Emergency sewing

 In other words, what do you do, when a day before the event, you realize that you lost enough weight to have the dress you just made a few months ago, hang on you.

I have dealt with weight changes over the last few years, I have quarantined out of my edwardian blouses, and realized that a day before the event as well (yeah, I should check my clothes sooner, I know), I had to turn in the boning and the hooks and eyes on my red dress because last years spring rush of Intermittent fasting was succesful, even if it was not long lasting.

And so it happened that I made my lovely Aidah gown early this year. However, I managed to find a much better doctor (GP) and I did got some help (if not a full diagnose yet) to some of my problems, and some medicine (for my blood-sugar and/ or insulin) problems, and finally loosing some weight. It is still difficult as hell, and I still have issues, but for the first time a long time things look more hopeful. 

Anyhow, the topic for today is not my health issues, but the state of my wardrobe, and my quickie solution.

I made a full petticoat to go with my Aidah skirt, made the ruffle and the decoration all around, thinking, I can use it separately too if there will be a need. I also had a piece of green taffeta in my stash. I meantioned that store chain often enough before, called I love Textile. The manager of one of the shop's wrote to me sometime in february I believe, that she got a small piece of taffeta, do I want it? Of course. By small piece she meant that smaller than the usual minimum six meters I buy from these stuff, only about two meters. And it was GREEN. Green is so much NOT my color. I hardy ever had any green clothing... It is not entirely missing from my wardrobe like yellow, but there are ony a piece or two here and there. It was a big step away from my usual safe corner of blue, but it went well with the fabric I made my Aidah gown from. 

I also had a piece of cotton, I got it from a friend, thinking, the print would be fine for 18th century, but then it is way too thin for anything than lining, or an underpetticoat. The coloring though went well with the green taffeta, so I had put them away together, to make something of. 

Then last week, a day before we went to a baroque/rococo event, I was trying to decide what to wear (my "outlander" stuff... nahh, too hot. My red dress? Naahh, as much as I love it, it looks... with its primary colored printed red cotton, it clashes Nóri's aristocratic mint green dress, and I would loved if the group appears more... more in one style, not all over the place. That is partly I went for the more aristocratic taffeta with the Aidah gown. So I've tried that one, and ... oops, it is waaay to big, and you can see that at the boobs and the neckline...

However, my friday night was more-or less free. I already had the pattern, I made my outlander jacket from it, though I wanted the "other" version the pattern offers, and I needed to make a new mock up to fix the fitting issues caused by my weight loss. (No, I was not going to buy another, smaller pattern. As much as I like the JP RYAN patterns, I resent the fact that they only come in one size). 

Unfortunately, it was late, and as usual, I was concentrating on sewing (and doing it fast), so no pictures of the process itself. But here is the finished result

I do love the print of the lining, which is sewn in by hand.

In the rush (I was sewing the hooks and eyes on around 4 AM) I even forget to irion out the marks for the hooks.

I think, I still have to practice my handsewing.

The jacket is closing with hooks and eyes, but I am afraid, I will have to put them deeper, because there was a slight gap at the front.

Modelled photos: Norbert Varga @Bodeszphoto

1840-ies bonnet

 Things are... well as usual for the last few years, busy for summertime. I try to balance, life, love, work, reenactment, clothes, music, concerts and whatnot... 

And sometimes I do fall off the vagon. 

But I do make things... even if I blog about later. Much later... even years later. 

This bonnet is not the latter case, it is actually it is... lets call it medium term. 

I've made it in march, as preparation for the annual round of 1848 events around the annyversary of the revolution. 

I ordered the base straw hat over the internet, bought some light blue ribbon, raided my stash of artificial flowers for some blue and a few white ones, and handdyed a bit of pure silk fabric for lining. 

Since I bought the hat that mostly correct in shape, I didn't had to start with cutting and reshaping it, my "only" job was to decorate it. 

I lined it with my handdyed silk, added some blue lace.

The ribbon decoration is folded with the help of a fork, you can easily find tutorials for that in Pinterest. 

When I asked about historical clothes, I say two things that can define whether what you wear looks like some costume, or something out of the period. No, it is not if you sew it by hand or not, neither is you only use natural dyes, or things in that line. 

For me, it is the right underwear/ understructure, and the accessories. 

While I am pretty good about the underwear, I have a tendency to neglect the accesories, and with this piece (and some others that are planned for the near future, I aim to remedie that.