A Dedicated Follower of Fashion

So I've started Job Number Two, which will be nice for the paying-off of loans but not so much for the sewing time. Hmmph. So rude. Extremely doubtful I'll have time for either the Brunswick or to finish the neoclassical dress for the card party in May, though of course I remain eternally optimistic.

Ha ha ha. Riiiight.

Job Number Two will be relatively short-lived in the near future, so if I sew like mad over the summer I should probably still be ok for Remembrance Day in November.

Anyway, I might not be posting as much from now on, but I am still reading!

Sunday I spent my day at Jessica's house, helping sew Erin a sack gown. We didn't get it finished, and I was floundering a bit, dealing with adapting the construction of a sack gown to be machine sewn, but we finished the petticoat, and all the main pieces of the dress are sewn together. Just needs the sleeves put in, the back binding put on, and to be hemmed, I think?

Yesterday I had to be up at the unholy hour of 4am to go to a store on the other side of the state. They're closing in early March and opening a new location, so they need help getting all the stuff prepared to pack up or sell off. Thankfully my coworker A offered to drive! We were supposed to go back again today (an hour later thank goodness), but it had started snowing in the wee hours, there was about 3" of snow on the roads, visibility was bad, and as I was on the phone with the closing manager, asking how badly we were really needed, the car was skidding itself in a complete circle...while we were trying to drive around a circle.

Yeah, no. I wouldn't even have tried it, but I wasn't driving. So I've got a day off today! Naturally, now the temperature's shot up, the sky's blue, and the birds are chirping - and the roads are clear! Don't care, want my day off. And much as I like getting essentially ten hours of pay for eight hours of work (they pay driving time), stooping to measure out bolts of fabric for eight hours yesterday was murder on my back. And I had to help cut fabric that wasn't bolted yet for customers, while not being able to sign into the scanners and without them having any cutting slips left that could filled out by hand. It's kind of a clusterfuck, to be honest. Thrilled not to do a repeat performance again today.

(They may want us another day this week, but with any luck it'll be the day I'm going down to the Red Bank battlefield...)

But, onto the inevitable Shopping! There was a bit of wool (a very little bit) and plenty of (horribly slubby not-even-worth-$5-yd) dupioni, but I bought mostly cotton prints since that's more of what I might need at the moment.

Thought the pear-and-apple print would make a cute vintage-style dress sometime, I couldn't resist another piece of the scalloped print, the white twill is always useful, and the other three prints are candidates for first-half-of-the-nineteenth-century dresses. The ostrich-feather trim was wildly unnecessary but at 75% off I couldn't resist...and wouldn't it look nice trimming a fancy 18thc mantle? ;)

Boo. I was looking forward to having two days in a row off from work, but... One of the girls came in today and had to leave after about an hour because she was sick, so I covered the rest of her shift (four more hours? No problem!), and was asked if I could work her shift tomorrow as well, 3-10. No, I'm not doing anything else, and yes, I want the hours!

But I was looking forward to sewing something! (Hadn't figured out what yet; probably the cranberry wool.) Ah well. I'm still off Thursday and Saturday, so I can get in some good sewing time then!

Just to play catchup with a few things (not that many. We all know how much stuff I do!):

( The weekend: sewing, another stupid outfit, &tc. )

Have found motivation for working on the Halloween costume -- I have friends throwing parties on the 29th and 30th. Motivation is good!

Motivation may possibly have come too late...there's really still a lot of beading to do on this thing! I'd still love to finish it, and I will try, but if I manage to finish beading the corset and not the tails, I'll still be reasonably pleased. As long as there's also a hat.

I think I've decided to dye my hair for the occasion, and buy extensions -- not necessarily in that order! The length of my own hair just doesn't cut it (harr harr).

Also I'm nearly out of silver bugle beads, boo. I thought I had another bag but apparently not! Off to pay Jo-ann's a visit tomorrow, I suppose. Gotta remember to get stupid glue-on rhinestones as well.

OH ALSO: I've finally been hired, yay! It's for this jewelry and accessories store; they're opening their first store on NJ soon. Soon here having the meaning of November 1, and they don't get the store til Oct. 18th, so no immediate monies for yours truly, and it's still just part-time. STILL. Income will be good!