Since today is the real Halloween I'm trying to keep the scary spirit up, but most of it is all partied out I must confess..Fortunately for me my outfit looked a lot better on me than on the mannequin, but not very witchy..more like a Fable barmaid..but I can live with that too! The party was wild enough for no one to actually ask me what I dressed up as, and the only clue to the witchiness was my poiton-bottle-necklace. Either way, my goal was to look very Fabel-y!
..And now might be a good time to mention that Fable is my favourite game (or maybe I should say my only game..which would be a vicious lie, because I have two! there's also Kefflings..), but more for the world it has..not so much for the story of the game. One of my impossible wishes is to move in to the world of fable..maybe in a house in Bowerstone..or Oakfield..that would be today's happyplace.
But on the that subject, my Halloween outfit (which is not of the 1800's as most of my stuff lately) and the film Lorna Doone that I watched part of this morning made me so very inspired to go back in time further than usually and do more 1600's things..we'll see..It's calling for me...
Just a short one before I go to sleep way too late again.
As I said, I threw together a witches outfit for Halloween..though it looks mostly peasant-y..and here I am flaunting it. The only new (that is relatively new, it's part of a dress I made 10 years ago) thing is the apron and an adorable little potion flask-necklace (tame travel, my favourite!). Then there's the pirate chemise and stays with a black underskirt and two red skirts on that and thadaa! I'm so rolling around in it right now.
And just as a side note: as you can see, mannequins don't really lace up that well...
..and one can wonder..is that a 4th generation of dressmakers I'm seeing..?
Since I just watched the latest episode of Dexter and the combination of murder an religion kind of creeps me out in a big way I thought, "bogging sounds like a good idea!".
Here's a witch who knows when bare thigh is a good thing and not.
So I'm now counting down the days to my favourite holiday, Halloween. (I do see the irony in that. My second favourite is Easter..I think we all see where that's going.) It's been decided, I'm going as a witch to my own Halloween party! Today my Lus helped me finish up the potion jars and I made the few items needed to complete my witch outfit. I felt really cooled out there for a moment (okay, it's still that moment!) when I realized that I now have enough complete pieces of clothing to just find an outfit that just needs a few extra things..and that's that. I've always wanted that to be possible! So my added pieces are apron and maybe a headpiece. I'll probably do some accessories too, but for now I'm gonna enjoy being cooled out.
I must squeeze in though that, and this happens every time there's a dress up situation, Googling for inspiration really sucks ass! Clearly Google knows that there's just no other theme than stripper for a dress up party! I'm serious, write anything with costume and there will be 100 stripping "costumes"...really, we're not all living in an American comedy. ("oh God, it's just me isn't it" is the first thought after that)
But back to Halloween!
About the potion jars, that's artistic freedom if anything! Just some cleaned up food jars and vitamin bottles, fabric,paper and string and basically whatever one can think of stuffing the jars with! I went a bit stuffing crazy, but I think I succeeded in not over doing it..too much..I think. My sons favourite is the one with a shrinked child inside..and the least favourite the one with the skeleton..both victims of my "DrinkMe" shrinking potion.
Hopefully the Halloween party will be a success..! It might be less of a success at the daycare when Lus walks in as "Puss in booths" on monday..but that's just a different story.
..in reality there's no part of me thinking I could actually live in the country (because everyone knows that's where the mass murdering psychos thrive..and bugs.), in reality I need city noise and asphalt under my feet to be truly happy.. but this looks so like the house I dreamt of having as a child..it is also right where I'd want it, in a living history museum in France (if I remember correctly).
It doesn't get more "Belle-from the beauty and the beast" to me..aside from the fact that I've always been very Belle pre-Beast maybe...the Beast kind of fucks it all up. It's not adventure enough to just move to the forest with your boyfriend and get a golden dress, come oon!!
.."Victorionized" is a Skrutt-invented expression for what I experienced some time ago.
One might think that someone who lights the gas light in the morning, knows how to boil starch and who's 3 year old child says "splendid" wouldn't be surprised at the level of impact "Victorianazition" can have on life..but just the other day my son got to a bottle of cough syrup..and my first thought when I came in the room and saw him drinking it was: oh my God, tell me that one's not opium based!! Because for a second there it seemed totally possible. Fortunately cough medicines haven't really changed at all (aside from the opium..) in the way that the most dangerous ingredient is liquorice, so he was fine.
But it really gave me a perspective on how "Victorianized" I already am.
...and I didn't mean a little flowers! Considering the vast amount of flowers my mother-in-law brought me today I might just have to learn some of this!?
In the middle of all the big entire-outfit-making projects I do sneak off sometimes to do little things on the side..in some cases they end up awsomafying my outfit..other times it's just cool in it self. In a way these are like creative one night stands..if you know what I mean.
..like this one.
or this..
Like the "picture" I made yesterday (literallyyy). I'm not sure what to call it..but the idea was born out of having lots of small dolls lying around and a bathroom decoration-frame thingy my friend Skrutt (again) thought I might have use for..and clearly I did! So in my 2-day project I molested the frame and turned it into a window. It's the new home for my Victorian street children. I always tend to be more fascinated by the dark side of life..so from the left there is first and orphan boy and his baby sister..a factory girl..a street-seller selling candy..and a pickpocketing boy. In my mind it's around Christmas time..hence the snow. All of the are alone, not all of them has shoes. And all the advertisement in the background is authentic Victorian. That's always fun to research, some of them are seriously odd!
Other than that I've been practising my hat making skills! I went a little hat-making-crazy after getting a bunch of base hats from my mother-in-law for my birthday..and today she came over to see her grandson bringing fabric flowers so now it's on again! but I am getting better at it. I think..?
The first one is obviously the paper one for my outfit. Then the black and the pale straw hats next to it. And today I made the one on the lamp..really pleased with that one! And yes, that is a spider peaking out under the flower.
Apart for some minor adjustments at the end, it does look like I dreamed it would. The accuracy-perfectionist is satisfied (ok, almost satisfied) and the environmentally cautious anti-consumerist in my is happy to say that there is almost nothing new about this dress. All the fabric and lace and buttons have already been used as something else..the starched stripes inside the bodice and all the fabric covering the hat is older than my self.
I feel a little scarlet o'hara in my cutting up of curtains and bedsheets...only less horrid.
So now that I've nearly finished my outfit ( I still haven't done that last thing) I've decided to include my family too! (not the extended one..I'm not crazy..er..)
Victorian child
My husband is already partly styled up from previous sewing adventures, so I'm mostly doing shirts, but my son with all his growing all the time "gets" to be styled again. Actually I've never really made a Victorian child's outfit before..what I have done is made him into a miniature adult..Victorian. So here's some of my inspiration for all this!
Victorian child in progress
Just like my own clothes I'm going for a sort of in the middle style, not poor but not rich either. As a Victorian child my son will be having knee-length trousers, shirt, jacket, a huge bow around his neck that'll be just freaking adorable and hat (aside from things like socks and shit..). I've already done the shirt!
Next is a larger version (or possibly 2, but that's my secret project for now) and less frilly around the neck for my other boy's outfit. Like always I've googled a picture of how the shirt and pattern should look and stared at it creepily for some time to figure it out, so now I just have to draw it up, try it and hope that all that staring paid off.
Truth is I'd kill (not literally..I'm not nearly bad enough at it for that) for a pre-made pattern ordered of the internet to fit all sizes, but alas, I live where dreams go to die and apparently "they" don't ship to the yello-snow covered hell-hole that is my birthplace..it's true, there is no room for patriotism when denial has left the building.
Anywaay, side tracked a little there, but what's a little bitterness at 2.40 in the "morning", now back to the point of this blogg.
My favourite inspiration for my husbands outfit right now is a picture I found of the man who illustrated one of my favourite books, Gustave Dore. It's a little too early in the era, but I like the casual style!
I really do like getting drawn into a period of time and every single detail of it becomes interesting! Something I discover more and more is that this one fascinates me a lot more than first expected. It's like going on a vacation..only to me that implies the desperate longing to stay..and this has in a way become like that. I'd like to have as much of it around me as I possibly can. Like I mentioned in an earlier blogg post, this feels more like home than my own time and place. And, unlike some pseudo-psychologist might think..there's nothing rose-coloured about it.
Picture from Dore's London
As I'm doing this..sewing and researching, there grows a story in all of it..but more on that much later.
And lastly..If you're sitting out there in a nice foreign country..enjoy! Living in Finland is like that time your sister ate all your Christmas calendar candy..lot's of expectations and that blowhole sitting next to you with a big chocolate mouth. Don't get me wrong, I love my sister deeply.. I just loath this country very much.
Hopefully by next year I wont have reason to bitch about it, so I can promise this to be my only time!
No..I can't end with that..this will be my sending-me-to-bed ending, it has nothing to do with anything, but it does make me in a very good mood!
Since today is the real Halloween I'm trying to keep the scary spirit up, but most of it is all partied out I must confess..Fortunately for me my outfit looked a lot better on me than on the mannequin, but not very witchy..more like a Fable barmaid..but I can live with that too! The party was wild enough for no one to actually ask me what I dressed up as, and the only clue to the witchiness was my poiton-bottle-necklace. Either way, my goal was to look very Fabel-y! 
..And now might be a good time to mention that Fable is my favourite game (or maybe I should say my only game..which would be a vicious lie, because I have two! there's also Kefflings..), but more for the world it has..not so much for the story of the game. One of my impossible wishes is to move in to the world of fable..maybe in a house in Bowerstone..or Oakfield..that would be today's happyplace.
