2018 “In Review”

Geesh! This year has proven to me that I’m not in control of time (or anything for that matter) in any way. I can’t believe the year is almost over… there were so many things that I had intended/scheduled to make but absolutely did not. I don’t know about anyone else, but this year kicked my butt. In terms of “upping my game”- in terms of quality events- in terms of meeting new people- in terms of turning my life upside down. It was a lot to cram in there.

Surprisingly, I’m alive. *CHECK*

This year, I had made a “resolution” to follow the “Must Do List” and to keep up with the Historical Sew Monthly. That went well for about 4 months. Then I tanked HARD. Moving really disrupted everything. I mean, my husband’s job was terminated at the beginning of January, so it’s been an entire year of upheaval- now that I look back on it. We’re finally getting into a “groove” in our new little town and I’m so excited to have some stability. I have an awesome friend who watches Anne once a week so I can get a solid day’s work in and the commission waitlist is getting smaller for Virgil’s Fine Goods. I know that once I get to where I feel I have a handle on things it’ll all go topsy-turvy but for now I’ll enjoy the little bit of routine we’ve got goin’ on.

Anyway, back to this year…. How did I do? On a scale of 1-10 (10 being best) I would say I fall around 4 or 5. I kept up with work stuff but personal projects didn’t go as planned in any way… If I were being graded at school, I would qualify it all as a D, but I’m getting close to 30 so I don’t even know why I would think in terms of that….

I still haven’t made my birthday apron yet- adlkfjahkdljahfdh- but I guess that’s the trade-off when I want to garden, do canning and craftting while having a kid under 2. It’s going to happen next year though. IT MUST.

The Must-Do List (2017) Progress

Finish Yellow 19th Century Ball Gown– Now I need to blog about it
Add more trim to Green Check 19th Century Gown
Finish Regency Stays- Busk Pocket, add real straps
Add Buttons to Black Regency Gown
Fasten Straps to Regency Petticoat
Re-Make Wool 18th Century Petticoat
Trim White 18th Century Petticoat–
Trim Pierrot Jacket– Now I need to blog about it
Hem Ian’s 19th Century Shirt

Wellllllll that’s not great. BUT I did make some fun things this year:

Finished Personal Projects:

(a lot of these will get their own blog post soon, I just have such a hard time getting nice photos to use!)

The 1908 Purple Dress
1908 Corset
1810 Yellow Silk Evening Gown
1760s-1770s Small Hoop
1760s-1770s Chine Saque Gown
Anne’s 18th century kit (cloak, mitts, gown, cap)
Anne’s 19th century dresses (3 dresses and corded cap)
1800-1805 White Ikat Crossover Gown
1787 Silk Cap
1810 Trimmed Straw Bonnet
1919 Christmas Dress for Anne
Late-1770s Linen Dress for Felicity

Unfinished Personal Projects (These will be added to next year’s “Must-Do” List)

1805 French Blue Bonnet- I just need to hem the ties!
1800 Green Corded Bonnet Repro- Add brim and trim
Felicity’s Rose Garden Dress Redo

All in all it was an alright year for historical clothing but next year is gonna be wayyyyyy better!

 

The Hairdressers at the Sign of the Mortar and Pestle take on JAF 2016

Happy Fall (well almost winter now), everyone! We’ve managed to have beautiful weather for the last few weeks and I’m finally in a groove where I can start posting more regularly. Hooray!

R-L: Ms. Williams getting her hair curled by me and Ms. Stephanie having her hair curled by Joanna!

Of my many adventures this past summer, I especially wanted to highlight our time at the Jane Austen Festival this past July. We were stationed with LBCC Cosmetics and set up a historical hair styling experience for those who would like to pamper themselves for the day and/or get ready for the ball and learn about historical hairstyling.

Here’s a sweet little view of our wee workshop complete with our turbans there in the back!

The LBCC tent was wonderfully situated so we could have our guests actually listen to the presentations given at the big tent while getting their hair done. We were also near Dames A La Mode, La Bohemian Belle, and 96 District Fabrics, which is a great place to be!

What was so wonderful about this project is that we were able to use historical hair products from LBCC Historical (namely the pomatums, oils, & powders) as well as historical tools to achieve a perfect look- and our guests didn’t have to worry about a thing; they just enjoyed not doing their own hair.

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Later on, I’ll do a post more in depth about achieving an historically accurate Regency hairstyle, including the tools we use to get the perfect look!

Joanna and I luckily had just enough time to get ready for the ball…and were about 45 min late. We still had a lovely time and so enjoyed seeing all of our guests enjoying themselves and looking utterly perfect! We managed to get a group photo with some of them- namely from the Regency Society of Virginia!

It’s a little dark, but the ladies looked so beautiful!

We were so glad to get a pic together!

Joanna and her lovely tissue silk & lace gown.

My hair was done up with hair pieces encrusted in pearls.

My gown was a silk/cotton blend sheer check fabric. More info on that later.

Dancing!

 

We had so much fun and plan on doing it again next year! I’ll keep you posted on when appointments open up!

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Pearly Whites

Well, maybe not “pearly” but they’re definitely pretty.

I absolutely needed an matching Cap, Neckerchief, and sleeve ruffles (and desperately want a matching apron). I bought some stunning woven-checked cotton lawn/gauze stuff when I was in Williamsburg for my internship (Hello, 3 year old stash fabric) but it’s just so pretty, I couldn’t use it for anything except the 18th century and now I have a reason!

I decided that my ensemble would be mid 1780s. Why? -one must always have a reason- My reason is “Ohio founding”. Marietta, the oldest city/settlement in our territory, was founded in 1788. So if I have an occasion to be a pretty princess in Ohio, at least I’ll be….. plausible. So…. mid 1780s. Check. Now what style of cap?

From French fashionplate with lots of “bonnet” styles from the Boston Museum of Fine Arts

Bonnet a la pierrot! Bonnet of the sparrow, if you want to translate it out literally. I made a pierrot jacket, why not a cap, too!?

As always, it’s good to find at least 3 sources to make sure that you’re creating something that someone might have worn. When I first saw this cap I thought How ridiculous! I want straight up ruffles on my head then I forgot about it and continued on my researching way.

1780-1785 Painter Francis Alleyne

Ah! Isn’t it fabulous! And to go with my pierrot jacket, it only makes sense, right? From the three sources, I decided I’d make a Bonnet a la Pierrot from my lovely fabric from Burnley and Trowbridge (an excellent source for period accurate fabrics and supplies, bytheway) with only one ruffle/pleat in the front, more like the first fashion plate.

Here are the pieces to the cap before they’ve been put together. You’ll notice that I’ve rolled all the hems of the pieces so they are to be whipped together. This makes it more sheer and is normally done on gauze caps, to ensure it’s sheer-ity.

**Disclaimer** Cotton does not always roll very nicely. This one fought me if I weren’t in the non-stripey areas. A couple of times I lost my temper.

Then I pleated my brim-ruffle and my caul-ruffle then whipped it all together to it’s gauzy glory. I’m very excited to wear this frippery! It took me three days to make because of all the rolled hems. And VOILA!

Top view!

The neckerchief is super easy. Just a big triangle with rolled hems. Look at the pretty!

And then of course, sleeve ruffles! I didn’t put them together until the morning of our costumed day in CW, but I got them done. They’re super cute and easy to do.

Ahhhh the little details.

All together now!

Not the best picture of me ever (hello big nose!) but I’ve got all my pretty whites on!

Pinterest Addiction: Cocoa Hair Mask

Unlike a lot of professional internet surfettes, I don’t have a tumblr or a twitter. I don’t do video posts/blogs. I don’t have a WordPress blog. BUT I do have a Pinterest, which can be quite bedazzling to behold.

I have to limit my time on the blasted thing, because I spend more time looking at pins to do than actually doing them. I’ve decided that I should try to do at least one pin a week.

Some background on this particular post… I’ve been dying to change up my hair lately. I’m growing it out, but it’s reached the dreaded “half point” where it’s not really long, not really medium length, and lacks any interest. There was a point where I was ready to chop it for a pixie cut and dye it Christina Hendricks Red, but then I remembered that I need to have it long and “natural” colored for Gettysburg.

Such a pretty color!!!!

I mulled on the ideas of cutting and dying for a week now and I’ve decided I won’t cut it until after Gettysburg, and red is really hard to make convincing. Sigh. Stuck with my hair as is.
I trimmed the dead ends, and then came across a pin regarding naturally darkening your hair with cocoa. O.O I think I can handle that!

This is the pin I ran across… it calls for regular cocoa, but of course, in my infinite wisdom (note: sarcasm) I changed it a little bit. I’d like to darken the ends of my hair or darken it all to a deeper shade. Soooo this was the recipe I ended up concocting:

1/2 c. Natural Yogurt (I used Chobani)
1/3 c. Black/Dark Cocoa
3 Tbs Regular Cocoa
2 tsp  Apple Cider Vinegar
1 tsp  Honey
1 tsp  Olive Oil
Plastic Wrap or a Shower Cap

Mix all the ingredients together and apply to wet hair. Secure hair in a bun, cover with plastic wrap or shower cap and let sit for 1-3 hours.
According to the original post/recipe, the yogurt is supposed to open up the hair so it can accept the darker color, and the vinegar acts as a mordant to lock the color in.

that’s pretty dang dark.

I kind of panicked after I mixed up the recipe. It’s SUPER dark and I was feeling kind of like Anne Shirley…. “He said it would turn my hair a beautiful raven black–he positively assured me that it would.”

 *cue nervousness* So here’s my hair before I put on the stuff:

You can see it’s kinda blah as a cut, and I don’t want a blanket color for it, I’d just like to liven it up a bit and darken the ends.

Now, I didn’t realize this was going to be a paste when I started this project. I figured it would be more like a watery solution to comb through the hair, so I doubled the recipe as I always do (my hair is both thick and long-ish). In order to get this stuff to get to all of the hair, I had to wet my hair to begin with, then apply the paste. Make sure you’re naked and in the bathtub, with the shower curtain drawn…. the stuff gets EVERYWHERE.

It feels pretty weird, I gotta say.

Real fun, real fun.

I put my hair in a top-knot and covered it with plastic wrap. Make sure to keep a damp washrag with you to wipe off any that decides to run down your face or neck. I was sweating with the plastic wrap on my head, which led to some drizzles.

I left it on for 3 hours then washed my hair like normal. I had to scrub my shower after it was washed out, because it looks like I had massacred a chocolate bunny. Thankfully it didn’t stain my tub, which was my biggest concern. I blow dried my hair, then went to bed because it was late, but managed a picture the next morning.

Morning face! Yay!

Slightly off color view of hair.

So what did I think of this whole thing?
Well, my hair was REALLY shiny, which was nice. But it wasn’t as soft and had a tendency to tangle more than the oil, vinegar, and honey rinses I have done in the past.

Did it do what I wanted it to?
No. I was after this mask to darken my hair, and it did the opposite. The ends of my hair are now a little brighter and almost reddish in color. I can see it working great for someone who’s hair is real brown, but my hair is a brown black, so fading into a reddy-brown isn’t what I had in mind. The second picture above is closer to the color of the ends than the picture before it.

Would I do this again?
Nope. I wanted darker, and got lighter. I may go back to the coffee soaks I did in high school, they actually did darken my hair really well.

Photo Friday

 “Woman Seen from the Back” ca 1862, Paris, France
 This is a really wonderful backview of a woman’s hair, dress and necklace. I find it to be really educational since this is a rare seen view of a real woman from the period.

Salted Paper Print from Glass Negative, ca 1862, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Here’s the description from the Met:

“A wealthy amateur photographer and a familiar figure at the French imperial court, the viscount Onésipe-Gonsalve Aguado de Las Marismas joined the Société Française de Photographie in 1858. With his better-known brother Olympe, a founding member of the society, Onésipe Aguado was among the early makers of photographic enlargements. The two brothers also collaborated on tableaux vivants that depict with wit and playfulness the fads and amusements of elegant society.
At once a portrait, a fashion plate, and a jest, this fascinating image expresses Aguado’s whimsical mood, and is probably an extension of his work on foreshortening. It is strangely devoid of depth, as if the sitter were a two-dimensional cutout, a mere silhouette. The figure brings to mind the compositions of such painters as Caspar David Friedrich and René Magritte, both of whom made haunting use of figures seen from the back.”