I finished my renaissance dress sewing project in the summer of 2010 and wore it to our state Renaissance festival.

How to make a dress out of a napkin

Yup. I made a dress out of a napkin. I made two. doll sized of course, but one thing you should know is that they were cloth napkins.

Creating doll clothes is one of my favorite hobbies. And I have a huge supply of cloth napkins, so I will be busy these days.....

Theater costumes!

My school is doing a spring musical this year, and that got me thinking about what they might do for their costumes! They might just rent from other big theaters or Opera houses, or they might have the students that are interested help out, like they do for the lights. So I asked a friend what they do for the tech stuff and he said they have students do it! So I emailed the director of technical things for the play telling him that I am an aspiring costume designer and would like to help out. I am so excited because I think they will need me, and now I have a chance to work with costumes! And the play takes place in the time period that I have been studying. I can't wait. The play is called "Kiss me Kate" a take off on the play "The taming of the shrew" by shakespear.

Mannequin Prom dress

I know it has been a very long time since I last posted anything, but that is because I haven't been sewing much. But I have gotten back into it by making myself a small work station for sewing projects like pillow cases and tiny prom dresses! Yup, that is what I have sewn so far in 2010. I made pillow cases for each of my siblings for Christmas and I just finished a tiny prom dress for my Mannequin. I used some pretty purple fabric that I got for Christmas from my brother for this prom dress.

I love purple fabric. If I ever go to a prom I would want my dress to look like this, purple with twists in the fabric so it looks like roses.

And my dress would have a gold sash, a wide gold sash around the waist.

I hope to enter this in our county fair, I wrote out the instructions for how to make it and I made the pattern! Tiny prom dresses are fun!

Computer

My computer crashed a few months ago that is why I haven't been writing. We are hoping that it will be back up and running in January. look for posts then.

Sewing class

As you may know, I am taking a sewing class at Andover High School this year. I just recently finished our first project in that which was a bag. We didn't have a pattern, our teacher just told us each step. It was pretty fun even though it was sort of easy. It was more relaxing than stressful. I love my bag! Here is what it looks like.

It was loads of fun to make and I use it every day. I like to sew stuff that is useful. As you can see the inside is blue and the outside is purple with a yellow pocket. I also got to use an embroidery machine for my pocket design. I put my initials on the pocket front just for fun. I did something I had never done before with this project, the corners of the bag. It was interesting how we did them. We folded the corners so the seams lined up and the just stitched across them. I was sort of scared to do that because I thought it would ruin the corners, but I guess not. It ended up giving the corners a sturdy edge and look more professional. So in the end I had a bag, a nice bag that I was proud of.

Something new!

I decided one day that I wanted to design and sew something new, something different. So I took an old skirt pattern and altered it a bit and made a smaller sized pattern. I cut out the fabric with my new little pattern pieces and started to sew. I really didn't know what i was doing to tell the truth. In the end it looked like a little doll sized skirt! I went and got my American girl doll to try it on, but it was to big. I was disappointed. I had wanted it to work. So I tried it one her in a different way, as a dress! It ended up working perfectly as a strapless dress!

I went out into the garden and took some pictures of her in it, and here they are.

Divine

It has been a long while since my last post, but that is because I have been ever so busy with costume design and writing a book about fairy fashion. I now have a scrap of time to write. I will soon start my next journey to the sewing machine. My hope is to create a dress from the 1200s time and also sew a cape. I want to finish it before winter so that I can use the velvet cape on cold nights.

Isn't it lovely? I am saving up for the fabric because I want it to be nice and expensive. I will spend lots of thought thinking about the right color. I don't want white because that gets dirty quickly. I would love to know what color you think will look good with this dress.

Costume Designing

I have discovered a love for costume designing. I love to sew, AND I love to design my own styles and fashions, (e.g. fairy fashion :) so being a costume designer for a movie would be a dream for me. Next year when I go to the high school, I will take all their sewing classes and all their fashion classes, so I can learn everything I can about that wonderful career.
One of the things that helped me discover this was the behind the scenes of The Lord of the Rings DVD. I know it sounds silly at first. The behind the scenes had a section about the costume that were needed to bring it off the ground.

In the Lord of the Rings there were:
*19,000 costumes all sewn just for the movie
*40 seamstresses
*billions of hand linked links for chain mail
*tons of hand embroidered costumes
*and too many other amazing things to be able to mention them all

This is why I want to be a costume designer. If you don't understand why I am excited about 19,000 hand designed costumes, then I guess you weren't made to be a costume designer:)

Future Wedding Dress?

Ahhh. Look at that dress. I found this dress while searching for Fairy Fashion on the Internet. I wish I could sew like that. I am resolved to sew my own wedding dress and I will make it look like this one as much as I can. But that is a ways up the road from now so I had better learn to sew that well.

I think that drawing dresses might help me in the long run of being a costume designer, so to figure out how to tweak the dress to my liking, I drew it up in different ways. I drew a spring-like sleeveless dress

and a more old styled dress with small puffed sleeves.

Renaissance Costume

Last year I went to a renaissance festival with my family for a day, and we dressed up for it. I wore a dress that looked sort of like a Cinderella dress and my sister wore a cape she had made. At the festival there were lots of shops that sold fabulous dresses and outfits and there were people like us who wore fabulous outfits. I got so many sewing project ideas there I had trouble keeping them all in my head, but I managed to remember some of them.

My favorite dress that I saw there was a fitted dress with a thin cord around the waistline and a full skirt below it. I drew it up as best I could but it is nothing like the real dress.

The hair of this girl is in two parts as you can see, and has a ribbon wrapped around each part. This is not a braid, but long rolls of hair that are held together by the ribbons. I found this very interesting.

If you have a dress or outfit that caught your eye, you can post as a comment and I would love to see it.

Fairy Fashion

Something that has grabbed my interest is Fairy Fashion and Fairies. I design Fairy like dresses and outfits and then draw fairies wearing them. Here are some of my favorites:

A fancy ball gown for Royalty

Desert Fairy Tunic

Commoner's ball gown

Fancy party dress

Fairy ballet leotard

Doing it differently

I have been busy preparing for high school next year and also have been neglecting my blog. But now I am here to write again! Next year in school I will be taking an architecture and computer class, band, and a sewing class. I will have to start with the first class in sewing which is where you learn the basics, but I am alright with that, there probably are things that I have forgotten. I hope to work my way up to the higher sewing classes from there. In the beginning class you make a bag or pajama pants, and learn how to read a pattern, and the other classes you learn to use all the different techniques of the sewing machine. I can't wait to see the sewing machines! Our sewing machine is from the seventies and has no computer technology what so ever. It is a good sewing machine for the seventies though.

It will be hard for me to have to learn a totally different machine and learn to do things different, but I think it is worth it. I have had a new yearning to use a modern computerized sewing machine, and to meet other people my age who love to sew, and the school class is just the place for that.

I finished my green skirt and I am ready for another sewing project. My next sewing project will be the biggest thing I have ever made on my own. This is what I will sew next.

A New Project

I'm back to my blog! I have a new sewwing project that I am almost finished with! It is a skirt of a pretty green fern pattern and is just the right length for a skirt. It is mid shin legth and has a very full skirt. I love it a lot, and can not wait to beable to wear it! I am happy with the fabric I chose, because I usally go with blue fabric and that is not even my favorite color. Since I am still a beginner at sewwing things to wear, like dresses and skirts, I chose an easier pattern from our pattern box. It only has two easy pattern pieses and a simple waistband. The skirt was not supposed to be gathered at the waistband but I cut the pattern wrong, so to make it fit right I had to gather it a little at the waistband.( Well, my mom really was the person who gathered it. I just watched and learned.)

Now for the reason I chose a skirt as my sewwing project instead of, let's say, a bag or pillow. Well, a pillow would just be to easy! Same with the bag. I've done those before, and I enjoy sewwing skirts and dresses much more. Dresses are a girlish sort of clothing( I like that because I am a girl) and the dresses and skirts I sew and wear are more modest, concervitive "old days" styles.

I would like to bring back to teenage girls minds the beauty of simple wardrobe. I don't really think that the tight, revealing clothes of some of todays girls wardrobes are very modest or make me see God's glory in there dress, manner or speach. We should be girls of Gods glory not our's. So, fellow girls, let's be God honoring in our dress.

Starting my project

I have started my new sewing project! I started it yesterday, and found out that the person who had it before I did had cut out the patturn pieces at size medium, and I need size large! Now I have to guess at where I need to cut it. But besides that little setback, I would say that everything is going fine.
So far I have the patturn pieces cut out and I am ready to start the sewing part.
Since the fabric I chose is very slippery, I have to wait with the sewing because I need to get a new sewing needle so that is does not snag the fabric.

What I love... Sewing!

As I start this new blog about my love for sewing, and other works with needle and thread, I would love to tell you that I am trying my hardest to start a sewing busness and website. That is what inspired me to have a blog too. It would be so fun to be able to chat with you about eachothers sewing projects and give and receive advice. What I love to sew the most are skirts and dresses. I love the pioneer days, so lots of my dresses are from that time period and style.
My friend, Mia and I went to a garage sale together and I found a patturn for some Colonial dresses for only 25 cents. I am planning on sewing one of them but I am not sure which one. Once I get the fabric for it, I will be sure to post some pictures of the whole sewing progress.
I just recently finished a light blue skirt that is ankle length. I learned alot of lessons on that project, and had to start all the way over again as well. Before that project I made a little red corduroy jumper for my 3 year old cousin. It was a little big for her, but she will grow into it. I had never worked with corduroy before, so I did not know that the nap had to go the same direction. I found out about that after I finished the dress. Thankfully my mom undid it for me and I just watched her.
(the picture up at the top of the page is of me working on this dress.)
So I hope that in the upcoming year or so I will get to meet lots of fellow sewwers who do whst they do for God and God alone. I'll see you in the next post, untill then keep up the good sewing projects!