Things New

Well, the new year has swept in like fresh air around here and I am off and running on a million different projects, sewing and otherwise. My current favorite is filling up my new ribbon rack with the many yards of trim I have collected over time. I'm scavenging for it in strange spots all over the house and with every bit I collect, respool, and rack I feel more and more wonderful!

I have a lot of trims! I know where they are! Wow! They are so pretty!

Looking forward to making pretty things with you this year. :)

Speaking of pretty things, another favorite  project is this skirt which I have rescued from my "donate me now!" bag. Once I have finished removing the remaining vertical strips of badly damaged sequins the skirt will be moving on to a glorious new future as part of my 'Night Circus' themed outfit for TeslaCon 6. I'll need to make the striped corset first, but watch for this fabric to reappear in all it's gaudy glory and BUSTLED later this year.

Classes at Christmas Court!

Today was Christmas Court in the Barony of Rivenstar and my first opportunity to perform my record keeping duties as Arts and Sciences Minister. I made sign-in sheets, taught a class on hair extensions and hair taping, and took a LOT of other classes. :) And I have the loot to prove it!

I learned needle felting!

I made a ball with my proposed personal badge on it. And discussed organizing a "make your own felted slippers" day.

I learned a new kumihimo braid!

I made about 8" in my proposed colors while I talked dying, and cooking, and heraldry. We all ate a great feast. And then we danced!

I'm still crazy busy with too many deadlines and too little time before classes end, but this was a great day. :)

Presents!

So, the lovely wedding glasses, of course, needed a box! I sourced the image from an extant betrothal plate, 'cause what could be better than a heart pierced by the arrows of love, two hands joined in faithfulness, and the fires of passion for a wedding?

I left spaces for their devices (which I hope they will someday register. Hint. Hint.)

And included the text from the glassware and traslation: For the love I bear for you in this fine cup! Also taken from an extant period betrothal gift.

For padding I used hay from one of those mini bales they sell for decorative purposes and also two small towels (always useful in feast gear.) the combination works really well. :)

I think I see more painted things in my future!

And then there was glass...

I've been intrigued by the idea of making my own enameled glassware for several years but I hadn't felt ready to take the plunge until recently.  I've purchased several sets of the La Boheme DOF Glasses by Abigails for my houshold's feast gear and, prompted by the need to make a wedding gift for a member of our Barony, I armed myself with an appropriate text, my Pebeo 150 glass outliners, and some source pictures for ideas and came up with this. Not too shabby for a first time! :)

Credit where credit is due moment:  I got the idea from some work by Mestra Rafaella d'Allemtejo which I found online and used her instructions found here: http://www.fridayvalentine.com/rafaella/paintedglass.html  Thank you!

IRCC4 Layer 1b-Yellow Petticoat!

I'm using 100% linen fabric that is about 58" wide. I am also continuing my experiments with using less fabric so this petticoat is...frugal. So frugal that in the past I would have called it skimpy! My waist-to-floor measurement is 42" in front and 44" in back. Since I want a petticoat that doesn't touch the floor I cut two panels, one of each length, for my front and back skirt. I wanted a smoother-fitting front to my petticoat and a fuller hem so I cut triangles from the side edges of the front panel -- 10" wide at the waist narrowing to 0.0" at the hem -- reversed them and attached them to the back panel.

I like to stitch my angled pieces bias to straight grain (or cut edge to selvedge) to control the tendency to stretch along the seam. As you can see, I offset the triangles a bit at the bottom edge so that the long sides would be the same length when I trimmed them for hemming.

I folded back a 3/4" turn at the hem, just eyeballing the curve at the inset triangles...

pinned and basted...

and trimmed the excess.

I'm contiuing my experiments with a lightly padded version of a doppia (padded hemline) so I cut three 6" deep strips across the width of the fabric and set them edge to edge with my cut fabric at the skirt hem and basted them in place, making sure to gives some extra fabric for wiggle room at the curves of the hem.

I attached the individual pieces finished edge to finished edge in the same manner as the side seams.

To pad the hem I knew I wanted to fold my 6" strip three times. I  tried folding and measuring to see what worked best and discovered that I needed my upper line of stiching to be 2 1/8" from the hem edge so I stitched that all the way around the skirt.

Then fingerpressed down form the stich line and folded the hem in. Once...

and then twice.

As you can see the edges are *just* shy of matching on the outside...

and inside.

To make the waistband I took two lengths of cotton ribbon from my stash (they came wrapped around some pillows I bought but were too nice to throw away, even with the bright yellow printing!) marked the center point and measured out 13 inches on each side of the center point. That will give me 26" per side (front and back) and exactly enough to fit my 52" waist. since the two sides will tie on independently the waist is extreemly flexible in sizing. The pieces simply overlap! :)

While I did run a single gathering thread on the front side I didn't find it particularly useful so I simply pinned the back half in place. for both side I useed the classic method of pinning the center and outer points, foldign the remining fabric in half and pinning the new center point of the skit to the new center point of the wiast, over and over....

Since I removed fabric from the front panel and added it to the back, my front waist is only slightly gathered but the back waist has little knife pleats. I basted both waist in place with two rows of stitching and then tried on the Petticoat.

And it fit! I split my remaining piece of 6" wide fabrice (left over from the hem) into two 3" strips and finished the front and back waist bands.

Just a little something for the sewing kit...

All the hand sewing I have been doing for the IRCC4 has pointed out, yet again, that I need beeswax for thread in my sewing kit. As it happens I recently purchased a vintage compact case with a damascene lid with an idea of making it into a wax holder so last weekend I tracked down beeswax at my local fabric store. After removing the wax pellet from the horrible plastic case I realized that I was going to have to melt it to get it to fit into/fill the case. But how to melt a couple of tablespoons of beeswax?

I imagine that sitting it in the sun would work, but since it was evening and all I went with putting it in the case on the top of the stove near the oven vent and baking something for dinner. It worked!

I completely love it that damascene is a medieval technique which is still practiced and pretty easily available. My new wax holder? Not perfectly period...but not bad! :)

A Productive Saturday

I labored and labored yesterday and these are my fruits! Four new bow bags to gift to my Barony and also a padded liner for Boen's bow case. Better yet, I bought *nothing* new for these. Not even thread!

I recently decided we MUST reduce clutter in this apartment so I'm working my way toward throwing out stuff. Rather a lot of stuff, I hope! The nice thing about being ready to dispose of things is that I sometimes look at things--like a mattress pad with perfectly good padding that we never use because the sides which keep it on the mattress are shot--and see possibilities. Yesterday I saw that mattress pad as the solution to a problem we have at archery practice. We have several bows of various sizes which have been donated over the years, but only two bags! That means we jam several bows into a bag together where they promptly get all tangled up. Not good for them. Frustrating for us...the solution? More bow bags!

I cut the queen sized mattress pad crosswise into strips 13" wide (I got five strips) and my bengaline outer fabric into cross-wise stips 15" wide. I made them wider to allow some fabric for rounding around the liner, as well as turning at the seams and loss due to zig-zaging the long edges together. It turned out the cover fabric was about 2" wider than the liner so I had enough to make a drawstring casing to close the bag at the top. Order of sewing: turn and finish side edges for the casing openings, zig-zag long edges of liner and cover together, zig-zag lower edges of liner and cover together--stretching liner to fit,stitch casing to cover and finish top edge of liner(stretching to fit again), add pocket (oh yeah, I cut pockets from scrap fabric I made when I neatened the edge of my fabric before cutting. Pockets are always good!), stitch long edges together, set bottom of long seam so it falls at the center of the bottom of the bag and stitch bottom together with two rows of stitching, turn the finished bag, Add drawstring.

You can see some of the details in this closer shot.

The final touch was to thread the drawstring through the casing a take a few stitches at the center point. No pulling the cord out of the casing by accident!