A Dedicated Follower of Fashion

Some sewing progress was made over the weekend! We'd planned to go to Longwood Gardens on Saturday night with my mom to see the Christmas lights (final weekend for the lights), but there was some Unpleasant Weather (about two hours of light snow starting around noon, then rain rain rain) so we all decided to nix that. So I got most of a day to have sewing time in pajamas, which was nice!

Goal for this weekend was to get as much done on the 1880s petticoat as possible, along with stitching the hook onto the corset to hold the bustle waistband in place. The latter was accomplished first, of course, with much more fussing than I wanted (oh, you have to cut the waistband smaller, because now with the hook instead of tucking the ties under the corset edge it's too long, etc etc), but the bustle/corset interaction is now 99.9% done, I just want to coat the ends of the twill tape ties so they stop fraying.

(They don't deserve to be hand stitched, so they'll get either a thin coat of glue, or clear nail polish, whichever I find first!)

Decided to use a length of I Can't Resist This Good Deal silk from a previous Silk Guru order, because 1/ I want a swishy petticoat to wear with the dinner dress, and 2/ it's ugly enough that I'd neverrrrr use this fabric for anything but underwear or lining - a really unappealing warm gold and bronze irregular stripe. (Okay, it might be fine on the right person, but on my skin tone and to my tastes it's just ugly.) But I still buy ugly silk that's a very good deal...because I like it for linings on outerwear, etc.! Plus if it's ugly then I won't be tempted to save it for a "real" project LOL.

I didn't get quite as far as I was hoping (story of my life), but am still satisfied with my progress, considering I'm not doing a completely crappy job and have been flat-felling all the seams, since it's a moderately-shreddy home-dec-shantung-type. I wouldn't look too closely at the actual stitching, but.

Used the front and side panels from TV261 - cut my own backs because my butt is too big for the pattern as-is! And this is why we measure before cutting, haha. Petticoat was as much a trial run for the dinner dress foundation skirt as anything else...happily I seem to have competently measured, and made it even all around.

Got as far as sewing all the panels together, gathering up the back panel, fitting the darts (sure, they're fine, whatever), pinning the whole thing to the waistband, checking the fit to make sure I hadn't completely screwed anything up (didn't. yay!), and then doing the ugliest machine-stitched hem ever.

I intend to make a flounce as well, but that will have to happen either in sewing time after work this week (ambitious) or next weekend (more realistic).

Next weekend's sewing goals are:
- Finish ugly bustle petticoat if not done during the week
- Take pictures of bustle and ugly petticoat (on me) for social media
- Post the above
- Choose & prep whatever hand sewing I want to bring to Robin's for stitch'n'bitch day on Saturday the 20th. Not that I can't bring a machine, of course, but I tend to prefer getting comfortable and curling up with a cup of tea to getting up and down to machine sew and iron and all that!

Done at long last! So...at least I'll have underwear to skate in, if I finish nothing else?

I ended up hand-sewing the ruffle on. I used the gather-over-a-cord method, which ended up being bulky enough that it really wasn't too excited about getting wedged under my machine's presser foot, so it was really the path of least resistance to just whip it on by hand.

Far too lazy to take any real pictures of it tonight, but here's me wearing it over sweatpants and fuzzy socks with my feet on the table. Since that's how I roll. Still wearing it as I type this.

I did try the skirt on over it, and yes, the damn ruffle was worth suffering through. There's a reason a large majority of petticoats in adverts from the period have ruffles. It makes the skirt look so much better! I hate you still, ruffle. I hate you.

Sewing day with two of the usual suspects; I didn't get a whole lot of sewing done but I always thoroughly enjoy "sewing" days! Much tea was sampled, many chocolates were et, and I did finish my hat!

It's definitely on the plain side when you compare it to fashion plates, but less so when you compare it to photographs! Bad pictures:



Slightly less orange in natural lighting. And yes, it's got wiiiiings!

I also cut and sewed (and flat-felled) my petticoat panels. And, ahem, managed to flat-fell the CB seam inside out. Ooops? Certainly not taking it out, because, underwear, who cares...at least it's a very neat seam? LOL. I used the center front and two side-front gores from my skirt pattern and a rectangle for the back, because it seemed somehow logical. We'll see if it was when I put it under the skirt, haha.

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I decided I felt inspired to finish putting the flounce on my white hoop petticoat, and sewed one tuck in it before it got too hot in the sewing room, and I retreated to the sofa to gleefully spend five hours in a book. I haven't done that for a while and it was lovely.

The petticoat itself is pretty uninspiring; I should've just looked a little harder for an eyelet bedskirt. That would have had the same effect with a lot less effort! Stupid Joann's clearance eyelet. Which is a very optic white, whereas the petti is a more natural white. It's a look...good thing it's a petticoat!

Definitely got a full-fledged nasty cold. Was entirely miserable yesterday at work, and called out of my overnight tonight. I'm definitely feeling better today, but I don't think staying up all night would do anything towards getting me better for the weekend! They did not seem Pleased. I don't care; I never call out sick (I haven't had a bad cold for two winters)! Suck it up.

Yesterday post-work all I did was flop on the couch and watch the marathon of classic Disney princess movies on ABC Family...seriously, all day. I hardly ever watch tv all day! It was fun, though; I haven't seen most of them for years. (And Eleanor Audley had the Best Villainess Voice Ever [Maleficent and Lady Tremaine], no contest!

Today I was reasonably productive though...especially after I decided to call out of work. ;) I did my wig...I'm dubbing it my Crackpot Whoopi Goldberg Wig. It is far from wonderful, but I'm happy enough with "wearable." I started out with directions from Kendra's book, and then threw all that out the window (because I was dealing with an already-destructively-ratted old wig) and started manhandling it.

(I should probably photograph a brown wig against a brown couch, amirite?)

WHATEVER IT'S DONE.

Should have probably tried working on the stripey dress after dinner, but that seemed to want brainpower. I'm feeling better but not that much better. Am fairly resigned that I'll be wearing the curtain-along dress at this point, anyway. So I made most of a new 1860s under-hoop petticoat. I have...um, three plain petticoats already, but two are warm and one is plain cotton broadcloth, and I want a pretty one to wear with my ballgown! A pretty one that isn't wool or fuzzy flannel to keep me warm at the ball, because I do not need that.

Three tucks and a bit of lace later...yeah, that's fancy enough. Just have to put the waistband on tomorrow and it'll be done. Then I can cross one (totally unnecessary) thing off my Gettysburg list!

I'm going to a concert tomorrow evening with my mum and grandma, at Laurel Hill Mansion in Fairmount Park. The original part of the house was built in the late 1760s, the small addition in the 1790s, and the octagonal addition in the 1830s, I believe. (This is from what I can remember when we visited it a few years ago; can't find anything useful on the actual house's website, it's like a bad trip back to GeoCities!)

So of course I feel the need to dress for the occasion! (And I expressly asked mum if I would humiliate her if I dressed up, she said not at all, so off we go!) Going to be hot, and there's not a lot of space, so I'm going to wear my spotted sari Regency dress.

I originally had a petticoat attached to my Regency short stays, but I didn't like the weight of the cotton muslin I used, so took it off the before Katy's Regency picnic last fall. Later I bought some white China silk to make a new petticoat, but never got around to it. Since I'm going to wear Regency tomorrow night, I thought now was as good a time as any to do that!

Still have to hem it, but other than that it's all attached. It's just two widths of the silk (I only had two yards), and hits about mid-calf length. The front's completely flat; all the width's gathered into the back, and I even ironed down the gathers to minimize poof. I know I'm insane, as I love Regency costume flicks, love the myriad of adorable Regency dresses you all have made - but I'm three-quarters convinced Regency dresses make me look like a cow!

I know. I'm crazy. But anyway, yeah, minimize the poof. I'll just try to stay away from mirrors til I get out of my house and it's too late to change! Although I swear if someone there asks if I'm preggers I'm selling that thing on ebay when I get home!

Okay, off to hem!

I have triumphed over the 1840s underwear!! Petticoats are all done, if in a slightly half-assed manner. I've been swanning around my room for the past few minutes, knocking things over because my skirts are so large -- much fun. Big skirts always freak the cat out, probably because I like to trap him underneath them occasionally. Poor tortured beast. XD

You mean I can start draping the bodice? Whaaa? *blinks in disbelief* I almost forgot there was going to be a dress, this underwear's dragged on so long! And my wool's been shipped, so when it gets here I can decide for sure between the black silk and brown wool for the Poe dress; I'm leaning toward the wool, but I have to see it first, duh.

Pictures and more detailed description forthcoming, of course, but not now, cause I have to get up for work in six hours. Stupid work.

Quick update on progress: I cut out a pair of mitts with the intention of Finishing Something Today, Dammit, but by the time I'd pinned one of them together, the sun had gone down, and this house is far too dark to be sewing black silk lining to black wool mitts with black thread. I don't like the "hooray, I'm blinding myself!" feeling.

So...back to the petticoats. I actually got all the flounces sewn on the flounced petticoat today, and I had all good intentions of finishing it tonight, but have been completely derailed by a certain AIM conversation (it's all good though, totally worth it! ;) ), so that probably won't happen. We'll see how late I feel like staying up!

Hey, guess what? I sewed something -- and even finished it! *gasp* Well, maybe.

Because I'm tired of feeling like I'm not getting anywhere sewing the boning channels on the 1844 corset, I decided to bring out the petticoat for my 1870 dress and see if I could finish it today. Because I like to feel accomplished, and I figured I could probably finish putting the flounces on in a day of sewing. And so I could! But now I'm not sure if I should put another flounce on...boo. I like the feeling of being done! Especially after sewing a mile of flounces.




For the last picture, I draped the fabric over the petticoat for a very vague approximation of the look I'll be getting. I'm going for 1870ish...very ish, as the fashion plate I've been most inspired by is July 1869, but the hats I based mine on are dated 1871-72.

Upon further reflection and much staring at these pictures, I think the petticoat's fine as is, but if anybody who Knows More Than I (which, for Victorian clothes, is, like, everybody) disagrees, please tell me the shape sucks and I'll try to fix it!

Bridesmaid dress that needs to be sewn? What bridesmaid dress?

(We can also play I Spy with Bad Cat in these pictures...)