costume progress - Big Trouble in Little China Gracie Headdress

 

So, let's start with the progress on the Big Trouble in Little China Gracie Headdress.   I purchased a piece of blue felt which I then cut into the shape I wanted.  At first I thought a good heavy starch was going to work.  I quickly reevaluated that thought.  So I pulled out some Modge Podge and thought, I'll do double duty and glue the beads on while I'm also shaping the felt in place.....this did not work.  At least the beads were not sticking to the felt with just modge podge.  So I pulled out dimensional modge podge.  This worked better......except that I had already sprayed the felt with starch and painted it with modge podge so ... it was a little soaked by this time.  So While I'm trying to keep the dimensional modge podge from dripping and placing beads and trying to keep them in place, the felt starts dripping a mixture of starch and modge podge down the head form.  Neadless to say this part was a mixture of trial and error but mostly error.  The end result is pretty near perfect however.

I had purchased a peacock glitter head band to act of the base of the head piece.  This seemed like the best way to have an easy to wear and sturdy base.  I cut out some card board using the inside and outside curve of the headband and then covered the front and back in the leftover felt pieces.  I hot glued this on to the head band and painted the inside of the card board.  This is going to act as a support for the feathers.


My husband 3D printed an assortment of sizes.  He free formed  this from a reference image and has been printing me feathers ever since.








I spray painted them with a gold glitter paint.  I'm realizing this is hard to see on my brown table at night.  You'll get a better idea with future pictures.  My first can got some glitter out and then just started spitting clear paint....so I tried to shake and shimmy and pull to make it stop and it wouldn't....so I put the cap back on intending to let it run out of aerosol so I could return it and get a new can.  The lid and the spray button shot off like a gun!!!  Scared me and my husband out of our socks!  Thankfully the second can hasn't blown up.

 So now I have glued on the gold edging and sewn on the pearl.  Once all the glue and starch dried it's holding its shape perfectly by itself.  Next steps will include making the peacock and gluing the feathers in place.  I'll also need to figure out the tasseled dangles.  That will be last looks though so I'm not thinking too hard about that.  My hubby wanted to design a peacock head that was filigreed so he could print it on his 3D printer.  I told him that would look lovely but wouldn't be accurate.  I think he will think of a way to use his new toy no matter what the project.

a good day

Because of my personality, and my physical health, it's rare for me to feel like I've had a day of accomplishment.  A day where I am proud of everything I've gotten done.  Today has been one of those days.  Loaded the dishwasher, did the laundry, started work on the Gracie Law Headdress and made great progress, returned the glitter spray that almost blew up in my face, found a geocache and cleaned Petrie's.  Then I came home and made a well balanced meal.  That definitely doesn't always happen.  In my pursuit to "be of help" I often choose to work on the most immediate request or the most urgent need before I do anything else.  This means my house is usually in a state of disrepair and my poor husband is helping me make dinner.  So days when balance has been achieved, multiple tasks have been accomplished and I have the rest of the evening to have fun or continue working, I feel so blessed.

Costume progress - Silver Sable Noir

So tonight I was working on Silver Sable Noir and trying to gather the supplies I had on hand for Gracie Law's headdress.  I had been getting pieces together that I thought might work and needed to kind of put them together and see if they would work.  I bought a silver clubbing dress and a silver corset along with some silver fabric I planned on making a skirt out of along with the silver wig and pearls I planned on making a necklace with to imitate the white cross shape that is part of silver sables distinct costuming.  I don't know if it's the fact that the necklace and skirt drape were just slap dashed on or if they just slightly not the same shiny silver materials are not working together but I'm feeling good and awful about this look right now.  I'll be getting a seamstress's opinion and I think I'm going to adjust the necklace idea.  

 I'm just glad the "clubbing" dress actually fits well.  It will help me feel more modest if I give the dress a slit and it definitely helps the low bust line of the corset.  I think I'm going to add a white strip just above the corset bust line to help break up the difference in color and to add the cross portion of white "T" I referred to before.  I know what you might say, what's Noir about it.....I think a proper skirt will help and a few things to tie it all together better.

I also took the next step for the print stamping I did for Gracie Law's wedding dress.  I'll need to wait to cold wash it in a couple days then I can start working on the sleeves and the collar in earnest.
I also revisited the plan for the head dress and am feeling much better about where to go next.  My hubby is 3D printing the feathers I need for the back of the headdress and then I'll paint them and add the embellishments.  I picked up a peacock blue sparkly headband to use as the base of the head dress and pulled out the beads I had that would work for  the front widows peak and the pearl embellishments.  I still need to grab some air dry clay to make the peacock head.

 I almost forgot.  I made a caplet for the Hubby's Dr. Strange Noir.  We already had a perfect tux with tails.  He also decided he was going to make himself a top hat since they are very expensive.  He pepakura'd the hat and worked on fiber glassing it for strength tonight.  He'll paint and flock it once that's done to give it a suede/felt/wool look and voila!  A lovely top hat for $20.  He's also going to make himself a collar because lets face it, you can't have a Dr. Strange without at least a moderately pointy collar.

All in all I feel like I'm at about 50% on costumes.  I have base pieces and a plan for almost everything.  Don't get me wrong, I have a long list of things to finish, but we're getting there.

Costume Progress - Gilgamesh Hat, Gracie Dress, Agatha Vest

I suggested to my husband that Gilgamesh Wolfenbach would look awesome in his Schmott guy hat so he's been working on that.  He modified a faux flame machine to fit in the hat he designed and made with Pepakura.  He's going to resin the hat and then paint it next along with adding spikes in the appropriate places.

I was working on Agatha Heterodyne's vest.  I found the perfect vest but it was too small and so I split it up the back and added a sheer panel that I button holed so I could tie it together.  Then I added strands of Tshirt yarn to mirror the ribbon effect from the front of the vest and to keep the general feel of the flow of the garment.  

I also found the things I needed to stamp my princess bride dress to convert it into Gracie Law's wedding dress.  I still have a few more steps to do to make the paint permanent on the dress.  The gold ends up being a little darker than I had hoped but it does sparkle so perhaps it will catch the light.  I still need to adjust the collar and the sleeves.  

I also got the silver corset in the mail which looks pretty but is much flimsier than I anticipated.  I may have to change plans or double corset.  It also sits much lower than I was thinking on my chest.  It seems it is just meant for lingerie and not as a outward wearable corset.  I was going to modify it anyway so ... it will work for now.  I also got my silver wig, which they sealed into the envelope without clearing the hair so I had to yank some of the hair off the sticky parts.  The color is perfect but I don't think I'll be able to style it into a 30's 40's hairstyle.  John has also designed several prop pieces to print out on the 3d printer so we're in a pretty good place.

The Costume Dump - SLC Comic Con plan

Gracie Law & Lo Pan

red dress with red and gold obi

I have the princess bride dress that could be modified by removing the cuff, cutting a new neckline and maybe stamping with gold fabric paint with an asian stamp

then all I would need is the obi, edging or just use the same corset I wore with the red dress last year

headdress 

green contacts ordered

hide regular shoes under long hem to stay comfortable

Need asian robe -  watchlisted several on ebay

will need red sash

hubby will need to build headdress (attach stringy long black hair to headdress or wear wig or forget it?)

gold long fingernail/talon

will need makeup for both.  

This is  the challenging bit.  I found a picture of someones handmade version.  She used the air dry paper clay to make the peacock head which looks easy.  The problem I'm having is how you design the form to the head.  I'm thinking about using one of my 1940's hats as the base or a headband which should keep things in place. I did find someone else's blog where they are recreating the looks and showing good step by step.  

Agatha Heterodyne and Gilgamesh Wolfenback or jagermonster

red or brown corset

black vest 

black pants with red stripe

apron with tools

trilobite necklace and knee pads

work gloves

goggles

round glasses

blonde wig

gadgets

 Depending on which Gilgamesh look we go for...

brown fishing style vest with lots of pockets and tool holds

dirty white shirt
brown pants

 gadgets

or jagermonster with face hair has green hat with yellow plume brown army jacket with sash but john likes the idea of a horn so that would be flesh tone jager with pillbox hat and fur lined collar jacket and vest

doing the Schmot Guy hat on gil would be epic

Silver Sable Noir

$300

$40

$14  

Silver Sable Noir is going to be less flattering in general.  I can order a silver corset to help shape underneath.  Plus one of the two dresses.

I plan on making or finding a pearl chocker that I can string pearls from to make the white cross that is silver sable.   Could also do the body jewlry and have it go all the way around harness style

 Making the Shirken shapes to add to the waist line and

 a silver painted hand gun to go in the purse. 

Silver wig has been ordered.

Silver gloves? or braclet?

Dr. Strange Noir

We have a grey tux and tails  that may work

modify red cape

top hat

yellow/gold cravat

Last week was pretty awesome and rotten

As life tends to go, this last week was full of ups and downs.  We started by having a geocaching adventure with thedisneybugs.

 We did something like 22 caches in the DPL series which is in every library in Denver and requires some easy and some challenging finds.  We got a special geocoin just for completing the series which was amazing fun!  Every library had something fun to do it in.  One had a plane cockpit you could play in....so of course the boys did.














I made them do a victory dance heheh

I had a super full week. We went to the jail for library duties, had some additions to the schedule with birthdays and 4th of July stuff.  And that's when things took the roller coaster plummet.  Our cat escaped the house, we still can't figure out how.  Then a friend informed us they had lost a loved one.  Death is hard.  It's awful when its close, it's heart breaking just being near by.  No one knows what to say.  I keep waffling between being sad this person is gone and wanting to love the people who are left behind with out overwhelming them.  I know I'd want to hide in my house so no one would bother me but I've heard that many people back away from people who have suffered a loss like this because they don't know what to say and figure the person wants to be left alone when the person just needs a friend.  

Then sucker punched in the face by a sinus infection.  Fever, cough, so much achy sinus pressurey aweful.  Then I burned my hand on the stove.

This week is starting with recovery.  I dislike recovery no matter how necessary it is.  I hate knowing I have all kinds of stuff to do and that I am instead going to cradle a cup of orange juice and a tissue box.  Yes, tissue for the sinus infection but also because I'm going to be thinking of my friends and their loss and wishing I could tell them how much I love them in just the right way.

Its that time again

I don't know about you but there are so many thing going on in my head right now.  The uproar on the internet has made me ponder some serious questions.  Is this the start of the persecution of the American Church?  Is it vital to make a stand publicly?  Have we lost the battle and need  to move to a new front?  Are we battling the right things?

I have friends that fall in a great spectrum on the LGBT issue.  The current victory dance that is happening has brought serious division and persecution to Christians who felt the need to comment publicly on this issue.  I've watch friendships implode.  I'm struggling with the questions this raises more than I can express on paper.  I know that homosexuality is a sin.  I can say that my close friends who are gay know this is what I believe and we have had a respectful conversation about it.  My acquaintances who are gay may or may not know what I believe.  Do I need to shout from a street corner or make a pubic stand online....I don't think so.  How do you express love and not hate with emotionless (due to the nature of print/text verses face to face conversation with all the nonverbal clues) blanket statements?  The truth is not everyone considers what they are saying, they are just expressing themselves.  They don't think of how it will read.  Plus, everyone says stupid things sometimes.  It happens.  You don't know what to say so you say what you've heard.  Is that taking a righteous stand or just hurting your own cause?  For me, I'm going to keep these discussions personal and face to face.

Now for the stuff that is going to sound even more religious, sorry guys.  This country and  this world are ending.  Every day convinces me that these are the birth-pangs the Bible speaks of.  This year a jubilee of Jubilees is happening, right after the third blood moon of the year.  The very conjunction of planets that may have shown and foretold the birth of Jesus Christ is in the sky right now.  Society is rejecting what is good and right as backward and wrong.  Terrorists are killing people all over the world and we're arguing about homosexuality.  I've heard my whole life that I should live as if today was my last.  Couple that with living like a workman approved.  Am I honoring God with what my day fills with?  How much time am I wasting ...

That's the question.  I know end of the world stuff can sound kind of kooky.  I wasn't even invested when I was younger....yeah sure, it'll happen someday.  I thought of it as good motivation to live like today is your last but because it wasn't real to me it wasn't really motivation.

So enough of the serious stuff.

ComicCon is approaching so fast and I'm left again wishing I had worked on costumes sooner but the truth is we just finalized the style with my brother a few weeks ago and I was doing stuff all this time.  I haven't been sitting around fiddling my thumbs.

Anyway, we're doing Lopan and Gracie from the wedding in Big Trouble little China.  Agatha and Gil from Girl Genius

 Plus Marvel Noir
I'm deciding styles for Silver Sable

Femme Fatal Silver Sable or Gangster Silver Sable

The real trouble as always is finding pieces.  I'm not a fabulous seamstress but I can do it if I have too.  But fabric is expensive.  I'd rather find pieces that would work but I'm not finding them.  A couple of the things we are definitely going to have to make and that's going to take time.  We really need to get moving on these things.  I wasn't going to do Silver Sable but my brother said he was really looking forward to it.  I had written it off as a possibility because I was unable to lose weight and I didn't think I could pull it off but going Noir with it makes me more comfortable because women were a little more curvy back then and going gangster will also be more slimming.  It will be harder to tell who I'm going as though.  Maybe I should print business cards?  Hmmmm