Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! This year, I wore my little red riding hood costume but with a few changes from last time. Wearing my red peasant dress as a skirt turned out to be a bad idea since the boning poked me under the corset and got painful by the end of the day.

I redyed the now green linen that turned out all splotchy last time and it came out sooooo much more even. I pleated it up onto a waist band and instant skirt.

The corset was a big hit although people kept asking me if I could breathe all night.... Yes, I am talking to you without breathing. *insert sarcasm here*

I had heaps of fun anyways. Halloween is a costumer's favorite holiday, after all!

What did you go as for Halloween?

Youtube: Let's Talk Pixie

Today's video is a talkie about pixie cuts, how to decide if you'd like one and what to do once you've decided to take the plunge! Enjoy!

The Runner Up Dress

You guys loved my date night outfit from last week but some of you were rooting for a different outfit. I too liked the runner up outfit so I chose to wear it another day.

It was a bit chilly so I paired my dress with tights and a cardigan.

I think this dress looked super cute with my pixie! (It helps that I'm far enough removed from sewing this dress up that I mostly forgot how annoying the fabric was to work with.)

Here's my new purse! I bought it from a darling etsy shop. For some reason, I just can't get into sewing purses for myself. When I spied this one in a cute teal fabric, I just had to have it!

I'm so loving the short hair!

Happy Friday!

An English Noble Woman

My Renaissance Faire ensemble got a bit of a makeover since last year (1) (2) . Interchangeable sleeves, a partlet, some new trim and a fab hat took it from Tudor Rose to Elizabethan Noblewoman.

It was pretty chilly so I ended up wearing me jeans underneath and still being brrr.

My mother-in-law came along and wore my lower class red dress. She had a ball.

My hoops are looking a bit elliptical instead of circular but my bum roll looks sharp.

The hubby donned the kilt again this weekend. He's super excited about it.

Yay for a great day at the faire!

Youtube: Allie Hamilton Pigtails

Today's youtube tutorial is for the cute rolled pigtails the young Allie Hamilton wears in The Notebook. They do take a bit of practice to get right, but it's so worth it! Enjoy!

The People Have Spoken!

On Friday, I asked you guys to vote on what I should wear on my date night. Thanks to all of you who voted! The majority of you loved this outfit so this is what I wore:

Sweater: The Limited

Circle Skirt: vintage

Shoes: Modcloth

Faux Pearls: Forever 21

The skirt is really fun to wear and I'd never worn it to a church event before.

I didn't wear the teal hat because it's a bit big on me and I really need curls to fill it out. I actually scavenged this bow on an elastic from a gift box and it just so happened to fit my head.

If you were a fan of outfit #2, don't worry, I wore it Sunday and got some cute pictures.

In which you decide what I get to wear

I need your help deciding what to wear out tonight! It's my church's biannual dinner and a movie date night featuring a great vintage film. If I was a sharp, prepared blogger, I'd have done this post at the beginning of the week so you'd have time to vote. As it is, I'm not so you've got less than 12 hours to vote.

#1 Vintage taffeta circle skirt and sweater combo

#2 Modern Rose print jersey dress

#3 Taffeta 50s me made dress

#4 Vintage pink zebra jersey dress

I've added the poll to the top right on my blog so please vote! Past Dinner and a Movie outfits (1) (2)

A New Hat

I love hats! And I picked one up at the local vintage store last week and just had to wear it on Sunday!

It was windy!

Hold on to your hats!

It was super warm too so I decided to let me legs out without tights! Might not get to do that for a while.

Pretty flowers!

Anise Sew Along Progress

I've made some nice progress on my Anise coat. I finally got lining and buttons so that's helped out a lot.

Bound buttonholes! And lovely basting in yellow silk thread.

It's starting to look like a coat! The collar looks great.

I used a handy new way to do the back of my bound buttonholes from the Colette Pattern's website. So genius! I always hated the back of bound buttonholes the most and now they look all pretty! Next up is welt pockets!

Adventures in Dying: Part 1

I had a length of off white linen that had gotten turned a bit pink after washing with a length of red linen (which had already been washed several times before) so I thought I'd try dying it. I really wanted a hunter green linen but they didn't have any when I bought the linen so I picked up an appropriate box of dye from JoAnns and went to work.

Linen before. The camera didn't pick up the pink tint well.

Vat of dye! I didn't really have a good place to dye my fabric and I think this bucket was a bit small. I'll have to try someplace larger next time.

Fabric drying. Hunter green-check Perfect dye job-no check

I got a whole bunch of lighter streaks from the dye not penetrating into the lump of fabric. Probably from using a too small bucket.

I also did something really dumb and tried bleaching my bucket on the other side of the sink where my fabric was rinsing. *facepalm* So there are a few orangish bleach spots where I dripped into the other side of the sink.... :(

I want to try and fix the streaking. Do you think if I dye it again, the color will even out? Or will it just make everything proportionally darker? I may try dying it in the sink since the fabric fit in there much better than the bucket. I'm planning on using this for a petticoat for my red peasant Renaissance dress, so I think it's ok if it's not perfect, but I would like it to be better.

Surprise and Fall Tag Video

I got a hair cut! Surprise! Also, there's a fall tag with some questions.


Tag Questions:
1) Top 5 fall makeup items?
2) Favorite fall hair product?
3) Favorite fall nail polish?
4) Favorite fall scent?
5) Favorite fall fashion accessories?
6) Who's your Fall Style icon?
7) Favorite Halloween movie?
8) Favorite Halloween candy?
9) Favorite fall beverage?
10) Going to a pumpkin patch/corn maize... what do you wear?
11) Favorite fall memory?
12) What are you going to be for halloween?

A Cape and a Kilt

It's hard to tell if the weather at the end of October is going to cooperate or not but it did this past weekend so I could wear my latest costume!

It's little red riding hood.

Me-made cape and skirt from peasant dress

thrifted blouse

leather corset Brown Cow Art

The cape was made from red stretch velveteen and black taffeta. Not my first choice for a fabric combo but it was stash busting and I made it work.

All in all, it was a quick cheap costume to go with my new corset!

My husband was super excited to wear his new kilt.

And I was excited that he decided to buy all of the pieces for this outfit! I was not looking forward to all of that pleating.

Halloween Pin-up Makeup

I usually like to look a bit more subtle when I go for a vintage makeup look but Halloween is the perfect time to have fun and take the look way over the top! This look features a smokey eye, bold winged liner, and deep red lips. Enjoy!

My Favorite 40s Dress

Everyone has a favorite dress in their closet that they love and mine's a bit of a guilty pleasure because it's not vintage, me-made or rtw. It's actually custom made for me! Now it was custom made before I lost my weight but a handy black velvet belt makes it all good again.

I wore this out to a political event where my husband went to hear a 3rd party candidate from the Libertarian party speak. I'm not much into politics but my husband is and I went with because he was so pumped about it.

My hair's been a bit blah lately so I went for a pageboy-ish hair do by curling under the ends.

I also got to wear out some cute shoes that hardly see the light of day. Yay cute shoes!

Oh, I wish I had Anne Miller's legs!

Anise Muslin #2

Anise muslin #2 is complete!

The front looks good with an 3/4" FBA. There was some weirdness going on once I put on the sleeves. It's kind of tight and awkward. I tried on a couple of rtw jackets and and they had the same kind of issues but not quite as much.

The back wrinkles are mostly gone. It's just a bit baggy there. I'm thinking with the thicker weight fabric it will be ok. It's so hard to judge the ease for a jacket!

Side shot.

The shoulder fits after the narrow shoulder adjustment. They slope down a lot though so I'm going to play around with some shoulder pads and see how it goes.

Anise Muslin 1

You may have spied a new button in my side bar:

I'm participating in the Colette Pattern's Anise Sew-Along. For my first muslin I cut a size 6, did a 1/2" FBA and took 1/2 off each side seam at the waist for a bit more shaping.

Muslin #1 over a sweater. So far I know that the shoulders are too wide. I'm going to try a real narrow should adjustment instead of just lopping some off! It's a bit tight in the chest so I'm going to do a slightly larger FBA even though I don't usually do such a large FBA.

The side-looking pretty good except for some back wrinkles.

More back wrinkles. Not sure what to do about those. Swayback adjustment???