I have a lot of sewing updates today! Well nothing like MAJOR but compared to the rest of September’s posts, it’s comparatively a lot of progress. LOL.
I decided to name today’s post after the first thing I saw when I clicked over to my pictures for today’s post, and the first thing I saw was a sad dog face. So I’ll start there this week.
Every year there’s this big sale in town every fall and I decided to run over there and see if they had a piece of furniture I’ve been hunting for all year (storage chest for my upstairs bathroom, haven’t found one I liked that I could afford yet). So we go through it looking and in the section with all the figurines I see…
And it spoke to my heart.
I have so many questions.
1. Why is this dog wearing a Dickensian robe and nightcap?
2. What is the platter for?
3. Why is he so tall?
4. Why is he so sad?
He was only $15 and at first I left him but that sad face stayed with me so I went back and got him. His sad face gives off the same energy as that dog from that Animal Planet sh ow who couldn’t have the cupcakes.
I assume the platter is maybe for a tea light candle? Maybe? Not that it matters, he’s going to live in my sewing room next to my Anne Boleyn figurine and his platter can hold the mini TARDIS.
So moving on, I did finally get some stuff cut on my silhouette; turns out the main problem I was having was that I was trying to remove the white background from an image I’d already removed the white background from in photoshop. OF COURSE THAT WASN’T WORKING IT WASN’T THERE LMAO
Stuck this on top of my Leia bin.
I drew up some silhouettes (ha) of Leia and Padme to try out later last week.
Though I actually liked the inverses better LOL I’m tempted to cut these out and frame them.
I organized my pattern collection last week. I used to have them vaguely organized at the old house (costume patterns in one drawer, everything else in the other, and some random oversized things stuck under the dresser and in a fabric cube storage bin). The collection has grown this year (acquired 2 vintage collections!), and they were all just stuck in however, so I organized them by era, then by costumes/costume type, modern wear, accessories, and so on. Well while I was doing that I noticed…
THESE ARE THE SAME PATTERN!
I have two copies of Simplicity 9891, good ol’faithful, it’s such a great basic dress pattern and I’ve used it a ton. That’s why I have 2 copies, I wore my original one out! So while I was organizing, I decided to just put the LOTR-inspired patterns in with the GOT-inspired patterns since they share some similarities and that’s when I noticed SIMPLICITY 1045 IS EXACTLY SIMPLICITY 9891 WTF LMAO
It was so mind-blowing I made Chase come look at it. Well now I have 3 copies. LOL
So now onto sewing.
My birthday money was burning a hole in my pocket so I bought some fabric for Raddus Bridge Leia. A friend of mine suggested it on IG so I was like what the hey I’m just going to get it. I’m not planning on starting it this year (it’s for next year) but I have it to work with if I get bored.
And on Friday my spoonflower swatch came for my Arwen sleeves!
Not bad! I’m happy with the scale and the repeat, but I felt like it was a tad too dark. I may also tweak the tone of the background depending on how my velvet swatch looks when it arrives today. Although I did notice I like the wrong side of the swatch better:
It’s lighter and the background is less pink. So I may just use the wrong side if it looks good with my velvet swatch!
Speaking of the velvet. The velvet I have picked out is expensive, $30/yard. YIKKES! Initially I was like, ok, 4 yards is definitely enough, but I wonder if I could get away with 3 and save $30? While organizing my patterns I came across this one:
Which is pretty close to the Hope Dress, and it called for just under 2 yards. I needed to lengthen it and widen it for sure, so I thought mayyyyybe 3 yards would be plenty? I decided to go ahead and do a full cut mockup out of scrap fabric to see before spending the money.
So this scrap lining was 48″ wide. I widened the front panel, lengthened both front and back (more in the back for a train) and cut the draped piece just like the pattern called for.
I did fit all this within 3 yards. But… I think I need to go wider on both the front and the back, and the draped piece was too tight around my arms, so it needs to be longer. The velvet I’m looking at is only 45″… I was able to fit the front and back panels next to each other, slightly offset, on the lining, but if I want to widen them more, on a less wide cut of fabric, I think I just need to go ahead and get 4. Boo! Oh well at least I know now.
Saturday we ran a bunch of errands and that night went out with friends to see the 25th anniversary of Friends on the big screen! They were doing 3 nights, each night with 4 different episodes. We went to the middle night… it was The One With the Prom VIdeo, The One Where No One is Ready, The One With the Morning After, and the One With the Embryos. It was really fun. Everybody in the theater was saying the lines along with the show. LOL.
Sunday we drove up to Jackson to visit with my grandparents and go to the Joann up there. Ours in the midst of moving and I didn’t feel like looking thru their remnants (the new store opens next weekend!). I took fabric swatches of my bodice fabric and the skirt fabric to try to pick out a median green for the main part of the dress. I picked out a green cotton that looked good with both and got it washed as soon as we got home and then ironed and started getting pieces cut. I got it all pinned on and…
I don’t like it 🙁
It looked ok next to the two swatches so I dunno. The colours just aren’t meshing.
The skirt’s too light and/or the cotton’s too dark.
I took one of the photos into PS last night and messed around with it. I decided that if I just added a touch more green to the skirt (less yellow) it looked more like what I had in mind:
So.. I guess… I maybe try to dye this silk. I’m off thursday. So… ugh I really don’t want to dye it but I don’t think I’m going to be happy with it like this. And I think dyeing it will fix everything. So I’m gonna try it.
I’ve also got to experiment with painting the stripes on the cotton. Should work fine. But I do want to do a test first.
I leave you with my grandparents and their favourite child:
And me and my angry child:
