still pleating

not much to update, I'm still pleating and attaching the skirt and I still need to do the sleeves for the dress, I'm up to 70 hours on the dress now. The puppy has been very distracting and I can only get work done when he and my son are asleep which really cuts down on the time I can spend working. Lucky for me once the dress is done the only required item I have left to do is the petticoat

delays

why do I do this to myself during IRCC? I got a puppy, I've been thinking about it for a long time with the hopes to have a new hearing dog. It does mean I am very busy chasing the puppy and keeping Neil from always being in the puppy's face.

His name is Raleigh, after Sir Walter Raleigh. He is a Rottweiler/ German Shepherd mix and he is a doll. Within minutes of coming home he curled up on the pile that is my IRCC gown and promptly fell asleep. So of course it was the most adorable thing ever and really annoying because it means I couldn't get the work done that I wanted to.

Bodice

quick pic of the bodice

binding

finally finished the binding on the bodice! I hope I have made enough lucet cord to try it on tomorrow and finish the strap placements- then onto the skirt!

bodice skinned

the fashion fabric is now attached to the bodice. I need to grade my seams and give it a good pressing before I take pics, and start putting the boning in.  I am now very tired!

bodice guts

two layers of twill canvas with heavy duty eyelets

pocket

so I have been doing as much work as I can after Neil goes to sleep on the bodice. It's slow going, I'm holding out to borrow a sewing machine to do the boning channels this weekend. so to distract me and to feed into my costuming ADD I started working on an embroidered pocket. The pattern is from an Italian pattern book from the mid 15oo's I have decided to try  a more traditional Or Nue technique This will be my second gold work project as the needle book was my first

working

Bodice has been cut out and lining put together, boning channels are drawn and need to be sewn.

I am playing with more wire jewelry and made two pairs of earrings and have started making components for the girdle




and the feather fan is done 

updating

 I feel I haven't been updating enough and I know I have a lot of folks who like to see in progress pictures. So I will try to be a bit better about that.

Since I finished the camica I am trying to give my hands a bit of a break so to mix things up I am painting a parasol with elements of my heraldry. It is very similar to the one I did last year as I really fell in love with it, sadly it made it to only one event before my son broke it. So I am making a new one. This time I am doing a touch more color to give the illusion that it is shaded and I am thinking of adding lace

Pics so far

Elements drawn out and painted ermine drawn

Ermine being painted

One half finished!

Next

Next on my list is the actual dress and to finish the work on the replacement parasol

Camicia Done!!

 The camicia is finally done! It is made of this diaphanous 8mm habotai silk. It is all sewn by hand. Each piece was cut then given a rolled hem that was then fagot stitched together with black silk thread. On the cuffs I created my own design made up of half of a pomegranate and half of a compass rose (elements from my heraldry) with some scroll work. I used a reverse chain stitch for the embroidery.

To close the cuff I used two pearls and embroidered button loops.

I'm making it a point to track my hours worked on each project this year as a lot of folks asked me how long each element took on last years projects and I really didn't have an answer. According to my time tracker I spent 94 hours and 18 minutes on the camicia.

As also seen in the camicia picture I have also finished two necklaces to go with this outfit. The shorter one of large pearls and jet beads and the longer, made up of two sizes of pearls, gold filigree beads, jet and coral. Both are strung on silk thread and hand knotted.

Two layers down, two to go!!