Sunday Dress/ Test Run

   I needed to do a test run of this patter that I wanted to use for  my next costume,and since my mom is always asking when will I make something I can 'really wear' this was the perfect time to make us both happy.  I used Butterick pattern 6018, and really like the pattern and how the dress turned out. I had to raise the neckline about a inch and a half but it still wasn't quite enough so I added a bit of lace to make it more modest.

It has a side zipper that was a pain to get to work with the velvet. If you get the stitching to close to the teeth the velvet jams it and it won't move. sigh. But the dress is warm. I also added a bit of lace to the front waist to dress it up a bit. I had thought of making just a small batch of flowers for there but decided that lace would look better.

IS love how it sits high on the back of my neck. It makes me feel regal and very posh!

       The pattern was very easy to follow and it has a great fit. I think it's going to become one of my favorites.  

Riddler 1950's Style!

    This Halloween I've decided on a Batman theme. Funny thing is I'm not dressing like batman...or batgirl as the case would be. I saw some dresses on pinterest that I fell in love with and am going to work on Friday and Saturday as the Riddler's daughter and the Jokers Daughter. Best part is they are done in 1950's style so it's like a double costume!  The ridder style dress took a day and half to complete and I do like how it turned out.

    The first thing I had to do was to hep the poor tiny crinoline.  It was so flat it hardly did a thing and when I held it up next to my red one it was very sad and maybe 1/3 of the size.

  Here it is after adding two layers. There is about 300 inches in the bottom tier. It's not the best addition job but it did make it where it fluffs the dress out.

 
   I used a basic circle skirt pattern for the base and added 7 yards of tulle to add more fullness to the skirt.

 
I measured wrong when I cut the tulle though and it's about an inch to short so I had to tack parts of the bottom down so it looked like it was at least close to the same length.

After I had the skirt assembled I drafter the belt for the dress and added light boning.

 
After I had the bodice sewn I attached it to the skirt and put the side zipper in. It's going to take some wiggling to get out of but that's okay. I can do that.

And here it is all done! There are 16 large "?"  and 15 small ones on the skirt. I divided them among two layers so it would have some extra dimension. and of course the big center front one had to have sparkles!! One of the hardest parts is trying to make the question marks look random and not planned.

Back view.

And that's everything. I hoped you enjoyed this look at my Riddler costume. Now I just have to think of a name to use as the daughter of the Riddler. Hhmmm.

Autumn Fairy

    I finished the Autumn fairy dress just in time for "peak week" unfortunately not all the trees got the memo.
    The dress is made of two pieces.  The under-dress and the tunic. It took forever to get fabrics that didn't clash. Surprising how hard that actually was this time round. The sleeves consisted of three layers, yellow, yellow to orange ombre, and red.  I loved the sleeves.  The tunic laced up on the sides and the leaves were glued on with E6000, you can still smell the glue faintly as it is STRONG stuff. Seriously. use it in a well ventilated area.

    I also found a really cool online site that lets you touch up photos. I then had a lot of fun as you can see in the above photo. Everything is black and white except for me. I tried it the other way too just for giggles but it just didn't look quite right.