Home
blog
costumes
Videos
tutorials
my art
About Me
Shop
site history

Home
blog
costumes
Videos
tutorials
my art
About Me
Shop
site history

kelldar.com

sketchblog: notes

Blog, my art, sundowner

sketchblog: notes

February 15, 2001 /

taking notes in class

and a qudiar

art old sketchblog sundowner

You May Also Like

Romana I Costume Planning

Romana I Costume Planning

March 26, 2013

Mando & Belle ballgown progress

Mando & Belle ballgown progress

August 21, 2006

when my phone embarrassed me

when my phone embarrassed me

March 4, 2003

newest costumes

Current Projects

Endor Leia Remake
Disneybound Leia 3

Follow Me

Instagram Feed

kelldar

My Costume History, Day 181: Tightrope Walker from

My Costume History, Day 181: Tightrope Walker from the Haunted Mansion, for our Dragon Con 2016

As I mentioned earlier, we cut back on cons this year, and we only did Dragon Con for a day and a half that year. But of course I still have to make something new, and since we were also going to do the Disney Halloween party later in the year, I decided to do the Tightrope Walker so I could wear it for both.

All my fabric came from Joann - I got a purple velveteen for the top, a matte white satin for the skirt, and this cool layered pink chiffon for the sleeves. Made the bodice out of the velveteen, lined with cotton, with spiral steel boning and a lace up back. I really like how it turned out. The sleeves were a take on the same Edwardian sleeve pattern I used for Edith (still had it laying out LOL), just smaller. I stuffed them with netting for shape. I made the upper white pieces out of some lace fabric from Joann, and the bows on top out of some leftover pink taffeta from my pink 18th century dress.

The capelet I went through a couple of mock-ups trying to get the size and shape right on me. Trimmed it in some faux fur and it closes with a snap, hidden behind a more decorative cape closure.

I made the basic skirt, gathered onto a basic waistband. (If I were to redo this I would’ve done this as a circle skirt instead of gathering it, I don’t like how it hides the flowers.) I made a stencil for the flower and used it as a rough guide for painting each on, but I didn’t stick to it exactly because I wanted them to look painterly. (I went with the earlier arts’ even rows of flowers look - another thing I’d change if I were to redo it).

Styled the wig from Arda, made some straps for existing pink flats I had. When I wore this to Dragon Con that year, I just used my Jane parasol, but for MNSSHP later that year, I bought a cheap parasol online, stripped it, replaced it with my own fabric and trim, and made an extension for it. I was really happy with how that turned out. (Also restyled the wig so my side curls weren’t so huge).

This was a fun costume and one I’d be glad to pull out again anytime - I dunno about MNSSHP again, it was still too hot for this there!!

My Costume History, Day 180: Edith from Crimson Pe

My Costume History, Day 180: Edith from Crimson Peak, for our Megacon 2016

While in the theater seeing Crimson Peak the year before I decided I HAD to make something from it, came home and immediately bought a wig LOL So since I already had some money invested in it, I decided to do this Edith costume for our one day visit to Megacon in 2016.

I bought a bunch of plain crepe de chine from Dharma Trading. I started with making the top yoke section - it’s a cotton base and supports the sleeves. For the sleeves I used an Edwardian era pattern I had on hand and made the big sleeves puffs, stuffed with netting for shape, and made the lower sections extra long so I could gather them. I trimmed the edge with some lace and added some faux buttons (they snap close). I took big squares of my crepe de chine and gathered them down to fit on each panel of the yoke and sewed them down - trimmed the edges to be the “ruffle” at the neck and bust line. It closes with snaps up the front.

Then I took all that I had left over my crepe de chine, sewed it into a giant tube, and pleated it down to fit onto the bottom of the yoke, under the ruffle. Once I had that all attached, I hemmed it. Now it was time to weather the whole thing.

I started with dip-dyeing the bottom hem - I tested out some dye mixes to recreate the “clay staining” and once I was happy with the colour, I set up a dye station and dipped the end of my dress into it.

Well, I messed it up. I got it way too far down in the dye. One one side it came all the way up to the waist! I tried some dye remover but in the end, I had to just take it off, buy new fabric and redo it (grimace emoji). Second time dyeing, my husband helped holding up the top so I could pay better attention to how far it went in the dye. Then I weathered the top with dye and paint for the blood splatter, which was hard to do LOL. I also made some plain nude spandex gloves and bloodied them up as well so I didn’t have to paint my hands.

I was really happy with how this turned out! It’s so floating and fun to wear. Got to do a cool shoot in a wine cellar later that year. I still want to do more Crimson Peak costumes... maybe one of these days.

My Costume History, Day 179: Princess Leia Disneyb

My Costume History, Day 179: Princess Leia Disneybound from Star Wars, for our Disney trip 2016

So 2016 was a weird year, because we did less cons, only did Dragon Con for a day and a half - instead, we bought Disney World annual passes and went to Disney a whole bunch of times that year.

But it didn’t mean I stopped sewing. I was inching closer and closer to a Leia disneybound on our trips years previously, buns, themed clothes, etc - so for 2016 I decided I wanted to commit and do a proper bound.

I made 2 pieces for this - the top and dolman shrug. I bought the shorts, necklace and shoes. The shoes were my attempt to find white versions of some shoes I already had and loved (they were SO comfy) but I didn’t really love these as much. Ah well.

For the top, I had this shirt at the time that I loooved and I basically wanted the same thing but Star Wars-themed. It was a white shirt with some white designs up the center front, so I recreated that with some very light grey/silver-y Star Wars symbols and had it printed on spoonflower knit. I also bought some of their plain white knit to use for other sections. I used my existing shirt as a guide to make a pattern, and assembled it from my spoonflower fabric. Easy!

The I got worried about wearing all white to Disney LOL I thought I’d make a shrug to wear over it - something I could cover myself in while eating or sit on if I needed to sit on the ground. I found this thin grey knit at Joann that had silver metallic stripes running through and made this Dolman shrug - heavily based on a Captain America one I had from WeLoveFine. I added a big rebel symbol to the back using some scrap red spandex. I love how it turned out, and it entered my regular wardrobe rotation after this! And it was perfect for the parks - light enough to not be hot, and it protected me from the sun (I don’t tan, I burn)

It was a lot of fun to wear in the parks - I wore it for several trips! It’s pretty much retired now, except the shrug, which still hangs in my normal clothes closet.

My Costume History, Day 178: Disgust from Inside O

My Costume History, Day 178: Disgust from Inside Out, for MidSouthcon 2016

I really loved Disgust’s costume design - and green is my fav colour so the idea of being totally green was appealing LOL

I used all fabric I could buy at my Joann, and I wasn’t completely happy with my green fabric I got for the dress - it was a tad more on the blue side of green, and a little lighter-weight than I would’ve liked, but it was ok. I started out with basic dress pattern but had to reconfigure a lot of it, the neck shape, fit, etc.

Once I had the basic dress constructed, I started embroidering the little mid-century amoeba shapes. I got some blue and yellow-green embroidery floss and just free-formed them in a couching stitch. It didn’t turn out perfectly, but I liked the added detail vs buying a version with the design printed on.

I made the leggings out of some scrap green spandex, the belt out of some pleather and spandex, and the scarf out of some pink glitter netting. Chase made the “D” belt b uckle for me. I bought the wig from arda and added in lots of strands of green glitter embroidery floss for some sparkle.

I bought 2 pairs of green tights - one I used on my legs/feet and the upper ones I planned to turn into an upper body piece and reconfigure the foot sections into gloves. In the end I didn’t feel like messing with it LOL So instead of just painting my face & neck and having tights for the rest, I painted my face,neck, chest and arms and just used the tights for my legs. I still have those tights meant for my upper body around here somewhere.

I’ve only worn this once - wore it to MidSouthCon and we did the white backdrop shoot right after we got home from the con that day. I’ve said for a while I need to just invest in a full body green suit so I can wear this and my Poison Ivy again sometime.

Morticia was a project that’s been on my to-do lis

Morticia was a project that’s been on my to-do list for ages, and when we went fabric shopping in LA earlier this year I thought this would be the perfect project to shop for - I wasn’t recreating an exact costume, I wanted to do my own take on the character, so it’d be fun to just shop for neat black fabric.

I’m really happy with how it turned out and it was a smooth sailing project. Can’t wait to wear her again - need fo find some Halloween event for her! #dragoncon2026

I’m not particularly happy with the handful of pho

I’m not particularly happy with the handful of photos I got of my picnic Padme at dragoncon. Guess that means it’s time for a photoshoot 🤔

I’ll have my usual breakdown of the construction of this up in my blog in the next couple of days!

Buckle your seatbelts. We’re going to reach speeds

Buckle your seatbelts. We’re going to reach speeds of 3!

I decided I wanted to make a Dr. Lea Jansen/DOCTOR Lady costume for #dragoncon2026 earlier this year and was totally shocked and tickled when Chase he wanted to be Blast Hardcheese with me. (Please give me your fav BigMcLargeHuge name in the comments!)

The first fabric I used for my leotard was cursed, it jammed my machine so bad I had to take it in to be repaired three times! I gave up on that fabric finally, and after that construction of these was smooth sailing. I picked up all the silver fabric when we were in LA, and I bought my wig online, cut and styled it. My belt buckle is my favorite part of the costume, you can’t really see it here, but head back a couple of posts to my reel showing these costumes up close and you can get a good look at it.

I really didn’t think that many people would recognize or care about these costumes, it was just something I really wanted to do - so all the love and shares and people chasing us down at the convention made it really special, so thank you all 💚💚

Roundup of everything I wore at #dragoncon2026 - I

Roundup of everything I wore at #dragoncon2026 - I always try to take a pic of each costume at this little cutout on the Marriott floors and this year I didn’t forget any!

Here was when I wore everything for those curious how I wear so many costumes.
Wednesday night: Rogue
Thursday morning: Rizzo for badge pickup and Muppets Photoshoot
Thursday afternoon: T’Lyn
Thursday evening: vacation Leia (would’ve stayed in T’Lyn but got too hot in that)
Thursday evening: Padme/Taylor Swift mashup (didn’t stay in this long, I did not put the wig on right and the front comb was killing me)
Thursday late night: Scully
Friday morning: picnic Padme for the Women of Star Wars shoot
Friday afternoon: Rogue for dealers room excursion
Friday night: Space Mutiny
Saturday morning: Belle (before crowds got too heavy!)
Saturday midday: Rogue AGAIN for art show excursion
Saturday evening: wedding Leia
Saturday night: Morticia
Sunday morning: Diane for David Lynch Photoshoot
Sunday afternoon: Rogue AGAIN for helping my husband while he wore his WoW armor
Sunday evening: Space Mutiny
Sunday night: Mrs Roper goes to Naboo for the Mrs Roper shoot
Sunday late night: Scully

I don’t do schedules beforehand anymore. I have a few things I know I want to wear at certain times (ie, picnic Padme for the women of Star Wars shoot) otherwise I just kinda go with the flow, change when I feel like changing, and wear whatever feels right in the moment. I did take one costume I ended up not wearing - Padme’s lake dress, but I’ve worn it there 3 times now so no big loss. I also did not think I’d get around to wearing T’Lyn or vacation Leia, I kinda just threw them in as backups - but Thursday ended up having a lot of time for changing (not a lot going on yet), AND it seemed extra hot that day so I could only last a couple of hours in each thing before i had to get out of it.

I didn’t do a packing video this year, but since i

I didn’t do a packing video this year, but since i’ve gotten a looot of questions and comments in my last video about how I pack for Dragoncon, here’s a couple of older videos explaining how I get everything to Atlanta with an updated voiceover. It boils down to - I live in Tennessee so we drive, I don’t fly. I can bring as much as I can fit in the car. I also talk a little bit about how and why I WEAR so many costumes at the convention. (It boils down to - that’s what I like to do at dragon con)

Follow on Instagram

Archives

Archives

SEARCH

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Receive notifications of new posts by email.

Email Address

SITE BY KELLDAR

Ashe Theme by Royal-Flush - 2026 ©

Home
blog
costumes
Videos
tutorials
my art
About Me
Shop
site history