im starting with the man in the mirror

Well hi, sorry I didn’t update last week. I was in the TRENCHES friends. Still am, but I’m stopping to post today, otherwise I won’t remember everything I need to cover. It’s already going to be dice-y here.

First and foremost – my site is breaking again, this time it’s my blog headers. I have a separate plug-in I use for that, and years ago I updated it and it broke my site. So I rolled it back to an earlier version and that’s how I’ve kept it. But somehow it’s managed to update or something because now there’s a whole new menu set-up for it in my dashboard, and obviously my blog headers aren’t working. Well, they are not working unless I manually go into every blog post and re-save it, then it works. Obviously I don’t have time to do that with 27 years worth of blog posts right now. I did at least do all of my 2025 posts so the recent stuff doesn’t have a broken image at the top.

After Dragoncon I’ll be moving the site to a new theme and rebuilding everything. Woof. Part of me looks forward to it and part of me is dreading it.

So anyway let’s move onto the thing you’re here for – costume updates. Let’s go one by one.

1. Deanna Troi

Saturday I finally styled the wig. It isn’t perfect, it got real frizzy when I was working with (why do I keep buying wig is fashion wigs…) and as I was feared my headband is too big. But I will be living with it because I don’t have time for anything else.

I did also finally try the the dress on, and my finished shoes (Chase painted them). The shoes are a little darker than the rest of my costume but oh well. They are also too big. I will have to wear socks under my tights to keep them on my feet. It is what it is.

2. Lorne

I have no pics to post here, but I finished up the last of the little things I needed to do – trim sewn on the ribbon, hook and eye on the apron, and I finished turning my little stuff Emile into a purse. Sadly he wasn’t big enough to fit my phone, but I’ll be able to have my glasses and badge ribbons in there.

3. Wanda

Chase has been working on my “hard” parts – the tiara is done, he’s working on the side panels. Meanwhile, my spoonflower fabric came in and I got my skirt made.

So the issue with the spoonflower fabric was that the back side of it is white. Which doesn’t work for this costume. Can’t dye the whole thing without dyeing the front. I did test paint but that also bled through. Thankfully the screen used costume has a black gradient dye at the bottom (and top) so I could at least dye the bottom. So I decided I’d add a black lining to hide the rest. I’d sew it onto the top and sides, and use heatbond for the bottom so it would all be one piece for me to tatter and fray. I did some tests and it worked fine in a smaller scale. Unfortunately it did not work in a larger scale.

After I dyed the bottom and top of the spoonflower panel, I sewed the black lining layer on, and then fused the heatbond to the inside of the spoonflower panel. Then carefully laid the black lining layer over it and pressed it into place. It seemed to be fine at first – stiffer than I would’ve liked, but it was all one piece. And then it started coming apart. The black knit was coming away from it. Dunno why. One quick rip and it was all off. So I said fuck it, I’ll leave them as 2 layers. I then spent an hour trying to get the heatbond off the inside of the spoonflower fabric. I read you can take it off by ironing a brown paper bag onto it, and that worked 75% of the time. In some areas, it didn’t. The paper bags got bonded to the glue LOL So after a soak in water I was able to get the rest of the paper bags off, but still has some sticky ugly spots that wouldn’t come out. At least it’s all on the inside.

I pleated the top edge, then put it into a bias tape waistband and added a hook and eye.

(The top is not zipped up in the back, just pinned on to see them together)

I sat with a pair of scissors and cut up the bottom layers. Couldn’t rip it as that stretch the design on the spoonflower fabric and caused the white interior to show, plus made it curl which I didn’t want.

Not too irritated over the problems with this – because I have a another panel coming. Probably won’t turn up til after Dragoncon. This spoonflower fabric was my backup because I knew I’d be cutting it close with the original panel I ordered. I can remake it after dcon with the other panel.

4. Belle (and Beast)

I haven’t done much on Belle for the past 2 weeks. I did dig out the gloves I wanted to use.

My grandma gave me these non-stretch opera length gloves years ago. I love them! But they had some stains on them. I soaked them in oxi-clean twice, which helped, but you could still see the ghosts of the stains. Good enough that I think, one dyed, it hides them pretty well.

Dyed! Love how they turned out. And feels much more luxe than a $10 pair of shiny spandex gloves.

I did design the embroidery for the swags. However, at this point I’ve realized, I am not going to have time to do it. So I tested out some HTV. I actually like how it looks?? I didn’t think I would.

(not the design, this was just a test file on a scrap)

So it’s not really the LOOK I wanted, but I do like how it looks, so I’m going to finalize my designs to fit on each swag and do that probably this weekend. Then, since my designs will be ON the swags, I’ll have a guide to do the embroidery later on.

I have done some work on Chase’s Beast costume. THANK GOD he found an actually really nice jacket to buy?? Like it looks fantastic for the price and now I didn’t have to make it. I did make the vest for him to wear under it out of my taffeta, and a cravat out of my silk velvet. I had some leftover gold rose buttons from Utena that I added to the vest. Turned out nice. Finished that up yesterday.

5. Radagast

Have done some work on Chase’s Radagast pieces. He bought pants and a tunic and I dyed them (need to dye the pants again). Sewed 2 curtain panels together for the cape, and made some big sleeves out of brown linen. Still need to sew the yoke to the cape and alter the other curtain panel for his vest. But overall some quick work especially since he didn’t want anything hemmed, he wanted it all to fray and look worn.

6. “Lover” Padme

THIS is what I was so deep in last week that I couldn’t post. This took SO much longer than I planned. I have no idea how many hours I put into this. I do know I’ve gone through just under 17,600 rhinestones.

My little spot on the couch with my rhinestones, heat gun, and the big box our le creuset came in the other day made for a great table. Used my ring light for more lighting.

I did a test row of yellow along the top, and then I did the pink “vines” so I’d have something to work around. I really thought having the bedazzling heat gun would be easier than glue, but it it actually took longer because I had to hold it onto each rhinestone for 30 seconds to a minute (depending on how much pressure I could put on the stone – if it was in an area I could really press it up against the form or my hand, I didn’t have to hold it for so long. If it was in an area where I couldn’t really get the fabric pressed against the form well, I had to hold it longer – but once they were glued they were GLUED.)

Starting to fill in. Realized I was getting them too close together in this part so I readjusted afterwards. There was a lot of that. I have a new appreciation for Taylor’s Lover suits. Getting these rhinestones placed correctly and neatly was a challenge. Mine are so messy but it is what it is. If I were to make something like this again, I really think I’d mark each rhinestone spot in a mockup, transfer that to a file and have it printed on spoonflower fabric, then I’d have the bodysuit in the colour I want, with guide points for rhinestone placement. Didn’t have time for all that here.

My purple stones are darker than I would’ve like but whatever.

You may notice some weird lumps in the suit through the progress pics – I would stuff batting down into areas to control the curve and flatten areas out. That way I could put like 10 rhinestones onto the suit and just move them into place with the gun, instead of picking them up individually. Went a lot faster that way. (Also my bedazzling gun was SUPPOSED to be able to pick up the stones but never could. I started with placing them with my wax pencil, then realized I could just set them on the fabric and slide them into place with the bedazzling gun before the glue started to melt.)

The back went so much faster than the front. And looks better too because I got better at spacing and just learning curve. I did space them out further to go faster on the back, but I think it looks better overall. Oh well. I decided to do the front before the back in case I ran short on stones!

Finally finished stoning the suit just yesterday – I had left the lower section for last to get the decorative tassels placed, and wanted to try it on before doing the crotch area.

The little tassels are the jewelry pieces from the dress, made of our my leftover stuff from my real lake dress. And I did substitute in a cabochon from the headband for the center of each. Built each one around a little piece of felt with a snap sewed on, then got the other side of the snap placed on the suit.

At this point it’s now ready for the sequins, which I started last night. Hoping to take a big chunk out of that today.

But of course we’ve got boots too.

The boots proved to be a pain in the ass.

I got about this far into boot #1 when I realized some of the stones weren’t sticking great. They seemed ok at first but any amount of pressure or movement and they were falling off. The upper yellow portion seemed ok – and I think that’s because that’s the part I could put my hand under and really put pressure on the stones to get them bonded well. The further down I went, the worse they were bonded. I got so fed up with finding ones falling off, that I took the boot, scrunched the whole thing down… and about 200 rhinestones fell off. UGH. And worse still, some of them were bonded well enough to chip my paint – but not well enough to stay on?? Oh well, I’d rather they fall off now then at the con. So I stressed the boot some more and made sure everything that was going to come off was going to come off. Then I set about getting them re-placed into their original spots with Gemtac. I hadn’t wanted to use Gemtac at the start because I don’t like how it leaves a shiny area around the stones, but I can live with that at this point.

Sat with my Gemtac and patched in the areas with missing stones. The worst area looks weird to me now but oh well. Then switched to gemtac for the rest of both boots. And it went WAY faster than the bedazzling gun, so a blessing in disguise.

Set up a fan to put them under while I was working on either the other boot or the suit. Helped the glue dry a little faster. Maybe. Maybe just psychological.

My boots say Jessica Simpson on the bottom LOL I think once I paint the bottoms red (waiting on my “Walk on Red” Angelus to arrive), I will cover that up with some Taylor stickers.

Boots are done now except painting the soles, Suit is done except sequins. Now I just need to find the wig I wante to use (my old Nightgown wig), and figure out where I put my Taylor tights.

7. Mom’s projects

Also been out to my parents several times to help mom with her projects. Her hobbit looks super cute! Lwaxana has been progressing – her skirt is done, we pinned the hem yesterday. The belt needs a closure. I got her interior bodice made yesterday and the outer fashion layers cut – tonight I’ll be basting the gold and brown layers together and then sewing them to the interior. Friday I’m off work so I’m going to go out and help make the upper portion.

We also got contacts. Yep I said I’d never do costume contacts again but here we are LOL Haven’t tried mine yet. Mom sent me a pic of her with hers on and it was freaky! LOL

8. Everything else

Have not even started packing. I did finally set up my garment rack and bring a few things down. Need to make a packing list. Too many things in my head right now. Had to take a xanax the other night because my brain was just going a million miles an hour with all the things I need to do.

Badge ribbons came in!
I should have both with me all the time unless I forget them in the room LOL

Ok so here’s my to-do list:

-Finish Scarlet Witch shirt
-Rig up the Scarlet Witch pieces
-Look at wig, style if needed?
-Close up Belle swags
-Attach chiffon shoulder piece
-do HTV designs
-sew swags in place
-add boning to bodice (need one piece in the front)
-add skirt hand loops
-sew rose bundles in place
-style Belle wig
-find Belle shoes (just wearing my old ones)
-find Padme wig
-finish sequins
-paint boot soles
-finish chase’s radagast pieces
-finish mom’s top
-pack????

That seems do-able. Two weeks left and 2 weekends, plus 2 days off (took off this Friday plus I’m off the Monday before).

Pray for me LOL