Pics of Finished Ottoman Vest

The front of the finished vest:


The back of the finished vest:


Ideally, this will be an ongoing project. The next step would be finishing the rest of the border and then filling in all the open spaces. However I do not know if this will ever actually come to be. It might stay this way.

Ottoman Vest Embroidery...

...is FINISHED!

Pictures to follow. Probably tomorrow, after I (attempt) to iron it so it looks all pretty and properly shaped. The couched embroidery deformed it some.

In other news, I'm almost ready for DragonCon. Just a little more packing to do, and charging of batteries and my Ipod. I also need to decide which purse to use that my parents brought me. Overall, I'm almost ready. Almost.

In three days, I'll probably be napping before we leave for Atlanta.

Progress -- Aug 15th To Do List

It's time for your mid-week update on what Miss Wilde has been doing!!!

I've been working on my vest every day, even if only for a few minutes. I have the largest section in the back filled, the others are all pretty small and should fill quickly. UPDATE 8/19 -- The vest is halfway done!!

I fixed the inner leg seam and sewed on the closures, which means the Persian pants are DONE.

I went to a friend who happily took the bands off some of my watches. I came home, pulled out some ribbon and a needle and thread and went to town. I now have an almost completed Time Traveler hat band. I think it needs some lace... UPDATE 8/19 -- The hat is DONE.

The new kilt is almost done. I finished stitching the waistband and added a graphic to the front of the sporran (the beau's idea, not mine. I think it should have been left plain). I made belt loops and then had to re do them because they were too heavy (there was denim inside, bad idea). The new ones are cut and waiting to be sewn on. I plan to purchase clips and D rings this weekend to get that done. And two of the four closures have been sewn on. UPDATE 8/19 -- Closures are finished. Most of the belt loops have been sewn on. I left the two front ones unsewn on the bottom so I can put D rings there. All that's left is D rings and clips!

I'm planning to buy a black purse and decorate with one of the Star Wars patches my beau gave me. Or use it plain. But I need a new purse, one big enough to hold the flask he's giving me to use at DragonCon. UPDATE 8/19 -- Buying this tomorrow.

I think I'm going to pass on the ball gown bodice for the Time Traveler. I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and need to cut something somewhere. That bodice seemed like the best thing, since its the least complete (the muslin's together, but not fitted). I'm also not making a skirt to match the new kilt. My mother made the point that women used to wear tartan over the shoulders as a drape, so I plan to just take the left over fabric and either do that or wear it as a sarong. So that's something else off my list.

In non sewing news, the 'to pack' pile keeps growing and I finished my food shopping today. I need to purchase a few more non food items, but at least the food itself is done. I've also started a separated by store shopping list as well as a to do list that includes everything, not just sewing.
UPDATE 8/19 -- I started actually packing instead of just throwing things in my bag or on top of it. I also made trail mix tonight!

In two weeks, I'll be grabbing a few hours of sleep before we get up REALLY early to start the drive south. I'm excited and nervous. Actually I sorta feel like I always do before I fly to Europe...A combination of excitement, nerves, nausea, worry, anticipation, etc. etc. etc.
UPDATE 8/19 -- In two weeks I will have survived my first full day of Dragon Con!

Well, I'm off to bed now, my dearests!

Bonne nuit!

Ottoman Vest Embroidery Progress

Here's a couple photos of the Ottoman vest:


The front, with one side completed. I'm planning to go back and add more pink in so its more noticeable. And I may finish the inside edge with some pink ribbon.


The back / collar aka the section I'm hoping to complete this week.

DragonCon To Do List -- Week of August 15th

Progress on last week's (Aug 8) to do list:

1. Post apocalyptic jacket was fitted, pinned and hemmed. So its DONE. Up next: the skirts, once the hoops are done.

2. I worked on the vest and one side is done! Now to do the collar and the other side...

3. The Ottoman bustle is DONE.

4. The Persian pants are almost done. I just need to sew closures onto the waist. I did end up putting elastic in the cuffs, it was just easier plus it ensured a good fit and the ability to get the pants on and off easily.

5. While I worked on the Time Traveler hat band, it is not finished. I'm going to seek outside help with the watches and I need to add some trim and ribbon to the hat.

6. While I didn't get the muslin made and fitted, I did cut out the Time Traveler ballgown bodice muslin. As well as thought about my trimming plans for it.

7. The pocket on the red and black kilt is DONE.

8. And I started his new kilt. I cut and hemmed the fabric last week and backed it with the denim over the weekend. I pleated it, fitted it, and shortened it by about 4 inches (it was rather long) before hand stitching the pleats down, attaching the waistband and working on hand stitching it into place. All that's left to do is finish stitching the waistband in place, make and attach belt loops, add D rings to the kilt, clips to the finished sporran, and closures to the kilt.

And now for this week's list:

1. Hopefully start on the post apocalyptic skirts, but that depends on whether or not Miss Von Stoup finishes her hoop skirt.

2. Continue working on the vest. I think my goal for this week is going to be getting the collar done. Then I'll have about two weeks to finish the other side of the front.

3. Sew closures on the Persian pants waistband.

4. Finish the Time Traveler hat band. I need to meet with a friend to deconstruct the watches, then sew them onto the band which I think is going to be decorated with a little green ribbon and white lace...

5. I'd like to at least get the Time Traveler ballgown bodice muslin put together and fitted. I'd prefer to get it made out of the satin so I can start decorating it.

6. Finish the new kilt: Stitch the waistband in place. Belt loops. D rings and clips. Closures.

7. And over the weekend with the beau's help -- He needs a new RFT vest. He knows how to do it and just needs me to help with a little sewing. It shouldn't take long. I hope.

Although I don't if I'll get to it this week, if I have time I'd like to make myself a little skirt to wear to conventions out of the rest of the kilt fabric...

Progress on August 8th DragonCon To Do List

Thursday seems like a good day for an update on what I've been up to this week, don't you think? Especially since it is officially three weeks til DragonCon. Although if you're a regular reader, you already know a little of what I've been doing.

First up, Miss Von Stoup's post apocalyptic costume. Her hoops are coming along and I had her try on the jacket yesterday. The only change she requested was that it be hemmed (which wasn't the original plan), so after she left I pinned up the hem and I plan to sew it tonight. UPDATE The jacket was hemmed on Friday.

I've been working on the embroidered vest pretty much daily, even if only for a few minutes. It's coming along, but it takes time.

The Ottoman bustle is ready. I pinned it and stitched it down in a couple places Monday night, then let it hang on the dressmaker's form to make sure it would hold. Yesterday I tried it on and liked the drape so it has been added to my 'to pack' pile.

The Persian pants are in process. I found a pale pink satin in my stash that matches the vest almost perfectly. Yesterday, I cut the cuffs and waistband and started pleating the cuffs and waist down to fit. However the pants are much too long so I'm going to have to cut a lot off the legs and maybe alter the leg seam. I'm also thinking of using a little elastic in the cuffs so they'll be easier to put on. I had to rip out part of the back seam so that I could get the pants on. The waistband has been sewn on but needs turned and stitched down to cover the raw edges. Then come the closures.

I also worked on the Time Traveler hat band yesterday. The band is too small, so that may need remedied, perhaps with some ribbon. The feather looks good, but I wouldn't mind more if I can find ones I like at a decent price. The watches are giving me issues though, may need to go to plan B which involves spending money. Or just toss out that idea and just go with feathers and the white band otherwise unadorned. Or just bedeck it in ribbon and trim, I have enough of it.

I haven't started work on the Time Traveler ballgown bodice, but I did pull out some muslin to use. I briefly contemplating attempting a new corseted bodice that I've been wanting to make, but I'd have to make too many alterations for it to be worn with a bustle so I think I'm going to stick to the original plan.

My beau's red and black kilt now has a back pocket. It's welted, which is my standard. Let me just say, putting a welted pocket into a pleated kilt and having to stitch and slash through I don't know how many layers of cotton and denim, was NOT pleasant. But it's DONE.

I also started his new kilt. We decided to go with a sporran instead the pocket route. I plan to make one out of heavy black fabric with clips that that fasten onto D rings on the kilt. I cut out the kilt yesterday. It needs sewn together and part of it needs hemmed. I also cut out what I think will become the sporran. I'm planning two pockets, one for his wallet and one for his phone.
UPDATE Friday: The sporran's done except for the clips, which I need to buy. And the kilt is as far as I can go without the denim, which is at a friend's house.

So there's where I stand on DragonCon preparations! I'll be in Atlanta in THREE WEEKS. I'm sure it goes without saying that I'm a little bit panicked.

Weekend To Do List - MARCon Preparations

Marcon begins six weeks from today (cue panicked screams). And you know what that means - lots of to do lists and updates!

This weekend I would like to:

• First of all, I'm going fabric shopping tonight and purchasing the fabric for our confederate uniforms. I have sincere doubts that they'll be finished by Marcon, but we'll see. I'll probably hand it off to Miss Von Stoup to pre-wash and get back to me asap. I'll also be getting her pattern, as well as a variety of other things. We're planning spending an evening next week working on our skirts, which will be the easiest part of the project. Then I get to make jackets!
• Repair the Captain's hooded vest. (Time estimate: around an hour)
  
• Finish Rachel's corset. She's okay with it just having lace along the bottom, so that issue is taken care of. So all I need to do is sew the lining to the outside and put in the eyelets. (Time estimate: two to three hours, depending on how much hand sewing I end up doing)
  
• Miss Dashwood's Steamnun - Part of my purchase today is for this: thread, a pattern for the top and elastic for the skirt. It should be a simple project, just an elastic waisted skirt, a loose blouse and a drape. The colors she choose are fabulous - a dark red and a deep orange. (Time estimate for total completion: 1-2 hours for the top, 1-2 hours for the skirt, 1 hour for the drape)
  
• My Persian Steampunk - I'm also planning on purchasing one or two things for this costume, including a little coral satin to use as trim. Hopefully I can match the coral I used on my buttons. I'd like to get the lining put together and the fabric dyed this weekend. (Time estimate for this weekend: under an hour to put the lining together since I already started it, 1-2 hours for the dyeing)
• Maybe work on my Ottoman vest embroidery a little. This is another project that I'm starting to doubt finishing.
  

Looking ahead, I have the following to complete before Marcon, roughly in order of what needs completed first and projects that I doubt completion of are towards the bottom:

• Finishing Rachel's corset. (two to three hours)
  
• Finishing the Captain's alterations. (three hours, one hour per item)
  
• Miss Dashwood's Steamnun. (three to six hours)
  
• Steampunk Confederate Vivanidiere uniforms. (two to three hours for the skirts, probably four to six hours for each jacket, so a total of eleven to fifteen hours for basic construction. Embellishment will add to that time considerably.)
  
• Steampunk Persian costume (I haven't worked on this enough to say how long it'll take to finish)
  
• Finishing the embroidered border on my Lady of the Ottoman Empire vest (a lot of hours, I'd guess at least around 20 hours to finish the border)
  
• Fixing my Ottoman bustle. (two to three hours, if that)
  
• Adding lace to Miss Dashwood's bustle if she purchases lace soon enough. (one to two hours)
  

In short, I have a lot to do over the next six weeks. Wish me luck.

A bientot!

Miss Leah J Wilde
Stressed-stress

PS My Shopping list:

1. Thread - red and orange for the Steamnun, coral for the Persian, gray for the uniforms, and white, black and cream for my stash.
2. Patterns - McCalls 4097 for the Steamnun top, Burda 7458 for Miss Von Stoup's uniform, and I may pick up a couple McCalls as well since they are on sale.
3. Fabric - 9 to 10 yards of gray stretch sateen for our uniforms and some coral satin for the Persian. I'm also going to check the discount table because its on sale.
4. Notions - elastic for the Steamnun skirt, elastic for my stash, and machine needles. I will probably also pick up hook closures, hooks and eyes and some snaps. I might buy some covered buttons and or bobbins as well.
   
5. Gray quilt binding for the uniforms.
6. Batting for my beau's Star Wars quilt.
   

Slow Going Progress on Marcon Prep

I haven't been up to much sewing over the last few days, between work and life.

Corset Commission for Rachel:

Rachel and James came in and bought the fabric for her corset the other day. Two cottons, one red and black, one white and black, along with white denim for the interlining. I'm going to use thread, boning, eyelets and maybe some lace from my stash. The goal is for the corset to be reversible. I prewashed the fabric and cut out the pattern pieces yesterday. Next up will be cutting out the fabric. EDIT The pattern has been cut out of all three fabrics. Next up: sewing the denim to one of the cottons and then sewing one side of the corset together for a fitting.

Ottoman Vest:

I worked on this a lot yesterday (I was in a car for four hours). All the basic border work is done, I put in a little more of the pink until I tired of it and then I started couching down spirals for the actual border. I have three spirals done, I probably have at least a dozen more to go plus all the fill in work. EDIT I worked on this more tonight, mainly some fill in work. I hope that I can have the border done by Marcon, I'm starting to think it may be too much work...

Joker:

My beau has decided that he doesn't want this costume for Marcon and wants it for DragonCon instead. So work for this is being set aside for the time being.

Cage Bustle Petticoat:

I hemmed this yesterday and just need to sew on a hook and eye closure to finish it off. EDIT I sewed the hook closure on so this is DONE.

Fabric Shopping and Plans for Persian Steampunk:

I purchased several things yesterday, but most importantly I purchased a new Simplicity pattern that is pretty perfect for the Persian inspired outfit I want to do. I think I am going to dye my silk faille olive green to go with the brocade vest. I'm going to do fabric covered buttons. I am unsure what the top is going to look like underneath the vest yet. I purchased a remnant of border eyelet, that may be what I use. I don't know if I want the stark white and may try to dye it, with tea or with dye. The only problem is its polyester / cotton blend so it won't take dye perfectly. I'm planning to line the vest in muslin, I'll probably dye that as well. Maybe coral if I can find a good shade because the brocade has coral in it.

I don't have enough fabric to make this wholly out of brocade. So my options are shortening it (which I really don't want to do) or making part of it out of something else. I think I'm going to see if I can find some coral satin or something similar to use.

Confederate Vivandiere:

Miss Von Stoup and I need to get started on these soon. I believe we may be fabric shopping this week or next. I'm thinking suiting fabric may best suit our needs.

Okay, let's take a look at my MARCon to do list, shall we?

1. Add lace to Miss Dashwood's black cotton bustle
2. Steamnun for Miss Dashwood (at least I assume she needs it for MARCon)
   
3. Alterations for the Captain - I finally gathered these from the Captain today. I need to take in a few things for him, and repair a vest.
   
4. New bustle for Harley Quinn - DONE
   
5. Embroidered border on my Lady of the Ottoman Empire vest
6. A more permanent solution to my Ottoman bustle. I'm thinking sewing the two scarves together along part of the top and then a bunch of hooks and or snaps to actually bustle it.
7. Steampunk Confederate Vivandiere.
8. Corset for Rachel.
9. I'm not really planning to finish the Persian outfit by MARCon, its more of a DragonCon outfit, but if it happens and its finished, I'm wearing it.
   

I'm starting to feel the pre-convention panic - MARCon is 7 weeks from this coming Friday.

Now that you have all been updated, I'm off to work on projects. Today will probably be - a little project for my beau, sewing the hook and eye closure on my cage bustle petticoat, embroidering my vest and maybe cutting out the corset if I get bored with embroidery.

UPDATE - Finished the project for my beau. Sewed the hook closure onto my bustle. Worked on embroidering my vest. And cut out the corset. I also spent time thinking about my Persian outfit. Not bad for a Sunday, huh?

A bientot!

Miss Leah J. Wilde

PS Non Marcon Sewing - I also cut out a skirt. The pattern is Vogue 2029, something I've had forever and never made. The fabric is a tan textured mystery fabric that Miss Dashwood got from her mother and said I could have if I wanted it. After cutting it out, I have similar misgivings to those that she had about it -- while the texture is interesting, the fabric ravels very easily and seems to lack stability. But I've already cut it out so we'll see how it goes together.

Marcon Prep: The Ottoman Vest and Cage Bustle

Ottoman Vest:

So far I've completely used up one skein of metallic thread - there are two rows of couched thread around the entire outside of the vest, and around the armholes and there is one row of couched thread about two inches above the first two rows around the outside but not the armholes.

Tired of couching thread, I pulled out the pink embroidery floss this evening and started a simple outline stitch inbetween the two rows of couched thread. I'm doing this to bring some pink into the vest to match the scarves better.

I'm thinking I'll add a nice gear design on the front in a couple places, but that won't come until after the border is complete. The large design on the back will likely also involve gears.

However, I have little to no idea what to do to fill in the border space. Maybe some spirals. Maybe a nice paisley design. I really don't know.

Cage Bustle:

I also worked on my cage bustle. I shortened most of the bones and basically pleated the casing down to be the right size. And I sewed the ties on underneath. I just need to try it on, and then put the skirts on over it to make sure the length is good before hemming it. I was thinking about ruffles, but now I'm leaning away from that.

I may have other plans for that left over muslin...

In other news...

I made myself a bandanna out of a remnant of UC Bearcats fabric that I picked up last week. It was a pretty quick project. All I did was use another bandanna to measure how big it needed to be and then did a narrow hem on three sides, the fourth was the selvage edge.

I've also had this costume idea running around in my head for a week or so. It's based on a Persian jacket I saw in a Racinet illustration. I was contemplating franken-patterning it out of a jacket pattern, but when I checked the Simplicity site today, low and behold, they have a pattern that is pretty much just what I had in mind. Of course, mine will be different as I don't have enough fabric for the entire jacket. It'll probably be sleeveless and shorter to accommodate how much fabric I have. Or I may end up buying more fabric, who knows. But this is probably where the muslin will go, cuz it would make nice lining for the vest I think. However, this outfit will likely not happen until DragonCon since I still have my vivandiere outfit to make for Marcon.

And now, this steam-stress is off to bed. Bonne nuit, mes amis, et dormi bien.

A bientot!

Miss Leah J. Wilde

The Joker 7 (Marcon Prep)

I got a lot done this weekend on the Joker costume for my beau.

Yesterday I put the waistband on the trousers. So all that needs done is hemming and two hook and eye closures on the waistband.

Today I did most of the work on the vest. We went to the fabric store and picked up some lining (blue poly / cotton). After we got back I set to work - cut the vest front and pockets out of the blue-violet and green checkered cotton, did the darts and put in the pockets, cut the vest back and the lining out of the blue poly / cotton, put together the lining and had him try it on (perfect fit!), sewed the vest front to the vest back, then sewed the lining to the outside leaving the arm holes and a spot along the back open to turn, turned it, finished the turning opening by hand, fixed another little issue by hand, then put in six button holes using orange thread for contrast.

All that's left is - fray checking and cutting open the buttonholes, sewing on the buttons, a little decorative hand stitching in orange thread around the pockets and sewing the lining into place around the armholes.

And the jacket just needs patch pockets on the inside, buttons and buttonholes.

It may be faint, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

And I also worked on my Ottoman vest this weekend. So all in all, a very productive weekend.

A bientot!

Miss Leah J Wilde

MARCon Preparations Begin...

They've already begun but I figured I might as well start posting them under Marcon prep.

Work on my Ottoman vest continues. I now have two lines of silver thread couched around the outside with enough space inbetween for me to put a line of pink, probably in a nice chain stitch. I'm starting a third line of silver that will be a couple inches above the other two, allowing space for a nice wide border, which is all I really plan to have completed by Marcon.

The fabric for my new bustle has been washed so that'll be ready for me to work on once the Joker is finished.

Speaking of, I really should have worked on the Joker tonight, but I'm feeling a bit under the weather and sitting on the couch embroidering was much easier than working on the Joker trousers. I plan to finish the trousers tomorrow, except for the hem and maybe the waistband closures since I need my beau for the former and would like his opinion on the latter.

A bientot!

Miss Leah J Wilde