chargirlgenius

As you may recall, sometime *ahem* before the holidays I started fitting Jeff for another Charles de Blois pourpoint. And when I say "before holidays", maybe I'm referring to Halloween. Maybe even Columbus Day.

I got the body pieces fitted on him, but I left the sleeves for later. And if you know anything about that garment, you'll know that the sleeves are the interesting part. They're also the part that needed the most change from the last time I did this.

Why yes, I am just posting links to other posts with pictures, because I was an idiot and didn't take pictures this time. Duh.

So tonight, I fit the sleeve. I started by drawing the lines on his body about where I wanted them, based on where the original was, on where his shoulder was, and a line about equidistant from that circumference. I tried keeping the sleeve opening a bit less deep than I had it last time, so it more closely matched the original.

For the sleeve itself, I started by cutting something close to what would fit on his upper arm (at the bottom, that just extended into a straight, wide-ish head. It was all getting cut anyway. For reference, look at the link up top, and I just cut what I thought would be the flat part of the sleeve, if it weren't cut into two pieces.

I wrapped it around his arm, cutting the gore slits as I went. When I got to the back, it was going alright, but I wasn't entirely happy with the fit, or how I would finish it off. The first round of fitting usually gets me a really loose sleeve around the shoulder, but then I keep pulling it in more closely until it's a pretty decent fit. This didn't look like it would work out well.

I started looking at the original a little more, and noticed that the top part of the sleeve actually had two main parts (in addition to the gores). It was split, and this time I looked more closely and realized that there was tailoring along that seam.

I cut the underarm gore narrower, like in the original, cut up the underarm slit all the way to the elbow, and repinned it all.

Lo and behold, it worked *much* better. So here's the lesson. At first glance, it looks like a big complex nasty thing. But in the end, there's only one piece to the original that I didn't cut separately. I'll only have one less seam than the original. Huh. Go figure.

I'll have to talk about padding and such tomorrow. I'm exhausted and freezing. Whee!

When Jeff and I were last in French, I picked up some kids books in French to read to the boys, just for fun. Jeff is upstairs now reading to Henry. I hear him start in French.

Henry: No! In English! (It's the Christmas story, we can manage the translation)
Jeff: *reads in Middle English*
Henry: No! In English!
Jeff: That IS English!

Is it so geeky that we're sitting here watching Rocky Horror Picture Show and I can't help but notice that Susan Sarandon's bra just doesn't fit right? The back strap is way up on her shoulder blades, practically in her armpits.

Listening to Jeff sing along to Touch Me (in falsetto) is priceless though...

:-D

What stands out most in my head from this weekend, is that when the zombie apocalypse happens, I want Jeff by my side. That is all. If you were there, you'll know why. :-D

Saturday, we visited thatpotteryguy and smiep who were hosting the La Belle meeting at their house. Typical meeting, boys played, ate lots of food, etc. etc. Of note, I purchased 70 squirrel skins that were being sold for somebody getting out of reenacting. Pretty white bellies! The back skin is reddish brown, not grey, so it's not the preferred 14th century squirrel fur, but Veale (In The English Fur Trade in the Middle Ages) mentions other varieties of squirrel, including a reddish-brown one (redwerke), imported from Southern Italy. Now, just to figure out the cutting and the piecing that results in the right look, plus not a lot of waste. 70 little squirrels is not all that much, and I want to make the most of them. I have a couple of ideas, but the most economical way to get a basic vair look means that the fur will not all be running in one direction. I have yet to figure out if this is an issue (Veale doesn't seem to say). I'm leaning away from that, and dealing with waste. On the bright side, a more miniver path looks like it'll be less sewing. *sigh* More research... Naturally, googling for more info turns up articles that *I* wrote. :-D

The boys were... busy... but altogether pretty good. Henry had a grand time helping throw sticks on the big bonfire. He likes to help (and when it's just him, he can). We should have brought a longer shirt for Henry, as we let him run around naked from the waist down all weekend. My apologies to our friends, but ( Oh noez! Scary (not really) potty training stuff! ) We really needed that.

Sunday I painted my closet. ( Do I really want matchy matchy in there? Wood color conundrums. (just cut to take down the length a bit) )

I love my husband.

I woke up this morning to warm, freshly made beignets, and hot coffee. He picked up a mix at Cafe du Monde in NOLA yesterday morning, and fried them up today.

That's WAY better than bringing me a cold, day old one. NOW I know.

Supposedly, we *might* get a bit storm on Monday or Tuesday. Here's hoping! Much as I like and support Obama, his comment about Washingtonians not handling snow as well as Chicagoans makes me hope he has to eat his words. That'll take about 12-24" of snow, I figure. It'll be *much* easier for me to handle if I have Jeff here.

I now understand why Twelfth Night in EK got cancelled for a little snow. If they school was watching Accuweather, they got a skewed view of things. Their blogger is a WHACKO. "I have basically taken the model runs and threw them away because they are wrong." Uh?

I love my Capitol Weather Gang.

Happy Birthday to my darling husband, jljonsn. Poor guy, it's been rainy and dreary, he hasn't been able to get anything done outside, and we weren't going to make plans for dinner this evening just in case the weather was still bad. The boys were also pretty antsy since they couldn't go outside, so it wasn't much of a day for him.

We did go out for a brief, but nice, Greek dinner last night, before heading over to a party at Jeff's boss' house. Today, Eddie and I headed out in the middle of the rain, to pick up a ILL book from the library. That's dedication to my art, I tell ya... After returning home, I made Jeff a homemade German chocolate cake. Henry wrapped Jeff's presents all by himself. They were covered, at least!

As for the storm, we got a lot of rain, but hardly any wind at all. The power didn't even flicker! Normally, I like a rainy, dreary day like this, but it just seemed... off.

Happy birthday, babe. Wish it had been better. Love you!

Other than the gas/diesel snafu, it was a decent enough weekend.

Friday evening, we had the au pair exit interview, where all we had to do was sign paperwork. There was no trying to mediate – she already had her plane ticket bought. No point.

After all of that, Jeff and I sat down to watch Doctor Who. I know that people have hated Stolen Earth, but I loved it. It *was* a lot all in one episode, but I could get over that.
( potential spoilers )
melaniesuzanne suggested that I shouldn’t watch it until I could watch both halves of the two-parter, because it would mess with my brain. She was right, so we immediately broke our rule and found Journey’s End online. Hopefully one episode doesn’t push us over our net usage.
( More spoilers )

Saturday morning we took the boys to the playground, much to their utter delight, and then ran a few errands before bringing them home for naps. Jeff napped too, and I puttered, picked up, and read a little (I have no desire to panic for Pennsic). At 3pm, Berta took over, and Jeff and I readied ourselves for a date. She’d spent all of Monday on the phone, and unable to watch the boys, so we asked her to work Saturday.

For our date, we did something that we haven’t done since Henry was 6 months old – we saw a movie… in the theater… with each other! Of course, we saw Dark Knight, which was awesome. Wow. It would have been awesomer but for the idiots behind me occasionally dropping popcorn on my head, and pulling my hair as they grabbed my seat back to go pee in the middle of the film, but it was still awesome. I have fast reflexes though, and as he grabbed a few strands of my hair, I flung my hand back and whacked his arm. At least I got an apology.

We had a leisurely sushi dinner at Yamazato, and did a bit of shopping at Whole Foods. I get there so seldom, I want to browse and linger, but I managed to be not TOO slow.

On our way home, we stopped off at National Harbor, a new conference center on the PG county side of the Potomac, right near the Wilson bridge. The place is HUGE. It’s not just a conference center, but they built an entire neighborhood, with shops, piers, restaurants, and waterfront. It was big, fancy, and …. odd. At 10pm, the piped in jazz changed to a show-tune like number, and the lights flickered in different colors for a little “all about National Harbor” show. It felt like indoctrination. Trendy, expensive, and FAKE. Thanks, but I think we’ll stick to hanging out in Old Town Alexandria, which is trendy, expensive, and REAL with its plethora of “George Washington shat here” sites.

Yesterday, more errands, more picking up, a little laundry, and I got to sit out on the porch with Henry and enjoy a thunderstorm. He’s such a FUN little boy. I just enjoy his company, and hearing what he has to say. Eddie was napping, so it was easy-peasy time. Verily, 90% of our difficulties are with fighting, sharing, and general getting along, so put one of them to bed and life’s a breeze.

Those of you that were in attendance, recognize that there are two meanings behind the title of this post. It was HOT. Unbearably hot and humid. Despite that and the frequent rivers of sweat running down my face, lightheadedness, and letting myself get sunburnt because the lotion wouldn't stick, I had a fabulous day.

The second meaning of the title refers to the fact that I have the bestest friends in the world. I had more than a full day's work left on Jeff's gown, but sskipstress gave me some critical help in processing the fur. What a nasty job for a day like that, but she did it in good speed, and without complaint. The woman is a goddess. And then, she jumped in to help on my dress. Yes, my dress got done, but only because, as I said, I have the bestest friends in the whole wide world.

( In which I can't thank everybody nearly enough, and in which I also post many pictures - I lied. Pictures in the next post. )

I watched the Doctor Who episode Blink last night on the laptop while I worked on sleeves. It's such a visual episode that I feared I might lose a little while sewing, but no such problem. I *knew* what was coming, and yet I still jumped every time those angels were on the brink of attack. Silence in the Library gave me chills and made me jump, as well. Eeeee!

Last night, I ( Accomplished stuff. )

( And what would a good gown sewing post be without more discussions and images of seams? )

Cartridge pleating question

I'm planning on cartridge pleating the sleeves onto Jeff's gown. I've never cartridge pleated before, though I'm sure I can handle it. I have a slight problem, in that the edge of the armhole of the gown was finished assuming that I would have a seam allowance (I hadn't thought about cartridge pleating when I did it).

I know that you're supposed to sew the pleats directly to the edge of the fabric. Is it worth me refinishing that edge (maybe folding it over, etc.) or can I pleat the edge of the sleeve to a arm hole with a seam allowance?

I'm also toying with the Elizabethan sewing technique of finishing all of the edges first. The sleeves are fully lined. I've sewn one of the silk sleeves shut, but I didn't finish the raw edges first, so I'm not sure if this is going to work. Perhaps I should have sewn the flat lining to the flat silk, first? I have another technique I'll probably do, along the sleeve length seam, at least. Stitch the layer of lining down in the ditch, folk it over, and then whip the other half of the lining down. As far as I know, though, this isn't documentable, but a more modern tailoring technique.



Brief explanation: The black lines are the silk, and the red lines are the linen. Stitches are left out. The two silk pieces are sewn together with a running stitch. The bottom (straight) red line is sewn to the silk with a running stich that comes out in the seam of the silk, thus hiding it from view. The second (top, bent) red line is sewn to the first lining, and maybe to the seam allowance of the silk, but not all the way through, with a whip stitch.

For the sleevehead, I might just sew the sleeves right side together, for my nice finished edge. I was looking at attack-laurel's description of the process, and she suggests sanwiching them together, right sides out, and doing a running stitch. Only trouble is, this is a significant curve, and I'm not sure how I can avoid seam clipping. Maybe it doesn't matter so much, as a good portion of the sleeve will be cartridge-pleated in to my armhole, but maybe there's a better way?

*sigh* I have lots of ideas, but so far, none of them are jumping out as exactly right, or right without any problems (self-caused or inherent). I'm open to thoughts from people who have used these techniques.