Lovely mending and random stuff

Hi everyone!

It's me, trying to get back into regular blogging. I have just been in a funk. Still no regular job, or steady income, so I'm just trying not to hit the brick wall as I scam my way through (don't forget to support my easy store-shameless plug!!). Hate it, but I'm not alone.

Onda has a new boyfriend.

Good morning lovely people. 

I bought Brian a sandwich.

Pimp My Dress Form: The 'She's got Legs' conclusion

Happy Monday one and all. 

I tell you, the weekend isn't long enough. Just when I get through with all the stuff I didn't have time to do during the week, Sunday evening us upon me. 

Don't you hate that?

I did manage to get some stuff done, though.

On Saturday completely cleaned house. Mopped the bathroom and kitchen floors, and set up the final touches of my drawing area.

Pimp My Dress Form: The 'She's got Legs' remix

Onda is still camera shy.

Everyone recalls my journey with Onda.

Let's talk about the sew-along.

This week I continued on with my get crap done initiative. 

I have this wax plant clipping that I got about 10 years ago when I was still in college. This one is about 5 years old. It's safe to call it a plant now, I think :) It's starting to flower again, and there is nothing more wondrous than smelling these sweet flowers on the air as you sleep. It's heavenly.

Circle the Wagons, it's the Official Launch of Make & Mend 2011!

Sloper is such a silly word, conclusion.

Tonight its 'Everything That Happens Will Happen Today', by David Byrne. He's awesome.

Oh.

My.

Goodness.

This was the most wonderful sewing exercise I've ever done!

My slopers turned out fantastic! I'm so happy. I made 9 pieces; two bodice fronts with different dart placements, two hip length bodice fronts, two corresponding back pieces, a skirt front and back, and a sleeve.

Sure there are some minor tweaks that need to be done, like I need to reposition the bust dart on the under bust slopers, but I am overwhelmingly pleased with this project.

The neckline is perfect. Not like, "I need to adjust it some and it will be great."

I mean perfect!

That was my main concern, the neck and shoulders and those are the best fitting parts. The upper bust and armholes fit like a dream. Im thrilled.

I don't have pictures of me in said sloper because I was in my skivvies while I was trying it on, so, um, no pics of that.

The first attempt at the sleeve (pictured) was a complete disaster, but that was my fault. I followed this tutorial (which is great) to make the sleeve sloper, but where it recommends how much ease to add on the arm, I added the max of 3", which should have been a red flag in my brain. You can see all the extra ease at the top where its sewn to the bodice, ew.

Don't worry. I fixed it with a much more precise sleeve that I just finished.

This ends my worry that Onda was smaller than me. Nope, we are right on track. *whew* She said we were the same size, but I didn't listen.

I'm really happy with this and now I just want to remake all my dresses. Oh! The fun of deciding how much ease I'm gonna put in my garments! Squeeeee! Its like a puzzle and I LOVE puzzles.

On another note, I'm sure you all are glad that Make & Mend Month is extended through August. I hope this will motivate people who didn't join earlier to join now and get some stuff fixed!

I'm excited to get craftier and see what else I can do. I still have to finish that cloche I drafted, and the make something for someone else. I have a day dress in my head that I want to make.

Or, perhaps Ill make something from last month's pattern acquisitions. The beauty of buying for my etsy store is that I often get to keep the patterns I really like.

Only a few this month, because I cut back on spending. But this August I have a bit of extra cash and oh, I'm gonna treat myself.

Yay patterns and yay slopers!

Sloper is such a silly word.

sloper [n]: a basic pattern that follows the natural lines and represents the basic dimensions of a figure, from which all styles are based on. Also called basic pattern, block pattern, or foundation pattern.

Onda and I were having coffee and she said,

". . . . . . . . . . . . . ."

And I was all, "Yeah." And she said,

". . . . . . . . . . . . . ."

"Okay, we can try that."

Id never made a base pattern. I didn't even know how, but I was getting tired of reworking shoulders and dragging out the one pattern that I really liked the fit to match it up to my current work so I wouldn't have that much issue with fit. Then I was all, hey, can't a base pattern help with that?

Onda said, ". . . . . . . . . . . . . ."

How can I argue with that? I got out my muslin, and bulked up Onda with a couple of t shirts.

Then I sewed a band around her waist and marked her in half. I also marked 7" down for the hips and in the back I did a different marking to make the back level with the front in case I was going to make an over the waist jacket or something.

I did two different bodice patterns, one with the dart beneath the arm, and one with the dart on the shoulder. I have a lot of gathered bust patterns so I thought putting the extra fabric up there was a good call.

I still cant believe her body is my body. She's so shapely.

I've done the front, back and front and back for a skirt. I even remembered to match up the darts on the waist to the ones on the skirt, like all my vintage patterns. I'm going to mark the seam allowance later and do a mock up. Once thats done and the fit is good, I plan on tracing the base minus the seam allowance onto heavy card stock and use it as a map for altering my patterns.

Like Threads Magazine did. I of course WOULD find this article AFTER I did all this, right!?

I just made a sloper, I'm gettin' fancy!

Pimp my dress form conclusion.

Im done. Im glad Im done.

I decided to give Onda some bling by transferring my actual tattoo onto her. I added some color, but its position is pretty spot on.

People always ask me what I have on my back so I can now just show them Onda. Case closed!

Pimp my dress form; redux.

Meet Josephine, my new head form.

Id actually planned her way before Onda because I wanted a head bust in a larger size (23") but didn't want to pay crazy bank for one. She started out as an aluminum foil head, and I was going to cover it in sculpy.

As I worked on Onda, I decided to do Josephine the same way, but used linen strips for the cover. I know she looks like a mummy, but I like the basic shape and no face.

She can wear a hat and thats what matters. I like the looks so much that Im re-shooting all the hats in my etsy store.

Onda is almost finished. Im piecing the back of her now because I ran out of the green linen. I was listening to The Mighty Wind Soundtrack (because its awesome) while I was painting Onda in glue and I realized, "Im sick of this glue stuff." I cant wait until shes done.

This was way too much work.

Pimp my dress form.

So Onda and I have been talking (about as much as one can talk with a headless dress form), and she thinks she's a bit 'under matched'. I mean she does look home made. Not that there is anything against that, its just she has a store bought personality.

Women.

After thinking on it a bit and realizing if I didn't do something to her I wouldn't use her, I decided to reshape her shoulders a bit, and give her a bit of a sleek look. I give all the credit to my little friend below.

Oh Elmer, is there anything you cant mildly fix?

After the shoulder shape up, I coated Onda's duct tape innards in a single layer of newsprint and glue/water mixture.

From there I decided to draft a cover (linen) that I can't WAIT to coat in the glue mix. I LOVE that stuff! After I draped the side (my first attempt at it) I matched the fabric and did some quick sewing.

I had to shape the boobs a bit more than original, and draping the sewn piece back in place was a bit of a challenge, Im getting it. Once the front is coated and dry, Ill drape the back and Onda will feel like a million bucks.

Meet my new friend, Onda.

I did it, I made a duct tape dress form. Thanks to a lot of help from my friend Jen, who now knows more of my wobbly bits than she ever wanted, I managed to finally get this done.

The whole thing cost 6 rolls of tape (two were used after the wrapping, and I still have one leftover), and two bags of packing peanuts. In sum a total of a few hours and $22. I put a hanger in the shoulders so I could hang the dress form up.

It was an interesting feeling as the tape built up, and me bending was out of the question.
After Onda was cut off me, I spent the next day stuffing her and shaping her a bit. I had to pinch the waist, because we had to wrap tons around the middle. I also padded the hips some. Shes really, really close to my measurements at 48, 39, 51. The upper bust is a bit larger on her than me (42" Im 41"). I may layer her with a few shirts to give her some padding so shes squishy.

The name Onda comes from a life size doll I had as a kid. She was like a life size Barbie, about 4' 8" tall, chocolate brown, and wearing a jean shorts set! My older cousin was so impressed by the name Onda. I forget why I called her that, but I feel its time to bring it back.

Its strange seeing my body size not in the mirror. Ive dressed her in a few of my shirts, and she looks cuter than me. But she is me, right? Creepy...