1. Dress Progress!
I got the underdress totally hemmed night before last. Last night I got the other sleeve put in, and started hemming the chiffon.
Mom gave me the idea to do a very small, tight zig-zag along the edge. I tested it out on some scraps and liked it. I started at the very back where I had some excess, so I could trim it off if I didn’t care for it on a larger scale.
But I ended up REALLY liking it. I did go through and cauterize it after doing this zig-zag – just to catch anything sticking out. It’s created this lovely wavy, rippling effect that I LOVE for this. I’ve got to go through and do the sleeve edges, and the front of the dress, and then I can start sequinning.
I’m not going to do a TON of sequins, just a few to catch the light. I think I’m going to do them at the top of the sleeves at the shoulders, and then a few along the sides at the waist/hips.
Chase is depositing my bonus check today so I can order my wig(s)! Everybody seems to be out of the wefts I needed. I could have gotten some that were a bit too short and still needed curled… or for $15 more I could just buy 2 of the same wig and have PLENTY to work with that’s the same length and style. So that’s what I’m doing. This is the most expensive hair project I’ve done in recent years :\
2. Anniversary present!
Wish I had a better picture of it than my washed-out phone pic, but Chase surprised me with this portrait of myself in my Meg costume for our anniversary! I’ve always admired Briana’s (TheLadyNerd’s) artwork – we commissioned her to do this gorgeous otter piece for my mom’s birthday recently – so I’m thrilled to have some of her artwork for my own.
I’ve got to get a frame for it this weekend — I’ve got that and a couple of other things I need to get frames for to put them up in my sewing room!
3. Messing around with art
So I’ve been going back through my blog posts here and fixing the broken image links – I’m through about mid-2009. That means I just had to slog through daily posts from 2010 where I was doing the 365 project and fix every single image, they were all broken.
The 365 project was a little challenge I gave myself to post a finished drawing a day for 365 days. I didn’t meet the goal at all, but I did fairly well, and the objective was just to get me drawing again, so in that way, it worked.
But a lot of the art I was pumping out at the time was… not very good. I often rushed through pieces that needed more time, and the constraints were such that the pieces were generally very simple. I’ve revisited a handful of the Disney ones before – cleaning up the faces a bit, fixing proportion issues, and adding a little more detail. Here’s a before & after of Mary Poppins:
So staring at all of these other pieces that didn’t get the same treatment, I started messing with some of them again. Here’s an Amidala – I didn’t do much do it outside of punching up the face a little, but I think it makes a difference.
That one was fairly easy though, as the only thing I felt needed fixing was the face. Then I decided to mess with ceremonial Leia, which was a giant mess of bad face and bad proportions. The “after” here is still a work in progress —- but I’m not sure I like it. The face is a better likeness, but I think it’s too far removed from my own personal style now.
But it’s fun to play with. I think if I keep playing with the face – namely the eyes – I can get it to where I like it.