Sorry for no Monday morning post yesterday. I’ve been dealing with a lot of anxiety the past week. Not much more I can say at the moment. Been trying to keep my nose to the grindstone and my mind on other things.
So the good news is I’m officially done with SEWING on 3 out of 5 of my Dragoncon costumes. Let’s recap!
Tatooine Padme:
First up, I finally bit the bullet and cut the excess off my disney cape. I also fixed the messed up interior seam. I got that all pinned back up to the right height for the shoes I’m wearing with it, and finished the hem by hand. It’s not perfect but at least it’s the right length now.
Then I finally made myself finish this front gathered panel:
This was tricky because every backing panel I put on it was too thick and stiff for this super thin lightweight fabric. Even the cotton. It was making the edges too bulky and sitting weird. So I finally just backed it in a scrap of the same thin fabric and that worked moderately better. It still looks lumpy in places but I’m just like whatever at this point. I got it handsewn in place on the inside of the skirt and then finally got to sit and do the beading.
After deciding my first set of beads were too small, I paused and waited on these larger ones to arrive. But once I had everything together, I realized the smaller ones fit better. So that’s what I used.
This was supposed to be fun mindless beading time but about 25% of my beads didn’t have the hole drilled through it large enough for even my thinnest beading needle to go through. It was a pain in the butt. I ended up not quite having enough workable beads. The front has them all because I felt like that was most important…
But I did skimp on the ones on the back of the hood. I used all that I could. It’s fine. This whole costume is fine. It’s got runs in it and the piping is fraying and it’s all fine. It doesn’t matter.
I also already managed to pop a stitch on the front gathering because trying to get the dressform arms in this is like wrestling eels.
But all that’s left is stamping the symbol on the cape. Chase printed out a bunch of the symbols for me so I could pin them on and make sure the sizing is right. I’m going to just have a stamp made.
Once that’s done, just have hair stuff to worry about – Chase is 3d printing the tiara for me and once that’s done I can style the wig into it. Yay. I’d call this one 90% done.
Lavender Haze Taylor:
I finished hand-sewing the zipper down on the sequin dress. Then I spent a couple of days hunched over the jacket laying on the floor beading it while listening to stuff like “3 HOURS OF CREEPY UNSOLVED MYSTERIES” on youtube. It’s really subtle which is what I wanted – here’s a short video of me moving the jacket so you can see them twinkle:
(Also, at first I was going to use the smaller Padme beads for this. I was like, I’m ordering bigger ones, I might as well put these smaller ones to use and do them as the dangly beads on the fur jacket so I don’t have to buy something else. But then decided they weren’t sparkly enough and thank goodness, because of course I decided the smaller Padme beads were more accurate on the gathered piece once I had it put together. Imagine if I’d sewn those onto the Taylor jacket and then started the Padme beading only to realize I actually needed those smaller ones…)
If you recall last week I was wavering on buying new lining fabric for the fur jacket. I didn’t like how what I bought looked. Well I did and it arrived Saturday — here’s the original cuts of fabric laying on top of the new (using it as a pattern) — so glad I bought new, look at how BAD this looks:
WTF!
I spent Sunday assembling the new lining layer, got an interior pocket made with a zipper and everything (was going to do 2 pockets but first one was so annoying I decided one was enough LOL). Last night I sat and hand-sewed it all together. I didn’t want to machine sew the lining in place and smush the fur so decided hand-sewing it all would be better.
So all my sewing on this is done, unless I want to add the garter belt. Which maybe I can just buy.
I also still need to buy boots and rhinestones. I have several boot options saved, just waiting til I can afford to buy them. I’m looking forward to the mindlessness of sitting and stoning these.
T’Lyn:
Hey remember how last week I had to take out the lining and reassemble it all without the underflap? Well guess who had to take out the lining AGAIN to fix something AGAIN. Basically my outer layer was somehow shorter than my lining layer. No idea how that happened since they were all cut out at the same time. It was causing the bottom of the jacket to not lay right. I tried to just take up the lining layer at the horizontal chest seam, but that was too much of a guessing game, and in the end I decided to just take the whole lining out AGAIN, so I could lay it all out and make sure it was all the same length and lined up correctly. I got it fixed, lining sewn in AGAIN, and finished the inside edges AGAIN.
So it’s finally done. Geez. Didn’t expect so much drama from a lining.
And after all that… if you see the front point of my tunic not laying right, or you see any stray threads poking out… no you didn’t.
I also got my headband covered in my matching fabric. All that’s left is to order my boots (again just waiting til I can afford it), adding the blue stripes to them, and styling my wig. I also need to buy new vulcan ears.
So what’s next?
I’ve got new Shin vest fabric on the way. I found something that was slightly warmer toned than what I had and I liked better.
This week I’m going to start looking at the undershirt, pants and cape. I have fabric for the cape, maybe the pants. I don’t think what I bought for the undershirt will work, maybe I have something in my stash that will. If not it’s a joann trip this weekend. Might start on Chase’s Baylan vest lining at least, since I need to do a second mockup and I could probably do the mods to the lining layer.
I need to sit down and re-acquaint myself with both costumes. Last time I sat and looked at them was February. Tonight I’m going to go through my refs and draw everything out so I can feel like I have a gameplan, because at the moment, I don’t.
I’ve also got fabric bookmarked to buy for Mara Jade. I know I’m walking into doing a costume nobody is going to care about, but I REALLY want to do it while Chase is still interested in wearing his Luke. I just really want to have a costume to match his Luke that isn’t his SISTER… even if it’s no longer a canon character. And I’ve wanted to do this costume for ages so I’m doing it for me.
So what’s my dragoncon line-up? I have no idea. Here’s a rough guess:
1. Tatooine Padme of course. Even though I hemmed the cape and the whole reason I made it is the cape, I will probably only wear the cape for photos and then leave it in the room LOL Too hot! I had it all on Saturday night, no wig of course, and I was sweating buckets even in the house.
2. T’Lyn of course.
3. Taylor of course.
4. Mara Jade – tentative just cuz I haven’t actually bought the fabric
5. Shin with Chase as Baylan. He’s already been working for a while on all the hard parts. Now I just gotta get started on the many many layers of fabric.
6. Ozma – I’m bringing her back for the 20th anniversary! Chase is repairing my crown with new 3d printed parts. I may upgrade the ribbons while they’re off the tiara. I have some of the green and gold ribbon leftover from wedding Leia and I think that would be pretty and fancier than the plain green I used in 2004.
7. Lady Jessica – Chase is updating his Leto armor. I really have no idea how we are fitting this all in the car since he’s also bringing back rebels vader.
8. Honeymoon Leia – while awaiting fabric for Shin to arrive I may bite the bullet and try to replace the messed up front panel.
9. Seven of Nine – there’s too my Trek guests this year for me to NOT bring her. Plus we did the updates for the photoshoot, so might as well.
10. Scully – downtime costume.
11. Stevie Nicks – another downtime costume. I need to get the necklace.
12. Wildcard. I’ll defintely be bringing something else, but what? Maybe jedi training Leia and wear that to the Leia shoot? Rebels Leia to go with Chase in vader again? Kinda thought about having dad help me with my ANH Leia belt remake and bringing classic Leia but dunno that I have time. Maybe time to finally bring back Love Shack Kate? Her wig takes up a lot space though which is why it’s never come back. We’ll see.
Luna & Kevin break:
She kept coming up to my sewing room and biting me yesterday while I was sewing the Taylor jacket lining in place, so she got a fur boa to wear.
Snooping
Thursday we had a family cookout.
Sir Winston
Kevin got to meet Walker.
Also Kevin got a PS5 for his birthday and didn’t tell me?! Until now?! He said he was only $10 short to buy the new Final Fantasy, so i went to put $10 on his account, but turns out he’d spent the other money and didn’t realize. I still gave him $10 so he’s at least got a start towards saving for it.
We went swimming Saturday morning. Needed the break. Took Kevin too, talked to him a lot about a possible disney trip. That’s how you know I’m stressed, future Disney trip is all I can think about.
So that was a rather eventful week. Time to straighten up the sewing room and reset for next project.