A Dedicated Follower of Fashion

It seems I have simply legions of fans (lol), so I suppose I'll keep truckin' through my current slump in journaling and try to stay active for the time being. I do appreciate all your nice comments. :)

The next big event is Jenny-Rose's Big Hat Party; I'm kicking around ideas but I don't feel the need to start actually working on anything yet. Plus I'm waaaaaay overdue on making Taylor's painted petticoat (uh, I did start it??) and I got an order for another one this weekend, so my next couple of weeks will pretty much consist of a lot of painting!

Fairly certain I want to attempt a 1780s portrait hat a la the Duchess of Devonshire (although I don't think I want it quite that large...); I know it's your "standard" 18thc Big Hat, but dammit I think they're rather fabulous. The accompanying outfit is currently doubtful. At the moment I'm inclined to finally finish off that russet and blue silk stripe revamp, since the poor thing's been in the UFO bin for YEARS at this point. But I could also fix up my orange and blue gown (that I made in 2011 and would probably HORRIFY me if I looked at the construction/fit now...so that might be more work than I'm willing to do!), wear the chintz Dress In A Day, or wear the painted petticoat/green stripe jacket. I don't think I'll want to start a new dress from scratch when I have a hat to engineer too...but you never know when inspiration will strike! ;)

In my defense, I haven't gone on a fabric-buying binge in quite a while (in costume lengths, that is. 2 and 3 yard pieces for modern dresses don't count!), so I don't feel too bad. I am, however, banned from buying any more for the rest of the year! (Although I will make an exception right now for my 10th high school reunion in November, because I need to look hot for that and that may well warrant a new cocktail dress.)

bauhausfrau happened to post this morning that FabricMart was having a sale, is what I'm saying... (actually, they still are, and there are still currently 3 or 4 nice taffetas in the $12-13/yd range! They should go to good homes!) Between the yellow faille...and the rainbow trout voile, and the striped taffeta that somehow ended up in my shopping cart at the same time as the voile...and the lime green taffeta that I bought today along with a couple yards of hot pink/orange shot to trim it and make some truly horrible 1860s or 70s Thing...

ALL THE SILK!

I should probably get around to sprucing up those few costume pieces I've been meaning to repair, etc. so I can put them up in my shop, huh. (Yes, yes I should.)

Aaaanyway, I mostly did some cleanup in my etsy shop today, since I've been neglecting it the last couple months. Got the new wooden fans listed, and finally came to terms that no matter what I do with this yellow 18thc hat I'm going to hate it, so just finish it and freaking list it already! To that end, sewed a couple feathers on it, and just need to stick a stupid little bow on it, and then I can list that too.

For some totally crazy reason, I feel like I'll have a snow day on Saturday. Just a feeling.

Managed to get off my butt and do listings for my two soft-crown Regency hat-things, so, woo.


I've been making use of my donated length of bright red silk...obviously. I sort of want one of the straw-brim bonnets for myself, haha. Also used up the rest of my millinery wire on the buckram bonnet pieces I cut last week (and ran out before I finished, oops).

- Finished a linen apron for the Indian King tavern that's been laying around almost finished for way too long.

- Trimmed and listed the brown mushroom 1780s hat:


- Unpicked the lining from the fur coat; now to pick out all the little bits of interlining! It's a process. I'm using small, very pointy scissors to do so, though, so my fingers had had enough for the night after getting the lining out.

- Took apart a thrift store hat for the braid and mostly sewed it back together in poke-bonnet-shape. It will be very interesting to see whether I finish the brim or run out of braid first!

I was awakened at Too Early o'clock this morning, when the Very Enthusiastically Horn-Blowing Speeding Rattle-Rattle Pope Trains started running. I do think it's neat the Pope's visting (despite not being remotely Catholic, I think he seems like a cool dude for the leader of a world religon), but it would be great if the trains could control their enthusiasm til at least 7am.

I listed my 1860s Hood Prototype 1 today, and should maaaaaybe be able to get Hood 2 up in the next day or so? I got my silk in the mail for the other custom 1780s Mushroom Hat so I want to get that out of the way first, and send it off Monday.

Hrrng, I am so tired of piecing things on this dress! I sewed the flounce lengths together today, and since I still had a few large-enough scraps, felt obligated to eke every inch I could out of them. The flounce is already a far smaller flounce-to-skirt ratio than I like, so whatever I could squeeze out of the scraps was a bit of help! A very little bit - I think I added on 12 or 14", with 6 separate tiny pieces!

But I am THROWING AWAY the scraps, that's IT, we are DONE, I CARE NO MORE. GOODBYE.

I should probably start gathering the flounce, as it's still early, but I don't know if I can make myself. Something Not Birds may be in order.

Oh, I also made a boringly functional apron this afternoon for the shop (it was nice weather, so I sat outside in the shade, with no online distractions...which helped immensely). I still have a flat hat in production, but I want to see if some other accessories will sell, too...impossible to tell what will sell without making it first, though. xD

And then I actually remembered that I said I'd give you the link to my etsy shop. It's got two hat-things in it right now (very impressive) because I'm an easily distracted and slow sewer. Also a few old bits and pieces from the costume closet, that I hasten to add I wouldn't expect anyone here to buy because YOU GUYS HAVE STANDARDS. They're very old bits and pieces... :P The hat and cap are all right, though.

I called it Cloth Fair because I'm horrible terrible awful at thinking up names for things (I first seriously considered trying to sell a few things for pocket money at least 6 months ago, but couldn't come up with a not-completely-stupid name, so gave up in despair), Cloth Fair being both the name of an old London street that, once upon a time sold cloth, and a play on the term for clothing/costume as cloth - so it's Pretty Costumes, geddit??

*sad trombone*

Well, I couldn't very well call it Crappy Old Costumes And Maybe Hats And Some Other Random Accessories If I Can Get My Shit Together, could I? Too long. And 18thc-entury-milliner-esque Sign of the Whooziewotsis or Whatever is already taken by several persons of note (plus, again, see the Clever Naming Problem. Sign of the Dodgy Hat??).

So, after several thousand disclaimers...uh, tell your friends??