked me, "Why aren't you wearing the metal bikini?"  Without a missing a beat, I looked up at him and replied, "It was a traumatic experience."  He just stopped in his tracks, looked confused for a moment, and then said, "Yeah... I guess it would be, wouldn't it?"

Second, I was wandering around Artist Alley, checking out the various booths, when someone in a Power Girl costume stopped me to tell me how awesome she thought it was that I was wearing the classic Leia and not the slave Leia.  Apparently Saturday's Leia got a similar comment from someone.  I guess it shows considerable hope that the fully clothed Leias are being applauded for it.  I did joke with one of my friends, after she texted me about the Slave Leia booth at Wonder Con, about starting a Fully Clothed Leia booth at cons.  Maybe there's an actual market for such a thing.  Who knows?

In any case, interesting all around.  I am heartened to know that when my position is explained to people, I'm not dismissed as an angry feminist.  The worst I've gotten is someone who insisted that my willingness to make one skin-baring costume but not another was based on a subtle difference, but even so, 'subtle' does not mean 'unimportant.'  I do think context matters, and I will take the time to explain that to anyone who has a problem with my choices.  So far, understanding has been had on all sides, so I think only good things can come of it.

Not dead yet...

*blows dust off blog*

Well, it's been an interesting few weeks.  My team lead's wife had a baby, we've been ramping up production, and I discovered that I was borderline anemic and had a severe vitamin D deficiency, which meant I was left with approximately no energy. Oh, and an infection. I got one of those, too.  Clearly, I've been having a fantastic month over here.

So I haven't done much writing in the last month, but I did take time to consider what I'm even doing with this blog.  I started it to keep myself accountable for what I'm wearing, and did it for long enough that good habits were really sticking.  And the fashion feminist posts were some of my favourites.

Truthfully, there will be a lot of touch-and-go with this blog for a while.  Work's getting busy, weekends are filling up, I have one less hour a day to do things for fun.  I also want to focus in on home decorating and organizing, which I also hope to do with some amount of style, so I'll probably document some of that process here.  I also have a project I want to do that involves a hybrid of fashion and costuming, so if that gets off the ground you'll definitely see it here.

Mostly, I'm here to say hey, I'm alive, and I haven't forgotten about this blog.  But I've been a little busy lately.

Some of the busy, however, I'm not arguing with. :)