10 years is a long time.

Arsenic green part 2

I am only buttons away form being finished with my arsenic green dreams dress. Literally, I have to find some buttons and then it is done. 

I'm having it for the Dickensian Christmas fair this year. It's not really very Dickensian (that tends to be either Regency or mid Victorian) but it is Victorian! and it turns out my friend Michelle does way better in a bonnet than I do.. Still, I'm pretty happy with my dress! 

I've made it in the style of the mid 1880's but I like to make it look a little bit unfashionable partly because I think it suits me better. If this was actually that time and I was really a Victorian I would be a lower middle class housewife with eccentric tendencies all the same, so it feels more at home to be..me.

In the past I've made the highneck collars of the 1880's but they do bore me.. I know everyone had them but would I have? That's always what I think when I make them and so this time I didn't. It adds to the unfashionability of it as well since a low neckline is an earlier fashion than the bustle at the back and I kind of like that..

The bustle was this ones annoyance though! There's always one thing that I get stuck on.. It's usually the sleeves or the neckline so I kept my eyes on that so much that the lower back part went off on a weird one. In the end I got it fixed but as one might notice it made the back a little shorter than expected. But I decided to be fine with that. For the most part the bustle will be made up of the green skirt since the apron skirt might just stay as a front piece.

That's another historically accurate piece, the apron skirt. Somewhere in the early 1880's the detachable part of the 1870's bustle swings to the front and becomes like an apron. I quite like the look of that, it makes it look like one is walking in a strange duck-like way. 

And speaking of historically accurate, I have not been so proud of a discovery for ages as I was when I last time discovered the right way to angle the fabric to make the stripes go in the historically accurate looking direction. So proud! (selvedge in the sides, not in the front/back) So this one is, now deliberately, made in the same way.

Now there are only the buttons left. 

The gloves are actually a pretty clever idea that Michelle, my partner in...sewing? had a few days ago. My sleeves are a little short for wintertime, and it is getting pretty freezing even in Kent, so I cut a kneesock in half and sewed it into my crochet cloves for warmth. We'll see how that turns out..

Undecided about the hat yet...I might have to turn to google for inspiration.

To be continued..

A taste out of todays Annoying bowl!

You know what I really hate? People who fear conflict. And I don't mean globally, I'm not sitting here backing conservative millionaires warmongering, no, I mean the little pointless fears of conflict. Like when I have a question to sort out and everyone answers "that's not my responsibility". Or when you are not allowed to go 2 streets down to talk to an actual person but have to instead call them. I don't like personal fear of conflict because I think it makes people unnecessarily boring while complicated at the same time, but I really hate the middle management  fear of conflict! I want to beat them with sticks until they take their human responsibilities. 

As for warmongering millionaires..there's two types of fear of conflict and I'm pretty sure you all chose the wrong one.

 

How Maidstone feels at this time of the year.

I ended up wearing a scarf wrapped around my head like someone out of the Emigrants today. That happened.

Belated Halloween

Sometimes things happen as fast as when rolling down a hill. And no one blogs while rolling down hills, but now I'm back!

This was the foggiest and warmest Halloween I have ever had. It was pretty perfect actually.. Partly because I finished Lus costume in time for once! The day before Halloween it was hanging there on the hanger, all finished and accessorised and ready to wear. 

And the costume: Draco Malfoy from the Harry Potter films.

The scarf was ready weeks ago and we already did the wands so all there really was to fix was the cloak (he already has a uniform because..England.) so during a day of Halloween films to keep the child occupied and off the floor I cut out and sewed up his green and black wool cloak. Wool was ridiculously hard to find in this country. I ended up buying it online and it was ok..but I suppose the British are not a wool wearing people?

As always my child picked the side of evil and so I had to also make a slytherin badge as well. Part of me didn't have the time to find a real one and part of me just really didn't want to so instead I looked it up and drew it onto some fabric and painted it instead. It could have been smoother around the edges but I think it's good enough. 

Then off he was! to Leeds castle for magic lessons. Pretty awesome actually.

To me it's still surprising how much of the British schools actually are just like Hogwarts! As I mentioned he obviously already have uniforms  but also things like being divided into houses and having prefects and getting house points for doing things and that weird pupil-teacher relationship where they call them by the last names, that actually happens! So really, Harry Potter is much less fiction then we all imagined. It's like a version of school all the English kids imagine would be the coolest school ever..I imagine. If English kids had really restricted imaginations (which is entirely possible!)

As soon as winter sets in for real I'll send him to school dressed like this.

And the rest of Halloween? well our pumpkin carving night went off as usual. We even dressed up! there were genies, witches, cats and even a "masked adventure" (still laughing about that)...and of course a morally grey wizard. 

Trick or treating is one of my favourites though. It's one of the few times of the year when peaking into other peoples houses is totally acceptable. And no child can eat all the sweets by them selves! 

As some might remember I am also slightly superstitious so at the end of the day I didn't let the lights go out..

Happy Halloween.