Well this weekend was weird.
To start off with, last night, I woke up in the middle of the night totally confused. We have a clock in our bedroom that shines the time up onto the ceiling. We haven’t changed it since daylight savings so it’s been an hour behind. I woke up at one point and was like “it was 3AM last time I woke up why is it 3AM again.” I checked my phone and the clock was still an hour behind like “normal” so that was weird. This morning I had to be up at 5:30 for work, and I woke up and the clock on the ceiling said it was 4:25. Which should have been 5:25. I decided to go ahead and get up instead of getting scared awake by my alarm in 5 minutes. I got up, picked up my phone and… it was 4:25. The clock had righted itself – which now that I think of it, it’s done that before, it tries to correct for daylight savings but it’s always way off. But I got to go back to sleep for another hour so that was nice.
So rewind to last week.
First I used the last of an amazon gift card from christmas to finally complete my Star Wars FoD collection:
(Ok so I don’t have the Kylo/Rey 2 pack, Chewie, or Luke. But I was focusing on the girls!) So glad to finally have Ahsoka!
Coloured my hair for the trip and… ew. My old colour has been discontinued so I tried to find something that looked similar.
I mean, objectively it’s not bad but it’s not what I wanted. There’s too much yellow on it. Going to have to redo it this week. UGH.
Random Skye pic mom sent me. She had her “big girl” surgery Friday… (aka she got fixed)
And she was soooooooo out of it. LOL.
I’ve officially finished the suit and my dress and all sewing for the trip.
In the afternoons now, the light from my skylight shines right onto my table like… here, this is where you should be. LOL.
So thursday I was lamenting the fact that Chase wouldn’t let me make him some Starlord-inspired ears to go with some Gamora-themed ears for myself. Then I was like what if we just did super lazy disneybounds? And he agreed to that YAY! But late notice meant finding stuff that could be shipped on amazon prime. Got Chase Starlord’s tshirt and found myself a black “Guardians” tanktop I liked… but it wasn’t on prime. Found the same design in a regular t-shirt, so I got that in an XL and I’m just going to cut it down into a tank top. Chase’s shirt was supposed to arrive Saturday but got sent to the wrong state first ugh. Supposed to arrive today. My shirt, even though it was prime, couldn’t be shipped in 2 days. Was supposed to be here Wednesday this week (plenty of time to cut it into a tank), but just checked and now it’s supposed to be here Thursday. Ugh it better be here.
Friday I took a half day off work. Chase took the whole day off for his bday! I had planned this so I’d have time to work on the suit with him home too but ended up not needing it, I just finished up the buttons that afternoon (I still need to get him to put everything on so I don’t have full pics yet…) and then got our midsouthcon pics uploaded. Then went over and spent some time with my grandma.
So let’s break for a couple of MidSouthCon pics! Like I said last week, we didn’t take many pics. But here’s a handful.
Saturday was… a nutty day.
Chase had a hair appt in the morning so I decided to finish up packing. I’d kinda started earlier last week but just couldn’t wrap my head around it. I got started in on it again and the same thing happened. My brain was just everywhere and not on that… even with two (TWO!) packing lists.
So I took a break and went upstairs and made some new pin board inserts for my ita bag.
That way if I want to have different “themes” on my bag during I trip I can just switch the insert instead of undoing and redoing pins. I have 4 all together (general Disney which isn’t pictured here because it was already in my bag), princesses, Leia, and random Star Wars. These are all made of craft foam (the top of our really big measuring cup was a perfect guide for drawing a circle onto the foam that fit perfectly into the bag’s pocket! Then covered them in scrap spandex.
So, while I was in my office, I suddenly hear the unmistakable sound of chewing. I look over and see Luna chomping down on a 10in long strip of chiffon I’d cut off a seam allowance the night before. I grabbed at her, and of course, the took off running, chiffon dangling out of her mouth. I chased, and she took off down the stairs. I chased her around the whole downstairs, each time catching sight of her and seeing less and less of that chiffon. I finally cornered her under the side table, tried to grab her, and she screamed and sank her claws into my hand DEEP. And took off running again. And this time I don’t know where she went. I looked all around the downstairs on the verge of tears trying to find her because I knew by that point the chiffon was gone, it was going to wrap around her intestines and kill her or be a very very expensive surgery. Finally she just randomly showed back up (still don’t know where she was hiding), chiffon was totally gone (I checked her mouth) and acting like nothing had happened.
I was SO frustrated and worried. It was another 2 hours before Chase got home from his appointment, so I just kept an eye on her and she seemed fine. Chase got home and we had some errands to run, so I reluctantly left her.
First stop was the crafts fair. I got this gorgeous handmade point-turner.
Much nicer than the old wacom tablet pen I’ve been using for years.
The rest of our stops were getting stuff we needed for the trip, sunscreen, some new foundation for me, new shorts for Chase, etc.
Our last stop was the mall and Chase had some birthday money and wanted to get new shoes for the trip. We went to buy what he picked and the store’s system was moving really slow. Finally the cashier said it came up declined, which made no sense. We tried my card, and same thing. Of course it’s Saturday and our bank is closed, can’t get in touch with anybody. Chase went back in and got the receipts from the manager, because from what we could tell, it looked like the charge went through – twice, of course – just based on what the account balance activity was, though the specific charges weren’t showing up yet.
And of course none of that updated on Sunday, either.
This morning he got online and it’s a big huge fraudulent charge. So Chase is on the phone with the bank right now. UGH
So that was fun.
We came home and I went to check on Luna. She was chilling upstairs, seemed normal. She came back downstairs with me and BARFED all over the living room floor. And guess what. The whole strip of chiffon was in there. THANK GOD, I’ve never been so happy to have a cat barf in my life.
I’ve been really lax about letting her hang out in my sewing room because she’s been really good about NOT chewing on stuff lately, but now I’m going to have to go back to watching her more closely. And cleaning up better I guess, too.
So a little while later I could hear her upstairs and it sounded like she might be barfing again. Went upstairs to check and turns out she was sneezing. I picked her up to bring her back downstairs to sit with us and I got to about the 3rd to last step on the staircase and my feet went right out from under me. I was in my socks – which I’m usually not hanging out in socks in the house, I’m usually barefoot or in shoes – but I’d take my boots off for just the few minutes we had between getting home from errands and leaving again for dinner. So I’m blaming the socks. But I fell HARD. Luna went flying and I landed fully on the outside edge of my right lower arm.
I legit thought I’d broken my arm for sure. I was freaking out. I immediately started wiggling my fingers to make sure I could still could – I could – but holy shit did it hurt. Chase got me some ice and held it to my arm… I’d sort of dragged down the bottom steps after falling so I had a massive scrape/friction burn on top of just the general pain of my full body weight hitting the stair on this one spot on my arm.
But the show much go on, it was Chase’s birthday dinner! We went to a Korean bbq joint in Cooper Young he’s been dying to try. And it was really really good! My arm – from my shoulder to my pinkie finger – was just screaming but once we got there and got to talking and eating it kinda faded. Sleeping was difficult because I like to sleep with my arm under my head and that was a no go. Sunday morning it was so stiff and painful and moving my ring finger and pinkie finger really hurt. But it loosened up throughout the day until by afternoon it was fairly normal, just anything I had to pull, or anything directly touching the worst spot was bothersome. Better again this morning – hand’s fully functional, I’ve been typing and working with my tablet pen, and there’s an occasional twinge but not bad. Hoping by the end of the week all is normal. And my fingers crossed I didn’t actually fracture my arm and it bothers me for years and I finally find out in an xray when I’m 50. (I’m thinking its just really badly bruised on that muscle but I’m still gonna be paranoid.)
So Sunday I again attempted to pack and made decent headway this time but it was still frustrated and stressful. I’m wondering if it’s just due to being in a new house and trying to pack while still not being unpacked? LOL.
Took a break to test out a couple of new things.
I got new extensions for buns a few weeks ago but hadn’t messed with them yet til yesterday. I finally tried the loose braiding hair everybody seems to love. I’ve never liked to use loose hair for extensions, seems so messy! But… ok I love this. This was just a quick sloppy test… i couldn’t even find enough bobbie pins, but just this looked pretty good. Currently I’m spraying my roots brown when I wear Leia to match my ponytail extensions, and I didn’t want to do that at the parks. (EW! brown sweat dripping down my face LOL) These match my hair pretty well, and bonus these are slightly lighter weight!
I also tested out my new foundation on one side of my face (can you tell which?!). I got Make Up For Ever Water Blend foundation. I’d been researching good foundations that are lightweight but also stay on really well – again, for wearing at the parks. I’ve previously been using a bb cream but have had a bad reaction to it last couple of times. Pretty happy with this, it is lightweight and sheer but evens out my tone – this was 2 layers applied with a wet blender and then a setting powder on top. It’s definitely not “costume grade” but this’ll be a good “I’m not in costume but still might get my picture taken” foundation (ie, Disney World, date night, etc)
Also yesterday, Chase finally fixed my cruise control! The button has been broken since last summer! Cruise still works, but I have to hold the button down for it to work. Which gets tiring LOL. He ordered the parts and got them replaced and it works great! So proud!
This week is mostly just me screaming about going to Disney World. My body is here but my soul is not.
ART! I have two this week since I missed last week.
This one was fun, pretty pleased with the way it came out. This was based on a black and white TPM era sketch.
Construction is velvet bodice and lower sleeves. Ombre dyed skirt with gold motif at lower edge. Layers of very fine pleated chiffon for the sleeves/collar/front and side skirts, manipulated into shapes on the sleeves. Pleated chiffon head-dress with ombre dyed tones and a delicate gold tiara.
St Padme Blesses You
This one is obviously based off concept art for the TPM travel gown. I thought the original concept was different enough it could warrant a place in the project, but as I drew it I realized the onscreen version ended up super close to the concept art. Really the only differences were small details. So I really tried to focus on those small details and a different colour palette to set it apart.
I’m thinking silk charmeuse skirt/sleeves (underdress). Blue silk with silver metallic motifs for the overskirt/sleeves. Velvet for bodice/veil. Layers of sheer, stoned blue and white fabrics hanging from the crown gathered at the bottom in gold ornaments. Metal pieces are gold and silver with star motifs.