The dreaded end of year post.

2013 was just not a costume productive year for me. I do not have oddles and oddles of costume projects to repost and share, thats been bothering me for a couple days. "I don't have a wrap up to blog about..." (insert possible feeling sorry for myself whine) 

But then I took a look at my 2013, I reeeeealy looked at it. Because while I do not have much sewing to crow about. Ladies and Gentelmen, friends and neighbors 2013 was a life- changing- amazing year. 

January - After 21 years of honerable and courageous service in both the Navy and the Air Force my Hubbie Matthew retired as a Master Sargent. I was so proud I could burst. We have had an amazing and interesting and neat and fun and challanging time of it and I would not change a thing. We met in the Navy many many moons ago so the military has mostly been our life and now its not. If nothing else happened, this one thing would have made this year special. 

Here we are many moons ago just starting our life together. 

And here we are at retirement...a wonderful moment. 

Then before we knew it he was off to a new job in Texas and we were working hard to wrap up a school year and while visiting Matthew for a week there was a tornado in our home town and the world stopped and stared. 

It was three days before we knew if we had a home. We spent those days trying to contact friends and neighbors and praying. We prayed for all of our friends and everyone touched by this storm. We finally got word that out block was still intact and made our way home. 

We started getting back to normal when Matthew found a car...no Matthew found THE car. So for his birthday in June we headed to PA to get it. We stopped along the way at a McDonalds to take a break only to catch live on the Weather Channel another tornado cutting accross Oklahoma City. This one was even closer to home. My mom and our children stayed with neighbors in a large underground shelter. We all waited out the storm via phone. Again our home missed the path of damage and we decided to continue on our trip. 

Here is Matthew in THE car getting ready to take to the Texas World Speedway track with his professional driving coach Wade for his Christmas present recently. The trip to PA ended up being romantic, lovely and just the together time Matthew and I rarely rarely get. 

While we were gone...we prayerfully decided to change our plan to move to Texas in the summer of 2014 and put our house on the market. With so many people in need of homes, it sold to the first family who came to look at it. They needed that home more than we needed to be in Oklahoma. So to Texas we came. 

But I didnt stay there long, it was summer vacation and I had the opportunity to travel East and visit some old dear friends I have not seen in a few years! 

What a joy to hug them all and catch up! In 2014 if all goes well we will be hosting our friends from Northern Ireland here in Texas. 

Oh lets not forget...I also took a little trip out to Henderson NV to help a friend who was recovering from a surgery move after her home sold. Four of us ladies took wing man in turn and we managed to get her through it with flying colors. Girlfriends are a precious precious treasure. 

Here were are "leaving Las Vegas!" Good-bye Hades like heat! It was not all bad however.

    

Then as life often does things sped up, got smooshed together and slipped by very quickly. 

I went to Costume College for the very first time!! Woot!! My dear friend Gina had a back injury and could not come with me (BOO- HISS) 

I bumped into lovely new costumers I have just met in 2012. Jen from Festive Attyre. 

I got to make this ball gown into a Pirate dress for the ball, I love the way Victorians took an old gown and re-made it to suit a new season or in this case a fancy ball. Also my tri-corn hat was super fun if I do say so myself. 

I finished a long overdue fantastic girlfriend dress project...The save me (from myself) sailor dress.

This for the reccord is the last time I can remember having my bustle...sigh. But that is for another post. 

We did it! We all have stunnng sailor dresses! My dear friends Gina, Beth and I. 

We moved...lets just take moment and say that again. We moved! 

Again, if nothing else happened in 2013 this would have been enough! I squeezed in a Charity SASS match at Fort Parker. 

and wore the Absinth tasting dress intended for the SPWF that never happened. UFO no longer undone! 

Then life sped up again and there were chickens 

and goats...

and the chickens have grown 

and I now have a huge space all my own to sew in that will soon be a dream space, now its just telling me it needs to be organized. 

and the Christmas SASS convention was here- just like that. 

I wore this dress 

hosted a tea with some lovely friends 

and yes I put documenting and photo taking back on my goal list for 2014 (again...) 

I also made my first Edwardian skirt. 

started a blue black and white dress which will also go on the UFO 2014 list 

 

I wore what is becoming my "this old thing" suit...but I love it. In 2014 this suit is getting a bigger better pop of red. 

So this year I learned that even when it seems like nothing is getting done and all your dresses are hanging forlornly in the closet. Life is good, it is short and it is very very sweet. May all of our costuming goals go by the wayside in 2014 with joy, if life comes calling for you to dance and may we take them up again with pleasure in Gods perfect time. Happy New Year! 

A tiara project part one.

My daughter loves to sew, and crochet and adores most everything vintage. She chooses to make homemade gifts instead of buying them whenever she can and spends hours and hours cutting paper snowflakes each christmas. I am blessed! 

Here is our new dress project. Daughter loves vintage movies, and of coarse she adored Audrey Hepburn (who dose'nt?) 

Classy! So we will be using a simplicity pattern to get us going namely this little 1873 by Cynthia Rowley. 

We will have to make a few changes to get just the right look but there is no need to re-invent the wheel from the ground up. 

For the classy little swing jacket she carries with this dress

We are going to use a vintage pattern purchased from Etsy. 

and the fabric we chose...

not too bad. While we think this dress was a strong pink, we are both happy with the look of the coral and daughter has a pair of coral shoes so...win! 

Now there is just the short wait for the after Christmas sale of Simplicity patterns and the post ro deliver the swing coat pattern and we are off! 

I hope everone is enjoying these days of Advent and will spend the twelve days of Christmas surounded by family and loved ones! 

Order of operations

In math there is an order of operations. The order in which you tackle large math problems and that order will get you to the right answer, that order is how you eat the elephant, that order is your one bite at a time. It goes some thing like this...PEMDAS parenthesis-exponents-multiply-divide-add-subtract. 

2014 is going to be my order of operations year and my order will be this.

A new dress dummie form

Ufo's you know those unfinished objects? Yeah it's happening.

Gaps in foundations ( I need to make missing pieces in various periods of undergarments)

Stash dress ideas

Two evening dresses - because I need them

Prepare for two conventions CoCo in Aug and SASS Christmas in Dec 

Frankly that list is so much more ambitious than it is long, but just in case all the stars in the heavens align... A dress on my holy grail list.

Post convention end of year thoughts

Haveing good friends is important. Having friends who uplift you when your feeling at the end of your rope, tired and slightly lame are priceless. 

Conventions always make me both tired and thoughtful. Nothing brings out my introspective attitude that when things go off plan and conventions are a perfect storm of off plan. 

So without sharing all the opps, forgets, last minutes and minor stresses. Let me share the new and improved 2014 event rules for convention sanity. 

1) Saving money is great but adding stress is often not worth it. Just stay at the hotel. 

2) it is absolutely not too early to start sewing for next year

3) anything not done 90 days before the convention stays home...that's right 90 days so get sewing. 

4) being just a antendee is great, helping with convention events is great...however, the two don't mix. I don't actually have much wisdom on this, I'm at an impasse.

5) delusions of stunning hairstyles made up of your very own hair will leave you with unimpressive photos. Back to wigs and hairpieces for me.

6) just sew, just go, just relax and have fun. 

Oh and if you can avoid crazy snow storms and fog...do. 

That's another SASS convention in the books. Off to make the sewing list for next year :)

 

sewing room update and a Tea Gown

Giving some thought to a new background for the blog and a little update on the sewing studio. Remember that nice clean open space? Well its full of stuff now...nothing like moving to bring you in close personal touch with just how much stuff you have.

Here is the hubbie putting together my new cutting table. I am super happy with it.

Then we moved in my new shelves. These are big sturdy things from Sam's club, so far there are three of them set library shelf style out away from the walls we still need to insulate and dry wall.

 

It is coming together. Never as fast as we might like but it is coming together.

 

My next project in the new sewing room will be a tea gown.

 

I'm am making the dress on the left with the fabric above, which is a shirting cotton with just the hint of a sheen to it. I had visions of a candy cane Christmas dress but this is sweet enough for me and has the added bonus of being able to be worn later for events not Christmas related.

 

I have the pattern traced and hope to be cutting it out this afternoon, right after I enjoy some warm home made potato soup on this surprisingly cold and windy day in November. It feels like Winter just showed up today. Yesterday was clear and 74*F how quickly things change.

 

 

 

A friendly prod or a prod from a friend.

As my dear friend Gina from "Beauty for Ashes" reminded me tonight, it's about time for a blog post. So the latest is that we have settled in Texas on eight acres of land and as you can imagine we have unpacking, and projects galore.

I have a lovely, huge, all mine, sewing studio being put together in a detached 23x23 ft garage. 

I am pretty excited about it!

I am also a huge fan of Habitat for Humanity Re-stores. You never know what your might find, it's always a treasure hunt. Last week I found this beauty! 

Can you believe it? It's a Singer from 1951, it's clean and looks as though it was hardly used. All of the attachments were included and were pristine as well. So how much for is glorious piece of sewing delight? $50 ... So yes, I rescued it and brought it home. Here you can see himself checking that the wiring is safe for me. 

I also found this very useful item.

This is a 9000 BTU portable AC unit. Cool air in the studio? Yes Please! This darling works beautifully and was $150. A very good deal.

So while I don't have new sewing to share just yet, things are moving along. The rhythm of our days is taking shape and I will be back to stitching very soon. Tomorrow I need to cut out a retro dress. 

Some other happenings around the farm.

Rooms have been painted. 

And electric gates have been fixed and are in working order. 

Tomorrow I will answer the age old question...If I make a 1950s dress with my blue linen will I kick myself later when the Edwardian bug bites? Night all.