Frankly Updates

Ah, such a boring name.

Well, the sun popped out today. I'm feeling a little more jumpish. I got rather down on Saturday.

My chemises are rather slow-in-going right now, but the first half of the first chemise is pinned to the fabric, so I miiight get it cut out sometime soon. :P Once the fabric begins to diminish, I'll get more up about it, because there's a big, neat pile of white muslin on the end of the makeshift cutting table. :) It's really just a round folding table with the cardboard covered-with-measurements foldable cutting board thingy. It's hanging off both ends, too... I just hate it that I haven't got a nice big table or something to cut on. It's so much more useful, even if you have to racing all around the room to get to other ends!

The planning for a corset is progressing. I went out and asked about various patterns for different mid-19th century underthings and tossed the idea of getting the pattern for chemises from Past Patterns #708, then I got a bit of info on different types of corsets, and which I should use. There are two types, the gusseted, which has gussets over the curves of the body... cuts in the fabric which are expanded and have pieces of fabric sewn in (the gussets look vaguely triangular when they're done), and then there's the gored type which has gores all over to make the shape of the corset. The gored one is by far much simpler, but I really prefer the gusseted type for gobs of reasons. It started way back when I first became familiar with gussets in anything, though really and primarily corsets. I don't know why I was attracted to the making-of-them (which is a little more 'complicated' than gored corsets); it may be my oddball want of more hard stuff.

Anyways, there are other advantages for me, in my opinion, to make a gusseted corset. A lot of it has to do with the shape the corset would give, the support, the comfort and... way of how it works that I believe I'd like better for wearing, and probably more. Of course, this is all too weird for normal 21st century people...?

I'm probably going to go first with Simplicity's #2890. I have always had a dislike of Simplicity, but it seems since it's cheap, and the ladies on the SA say it's accurate, I could go with it. Anyways, it was designed by one of the ladies on the board, whom I know is dedicated to accuracy. :) If you're interested (at all... I think it's just fun to scoot around on her site), this is her store site... she has a lot of ready-made clothing on there.

Mostly the reason why I think it would be plenty fine to go with the Simplicity is because we can get it DIRT cheap around here at JoAnn's. Just wait for one of those $1 or $2 sales at the stores (generally they just happen on you all-of-a-sudden), and get it. That's sort of the way we got some patterns recently. It's just... foolproof. :P If it doesn't work, it won't be much of a waste because that pattern is so cheap, and I can learn from it: if I have to get Past Patterns' one, or Laughing Moon's, well, I'll just have to really mean it, and I'll be ok with it. :) I don't like to get pricier things without a reason.


The reason I just suddenly decided (because I did) was because one of the ladies on the board (SA... I'm so used to calling it 'the board' now) encouraged me to really encouragingly. So I think I'll just go head-over-heels into it, and maybe I'll make some progress. I'm getting into the habit of making progress. It's hard to start sewing historical clothing JUST like that, because sewing last year (back in September) was stressing me out SO much because, well, I was under a lot of stress to get it done, and we had lots of problems with the skirt and shirt I made, and so I had a big, long rest from sewing. I am almost over it, but I still fear I'll go into huge lapses of stress again. Hopefully not. Frankly, if I do it myself it tends to be ok, because I don't have to worry about blaming other people for things. :P I get to blame myself, cleanly. And I did wondrously on my skirt, the calico one... arrrg, I need to crop one of those pictures and post it here. Then y'alls can see the gorgeousness of my plans.


You may have guessed, I'm kind of happyish right now. Joyful. The temperature went up today, instead of hanging in the 40's with rain and all, and so that's nice, and it helped. Then, this morning, I got totally inspired about 1860's work dresses again, so now I'm trying to find out how many ways I can decorate my work dress without going overboard. Oh, and I'm figuring out where to get a good, round, largish-handled whittling knife. I love the idea of going at whittling and stuff, and practising to perfection, so to speak. I want to try to make a Noah's Ark sometime soon. Lots of little pairs of animals, and a nice ark to put them all in. It's one of the most creative ideas I can think of now for a child's plaything; I've been into it ever since I reread On the Banks of Plumb Creek some time ago. And then, recently, it was recalled when I was reading one of Mrs. Clark's articles on elizabethstewartclark.com. Joy! I also want to make needle-cases and little boxes and randomly carve some things, and make my legendary Javelin. He's not exactly a javelin, but he is THE Javelin, all right. And I want to make him. A nice, strong, taller-than-me stick of wood, thick enough to be whittled down to a still-thick size, and be a good stick for lots of things.

Yay for whimsical ideas! You all should get your own, really. I mean, don't get downed by life! Just DO things. It's tons of fun.