Summer, Ashford, and Sewing

Summer has finally arrived, though it took its time about getting here.  My roses are starting to bloom, and the raspberries (which we just planted this spring) have little green berries.  The plum tree has its usual horde of tiny purple plums, which are rather hard to see because the leaves on the plum tree are purple as well, so you have to hunt for the plums.


The Ashford rewrite is coming along steadily.  I've committed myself to a chapter or two a day, but no more, even if it's going well.  If I do more I find I start scanning instead of reading carefully, and then I miss things.  I'm approximately half-way through, and hoping to be done by the end of July, assuming I don't have to do anything too drastic, like delete whole characters or add six new scenes.  Then I have to get it out to a few people, preferably people who have never read it before, to make sure it all works and catch anything horrid I've missed.  After that, if all goes well...we'll see.  I have ideas.


For the sewing, I've sold a jacket and a skirt in the past month.  Yes, they were to personal friends, but a sale is a sale, right?  Besides, though a little extra income is always nice, the main reason I'm trying to sell them is to give myself some excuse for something I would be doing anyway.  I enjoy making things, particularly out of other people's old clothes and curtains and table-cloths, and it's more fun if I'm not the only one enjoying them.

Fabricide

Here are a few of the pictures from today's photo shoot.  Not professional at all, but better than what I had, and they show the clothes to advantage.  The goal is to put them up on Etsy in the next couple of days.  Thanks to Lexie, Megan, and Kezia for modeling for me.

The skirt is 100% mine.  The jacket is second-hand, which I then attacked with the scissors and filled with lace from someone's ex-table-runner, thus making it "Zombie-chic"

This dress was the result of a spell of winter blues and a longing for summer clothes

And hey!  I had extra fabric from the dress, so I made the skirt also, which, I might add, is super comfy.  I did not make the shirt, sadly.  That was someone else's genius creation.

This skirt I had already posted on Etsy, but I wanted better pictures of it.

Another one of my jacket makeovers, though slightly different from the attacked-by-zombies look.

This is the result of my excursion into the world of hat making.  I made it by braiding strips of fabric cut from second-hand lingerie, which I then wrapped, sewed and starched.  I was fairly pleased with the result.

This jacket I had also already posted, but I got much better pictures today.

This is my "Scarlet O'Hara", so-called because I made the skirt from a curtain I found at Value Village.

This butterfly greeted us on our way back to the car, and cooperated wonderfully with having its picture taken.

A Moment

It is cooler today, with a light rain.  Inside, the house smells of freshly baked bread.  Outside, the breeze brings the scents of rain and lilacs.  I've been gathering up my sewing for Sunday, when some of the girls are going with me to help take photos for my portfolio.  I like looking at the fabric, lying in a heap, all the colors together.  It's been an idyllic, dreamy sort of day.  I've been alone since Aaron left for work, and it's been one of those days when I think sometimes I will forget how to speak.  The silence goes so deep that I don't like to break it.  In a moment I will leave for class and there will be music, life, movement, laughter.  That is a dream of a different kind.  Just as pleasant, but as alien to this other as the fresh-baked bread to the lilacs and rain.

The Joys of Costume Fittings

Had a costume fitting today.  I've really been enjoying fitting the girls, creating something and spending time with each of them.  They come to my house an hour or two before class, and stand in my living room while I drape them in fabric and sew things and we sip tea or coffee and watch watch Cirque du Soleil dvds.  They are such wonderful girls, all of them, and don't seem to mind me sewing things onto their bodies.  Photos of the costumes hopefully coming soon.

Encouragement

Yesterday found me rather gleeful, as I received an email from the 100 Words or Less Contest containing the evaluation of my story.  I still won't know the outcome of the contest until the middle of May, but I did well in the evaluation (66 out of 70) and that's always splendid to hear even if a cash prize isn't involved (though it is nicer if one is).


So I'm feeling a little better about the world in general today.  I also get to sew feathers onto little girls' canary costumes, which always creates a bright spot.

Sewing Update

So, I know I've been saying I would post more sewing project photos soon, but I've been waiting to get photos of the clothes being worn by people other than me.  I don't mind having one or two of them with me, but it feels odd to have them all of myself, so the plan is to have some of the girls over one day soon for pictures.  However, I did finally open an Etsy account.  "Reanimated Rags" was already taken, so I (being in a rather odd mood at the time, and inspired by the fact that my sister referred to one of my pieces as "zombie-chic") decided to go with...  Fabricide.  It may be the dumbest idea I've ever had, but I'm getting rather fond of it.


Basically I think clothes should make the wearer feel good, regardless of whether they follow the latest trend or not.  I refuse to pay the price of feeling hideous in order to squeeze myself into a pair of skinny jeans, the return to popularity of which is as inexplicable to me as that of jumpsuits and rompers.  So, I've been having fun creating (or re-creating) my own sort of look.  I only hope other people like it as well.

Happy New Year, a day late

Happy New Year, and Happy Birthday to me!  Twenty-five today.  I have a feeling this is supposed to be a milestone of sorts, but I really don't feel any different than I did yesterday.  


Looking back at the past year, I see good and bad things, things I wish had happened that didn't and things I never expected to that did.  I wanted to finish my novel, and I did, but I'm still waiting for that acceptance letter.  I started a new one, but am not quite as far along with it as I would like.  Aaron and I bought a house, and I have to be glad and amazed that we could actually manage it so soon.  Altogether it has been a good year.


Oh, the latest Reanimated Rags project is a dress made from curtains, which, appropriately enough, I've been referring to as the "Scarlet O'Hara".  Still not quite sure I have any right to try to peddle these things, but people do seem to like them.  Hopefully I'll get some pictures up soon-ish.


I don't generally make New Year's resolutions, as I'm quite prone to guilt, but I do set goals.  Somehow "goals" sounds a little less, well, resolved, thus there is less guilt if you fall short, or so I tell myself.  Maybe I'm just weak.  It's quite possible.  In any case, we shall see soon enough if the goals set for 2011 end up fulfilled or not.

Reanimated Rags

 

 So, my latest notion is the reinvention of secondhand clothing, which is actually getting some fairly decent feedback, and I actually sold a jacket today to someone who thought I should have charged more than twenty dollars for it, which was pretty sweet.  My biggest fear was that people would look at them and think, "Old clothes, why?" but people actually seemed to like them.  I'm calling them "Reanimated Rags" because that's what they are... also because I have a thing for alliteration.  The next step will be to put some up on Etsy, or at least I think that's where I'm going with it.  I'd like to put up some of the ballet costumes I've been working on too, but we'll see.  It seems arrogant in a way, because I'm really an amateur when it comes to sewing, but I am decently creative and people seem to like what I come up with, so... why not?

The jacket that sold.  It was a great color and fabric, but kind of frumpy with shoulder pads.  I ripped out the shoulder pads and cut big gashes in it which I filled with pink satin from an atrocious pare of pajamas.

This one I actually made in its entirety, so it's not really a rag.