I’m not totally back to sewing normality yet, as our halls
and rooms are still full of boxes needing to be unpacked, but I needed a little
normalcy in my life. With Costume College looming at the end of July, I just
had to get going on the one dress I wanted to make, especially since I’d bought
all the accessories for it, and fabric. Since the accessorized outfit will be a
one-time wear, it needed to get made. My dress, however, is going to be able to
be worn in in the future. That’s my thing. I won’t make a one-time only dress,
especially with all the work and money that goes into it. This is turning out
to be fun.
There are many theme-inspired groups on our Facebook page,
and the one I liked was “Once Upon a Bustle”, a Disney-themed idea. Any bustle
dress but made to follow a Disney character. My friend Cindy was originally
going to be Cruella Deville from 101 Dalmatians. Since I had been saving a
dress for inspiration, although from the 1890s, it gave me an idea of doing a
“Dalmatian bustle”. I’d still like to make that 1890s dress someday though.
Prior to our moving, I got really industrious and came up
with a plan to make my own dotted fabric since I couldn’t find any in the
stores or online that were a light weight, like voile or linen. So I started
planning on stamping quarter-sized dots on my fabric. I looked through my
swatch book from Costume College for the linen that I thought would work, and
decided on an Irish linen, which I bought from Em-Bee Fabrics in the LA Fabric
District.
I did a lot of questioning from friends what the best paint
was to use for this, and bought one bottle each of DecoArt Americana & So
Soft black, and a bottle of Ceramcoat Delta Textile Medium. Both worked the
same with the textile medium, although the Americana is cheaper. I bought a set
of foam cylinders to do the stamping with and picked the quarter-size one to
use.
I had 10 yards to stamp dots on so it was going to take a
LOT of paint, and a LOT of time. Then I had to decide do I cut the pattern
first, then stamp, or stamp the fabric, then cut? I decided on cut first.
Before stamping, I did a lot of testing on strips of the fabric. I started out
using too much paint, then not enough. I was getting worried, and I didn’t want
to ruin my expensive fabric.
For one week I was having the inside of my house painted,
and I *thought* this would be a good time to find a corner and just stamp away.
But in reality, it was so chaotic here, that I couldn’t even concentrate, and I
would have to keep being moved all over. So I gave up and binge-watched Game of
Thrones from the beginning. Yeah, I’m bad. I’d only seen the first 3 seasons,
and now all 7 seasons were over. It had been so long since I’d watched it, I
decided to start at the beginning. And this time it made more sense and I was
able to get a handle on all the wonderful characters.
People started posting about how many days were left until
Costume College began. But I couldn’t get up the enthusiasm I’d had before to
do all that stamping. And then I’d still need to sew it. *sigh* I still wanted
this to happen though. I went back to look at some links Cindy had sent me from
Amazon for fabrics and most were either too small of dots or a stiff type of
fabric. I finally found one that was a cotton-polyester for $4 yard. I ordered
it on a Monday and it arrived on Thursday!! It was so soft and perfect!
Now some pressure was off. But I still couldn’t get to it
because now I had to put my house in order after all that painting. It seemed
like every time I emptied boxes in the hallway, hubby would bring more in from
the garage. It was like a reverse Black Hole.
Meanwhile I decided to run away from home one day and went
to a sewing workshop for the Dress a Girl program that Shelley Peters hosted.
After hearing that the older girls just wanted long skirts, I had bought about
6 fabrics at the Walmart $3 sale and worked on my first one. Then over a week’s
time I got 7 of them done. But now the serious sewing needs to begin.
This last week I finally began to feel a little less
stressed, and laid the fabric out to be cut. I still don’t have my new cutting
table assembled. Its in the garage somewhere. So I used my dining table. It
still took about 4 days for me to get around to start cutting it.
I’d say I have about 35 days to work on this, especially
since it looks like I might have to make a pair of 1920s white wide-leg pants to
go with a Miss Fisher outfit I want to wear for the Miss Fisher Murder
Mysteries theme day. I made it even easier on myself with that and found a
gorgeous long yellow knit jacket to use for it. I just wished I could find the pants to buy.
I’ve never made pants before, and my hip-hugger ones I made in class in high
school doesn’t count. I have a black pair, and if I’m able to finish the black
and white jacket I started, I would have a second outfit. Or just wear a teal
knit jacket I have. Hmmmm… less work….
Back to my Dalmatian bustle: I wanted an 1870s polonaise
that closed all the way down in the front and it seemed the easiest thing to do
was use a previously-made pattern and shorten the polonaise, Truly Victorian
#410. And I liked the style of the dresses from the series, The Buccaneers. I
even have enough fabric to make a ruffle around the bottom.
Cutting began this weekend, and once that is all done, the
sewing should go together pretty fast since I’ve made this about 5 times
already. The accessories are what’s going to make this a Dalmatian bustle.
Using the pictures from the book, I’m going to have a blue belt around the
waist, and make a “dog collar” like Perdita's of blue ribbon with a small gold medallion I
hope I can find at Michael’s.
Dog ears! I found this on etsy. Its cheap, and nicely made,
and perfect for a one-time costume. A few months ago, I found this Disney
Dalmatian stuffed animal for sale on ebay. So if its not REALLY obvious just
what I am, LOL, this will help.
And if I have time, I bought some of this Disney Dalmatian
fabric to make a simple tote to carry my class things in. We’ll see if that
happens.
*Yesterday I got the skirt sewn together. But today I need
to unpack some more boxes, so stay tuned.
Chloe, “Queen of the World”, surveying her domain.
~~~Val~~~
