Kairi's Blessing

Thank you to everyone who made it! We wish all of our friends and family could have been there!

Merida Formal Dress Part 3: Trial and Error

Well, overall I'm not as happy with this dress as I was with Chaela's.  There are still some things that need to be tweaked.  You can't tell in this picture, but the wimple is way too short and has a ton of excess fabric that makes it look nothing like the one in the movie.  I also need to glue a button I got onto the D-rings that fasten the belt to cover them.  Maybe once that stuff is done I'll feel better about it. I'm off to the sewing room to see what I can do!

Merida Formal Dress Part 2: Finishing Touches

Most of you probably figured that I finished the main part of Joci's dress when I posted a picture on Facebook and in my last blog post.  However, if you didn't, here is Part 2!

Here's a view of the dress from the back.  I made it lace-up because I'm too lazy/impatient to go to the store and buy a zipper.  The finished muslin/under dress shows beneath at the neck and ends of the sleeves.  It's not supposed to show at the neck, but it doesn't really matter because the wimple (the white thing Merida wears on her head) will cover it.

Here are the fastenings I sewed on today.  Snaps on the under dress and a hook and eye on the dress.

This is what Joci does when I want to take a picture that shows off the dress:

The circlet and wimple.  

Now all that's left for this costume is to have her try on the whole thing!  I'd also like to get my hands on the official bow/arrow/quiver set that Disney makes.  It would really make the costume complete!

Deep joy.

Just dropped the girls off for grandparents' weekend.

Ate an a-freaking-mazing beef sandwich from Cubby's.  If you live in or near Provo, go there.

Kairi is asleep.

Lunch with Rosalie tomorrow with no kids to force to behave in a restaurant.

I can sew all night if I want because I don't have to get up early.

Also this:

Deep joy.

Merida Formal Dress Part 1: Pattern Alteration and Muslin

First of all, don't you hate it when you're trying to sew and...

Sigh.

Anyway, I've had a lovely hiatus.  I got some writing done and finished about 80% of a pirate costume for my friend's daughter (which I didn't post about because it's straight from a pattern).  Now it's back to the grind, especially since I've had two more (non-pattern) costumes added to my list, bringing my total up to seven.  I'll post about them later, I suspect.

So, here is how I'm going about the formal Merida dress for Joci:

First, I have this pattern that I used four years ago to make Chaela's first Halloween costume ever.  

It's amazing for a long, basic dress with a fairly full skirt.  First I measured Joci and resized the pattern because the smallest size on there is a 3, and I needed something smaller.  You can see how lovely and organized I keep my sewing room.  The smallest size you see on there is the one I drew.  I also did the cutting a bit differently than last time.  I didn't have tissue paper (where are my presents, people?! ha ha) so I laid the pattern directly over the muslin and traced it with a marker that bled onto the fabric underneath.  I didn't mind this firstly because it's a muslin and secondly because I knew if I did it right I would finish all the edges, so none of the marker that ended up on there would be showing anyway.

Now, the sleeves on the pattern are substantially different from what I want.  Even the tops of them were weird, so I couldn't even trace those.  My solution to this was to lay out the two pattern pieces that attach to the sleeves and trace.  Like so:

Then I drew the rest of the sleeve to fit the measurements I'd taken of Joci's arm.  At first it came out like the one on the left, but when I folded it, it looked too small (besides not looking like any sleeve pattern I'd ever seen), so I added another seam allowance on each side and ended up with the pattern on the right, which I used.  While the curve is still weird, which made sewing it weird, the rest of it looks a little more normal.  A little.

Once all of the pattern pieces were finished I cut them out and sewed them together.  This is the muslin I ended up with:

I'm pretty happy with it for a first try!  All I want to change is to let it out about half an inch around the waist, and I don't have to change the shape of the pattern to do that.  So I'm going to tear this apart to use as a pattern on my "real" fabric and then sew it all back together, finish it, and add the other sleeve (and a bit of fiddly embroidery... you know, for fun) and this will become the under-dress for Joci's costume!  Part 2 to come soon!

The ticker you see here ^

is to help motivate me to write.  I'll try anything since I've been a major slacker.  In fact, this ticker and blog post are nothing but procrastination.  Oh well.

As you can see above, my goal for complete manuscript #2 is 80,000 words (which would translate to roughly 280-320 pages in novel form, depending on the format).

I am not close.  However, I am hoping that public accountability will help.  We shall see.

Rapunzel Dress Part 4: Complete!

Finished. I put together the skirt, added a waistband, and hemmed it. That's all! The skirt was super simple and the top was crazy complex.  One costume down!

Rapunzel Dress Part 3: Finished top!

The top is finished!  It's not an exact replica, but I think it's pretty close.

Now if only Chaela didn't smile like a crazy person...

Rapunzel Dress Part 2: The devil is in the details

Did you ever notice that the sheer part of Rapunzel's sleeves are embroidered at the top and bottom? Me either, until I started studying the dress. You'll also notice if you study pictures of the dress that the sleeve fabric isn't striped, it's a bunch of pink ribbon stitched on with lavender thread. Yup. I guess it makes sense for her outfit to be ornate; it's not like she had much else to do locked up in her tower.

So far I'm cruising through this dress. I am a little worried that the embroidery on the sleeves might have gathered the fabric and made them too tight, so I'll let you all know about that. And the petticoat was too long, as predicted, but I think I'll just roll it because A) I might be able to use it again someday and B) I am too lazy to change it now.

Rapunzel Dress Part 1

I mentioned that my neighbor wants me to record my costume-creating process, so here it goes!

The first part is study, so I Googled Rapunzel images and saved the best ones, then looked for tutorials.  This website was insanely helpful.

During my study I noticed something convenient: Rapunzel's bodice sort of resembled the top for the pirate costume I made Chaela last year.  Score!  That meant that I could use that same pattern with a few minor alterations.  When I alter patterns I never destroy the original in case it can be reused (in fact I'm reusing this one two or three times this year).  The picture below is the pattern for the sleeve of the top.  The red lines are from when I resized the pattern last year, since the smallest size on there was a 7 and Chaela wore a 3.  The green lines are from this year, it's shorter because the sleeve on the Rapunzel dress is a short sleeve (though the sheer part extents to 3/4 length).  The easiest way I've found to create new pattern pieces is to take a good marker (one that's not drying out at all), lay the pattern piece over some tissue paper or whatever it is you want to use for your cutting pattern, and trace over every single line with the marker.  It will bleed through the original pattern paper onto whatever is behind it, so I feel like it's easier and more accurate than trying to trace around the edges.

So I do that to every pattern piece until I have all the ones I need.  Behold!

 I use tissue paper from presents in bags people have given someone in my house.  Side note: I ran out of tissue paper for patterns last night, so any presents would be appreciated.  Ha ha.

Next I cut the pattern out of muslin and sew it up really quick so I can try it on whomever it is for and make the necessary adjustments.  While trying this muslin on Chaela I discovered that I needed to make it a teeny bit bigger on the bottom but take it in about an inch under the arms.  I also discovered that the sleeve was about 3/4 of an inch too long and was able to experiment with the sheer fabric that makes up the bottom of the sleeve.

When I'm satisfied that all the bugs are worked out I cut out the real fabric and start on the actual top, which takes a lot longer than the muslin thanks to the fact that it's lined (the pattern is laid out on the dark purple lining in the picture).

I may or may not have accidentally sat on the top while sewing the petticoat, which is why it is wrinkly.  Obviously it isn't finished yet, but Chaela is visiting her grandparents for a few days and I don't want to go any further before I try it on her.  Once that lining is on, there will be no more tweaking the seams.

So I made the pattern and muslin for the skirt which, since I decided it would fit her (and hopefully am right) I went ahead and finished because it's doing double duty as the petticoat.  For this I just made a pattern piece.  I've seen a lot of skirts, so I winged it.  The piece is fairly narrow at the top and broadens out at the base.  I used a measuring tape to make sure that the length of the piece was consistent, meaning 23 inches long at each side, in the middle, and all points in between.  I wanted the skirt to be fairly full, so I cut six of these from the muslin and sewed them together.  Then I added a simple waistband and threaded it with elastic, hemmed it, and added the lace on the bottom.  Since I love fancy details and my machine has a few basic embroidery stitches, I put a band of embroidery around the bottom.

I am afraid that the petticoat may be a bit too long, but if that's the case instead of taking it off the awesome bottom of the skirt I'll cut a few inches from the top and re-attach the waistband.

So that's what I have so far!  I'm at a bit of a standstill on it until Chaela gets home and can try things on, and I can't start Joci's because I don't have her measurements either.  My preliminary idea for Joci's is to use this pattern once again to help me shape the bodice, but instead of having a separate skirt I'll extend the pieces I draw into a dress (if that makes sense).  I'll also have to do some other minor alterations, like change the shape of the neckline.  Fun times!