Hey, it looks like a bodice!!!
At least, it’s getting to look that way. Here are a couple of pics of the bodice progress so far. There will be another row of trim, horizontally, between each of the angled pieces and the vertical purple and gold trim in the center. The tabs at the bottom and shoulders are not finished yet. I am thinking that in addition to the darker purple piping at the edge of the tabs, I will also try to add a line of the purple and gold trim at the center. I think I have enough. We may actually need to order more of this trim for the king’s doublet. Hmm… I’d better measure and see how much I have left…
Bodice Front – trim partially finished.
Bodice right side – you can see how the different pieces are shaped in this one. Notice the fact that there are no curved seams in women’s garments of this time. This helps create the smooth shape, and helps push up certain areas of the female body.
Tomorrow, the goal is to finish the hand-sewing on the binding, and get the tabs made, basted to the waist line, and sewn into place. I want this mostly finished by tomorrow evening, so I can focus on the doublet. We open three weeks from today.
Crunch time. 
Darn.
Nothing like getting to the stage in bodice construction when you finally get to baste the lining and outer fabric together, only to realize that the outer fabric is juuuusttt thin enough that it needs to be flatlined to keep the boning from being slightly visible.
Sigh.
Oh well, I’ll cut out another bodice front piece and the two back pieces out of cotton drill, top stitch them to the lining. That should work better. The thing is, if the outer fabric weren’t shiny, the boning wouldn’t have been so visible.
In either case, the bodice should be very close to being done by tomorrow night, with the exception of the shoulder and waist tabs. Progress is being made. I lost a bunch of time last night, because I had to go to the funeral for close friend’s wife. 
I just was not up to sewing last night, and I didn’t have the trim set yet, and I didn’t want to make a hasty decision that I would end up regretting. What I did come up with looks great so far (can’t finish the rest until the binding is on). No pics yet because my son scavenged my camera batteries for his wii-mote (with permission, via chat while I was at Vista Deployment Training). This weekend will be the huge push to get the Queen’s gown DONE, and the King’s doublet started.
The end is approaching quickly…
Lots of progress and photos!
Finally have photos uploaded!
I spent today working on the bodice lining, along with cutting and smoothing the duct tie boning. The lining is finished, and I’m waiting to start cutting out the fashion fabric until after Mad Men is over.
Sewing channels…
Sanding and sanding… That old nail shaper works great!
Front of the bodice.
Sleeve One! Light yellow embroidered silk with violet piping. The panels are tacked together, and will have pearls or crystals at each joint.
Low necked smock, complete except for the cuff fastenings.
The underskirt is finished, and the overskirt is very nearly complete (one more trim to be added, then pearls). The end is in sight!!!!
Lots of work being done!
I am currently working on basting the wrist ruffles to the cuffs of the smock. As usual, I have done the first one WRONG, and had the wrong side of the ruffle up (the turned under part of the narrow hem). In my defense, I was distracted when I pinned it together. It was only after I had finished basting the cuff together, and was getting ready to put together the other than I realized I had done it YET AGAIN.
Wrap up so far: Forepart is still being beaded, trim is still being basted to the overskirt, the smock is missing the arms yet, and will need to be sewn up the side seams, and hemmed after the sleeves are attached. The bodice sleeves are soooo close to being done: the binding at the top needs to be hand-sewn, and the inner panes need to be tacked together, and a hook and eye added to the wrist area.
And the reason why more progress has not been made? My son has been sick since Friday, and is still not 100%, although he was able to actually eat noodles tonight for supper (very sore throat, HFMD). Hard to sew when you are madly sterilizing the house and trying to figure out what to feed a 14 year old with sores at the back of his throat…
Lots of work being done…
So far:
• Forepart = done! The queen is in the process of beading it, and it looks great!
• Gold trim is sewn to overskirt – hand sewn. No real way to neatly machine sew it.
• Gold and purple trim is in the process of being basted to the overskirt.
• Smock – cut out, waiting to be sewn
• bias tape for binding and piping – yards, and yards, and yards! update: 12 yards of piping, done, and looking great! Hope it’s enough to pipe the sleeve panes. If not, I have about 18 more yards of bias tape… definitely made too much bias tape…
• Sleeves – one set of fashion fabric is cut out. I will be cutting out the other sleeve shortly. These are 5-paned sleeves. Add two layers of lining for each pane… oh boy. update: second set of panes is cut out!
Many thanks to Lynne for helping out so much today! It really helped get this project rolling faster, and it was a lot of fun!
Jump
Finally have the trim on the forepart, the guards to the overskirt cut out and sewn, and the hem to the underskirt ready to be sewn.
Total hand sewing hours this week = 8. That trim was a bear to sew down neatly and still follow the curve of the bottom of the forepart. I have got to figure out how to sew the gold trim by machine, or the overskirt is going to take forever. I am thinking clear thread, zig-zagged might be the trick.
Photos tomorrow!
Actual progress!
The underskirt hem is pinned up, the overskirt is waiting to be pinned (and looking gorgeous!), and the trim has been finalized (we finally came up with the WOW combination). I have to finish pinning up the hem, press it to set it, and then shorten it another two inches for the guards at the bottom of both skirts. The bodice pattern has also been finalized by checking the paper pattern over the skirts to make sure it wasn’t too long.
We decided against a bumroll, as it made the skirts way too high at the waistline. I had padded the pleats on the overskirt, so a bumroll really wasn’t needed anyway. Luckily, the bumroll fits me, too, so I may just end up replacing my old one.
List of things to do on Sunday (Saturday is full): cord the fabric for the doublet, hem the skirts, add the guards and part of the trim. Possibly add cutting out the bodice lining, and sewing it together. Oh, and cut out dark purple bias strips for binding and piping.
Seven weeks before faire, and this needs to be done within 4 weeks.
eeek!
Another week’s progress… Detailed. TMI, probably.
Erg… This has been a frustrating week.
Monday: no sewing possible. Had scouts in the evening, after getting home later than planned from work. By the end of scouts, I was having problems staying awake. By the time we got home, I was in the “dangerous behind the foot pedal of a sewing machine” state. All of this because I had major problems getting to sleep the night before…
Tuesday: Underskirt cartridge pleating still in progress. Front opening is really wonky… Hmm… I had planned to have the forepart snap in, so it can be changed easily without having to go the “apron” route. Like an idiot, I cut the sides to match the angle of the forepart. Having second thoughts about that…
Wednesday night: Mom calls and wants us to go to my hometown Thursday evening instead of Friday morning, so my dad and my son can have some time to goof off and burn stuff in the chimnea. Oh, and my sister, M, chimes in with the magic word: “Margaritas!!!!”. Laundry therefore took precedence over sewing. Feeling the panic by this point. But, I finish the cartridge pleating on the skirt, and start intensive work on fixing the stupid drape of that stupid opening in front.
Thursday: worked all day, drove 80 miles to my parents’ house, played with my nephews when my mom got there with them (she drove nearly 100 miles with a three and a half year old, and a one year old who was ticked off for the last 20 minutes because he was HUNGRY EARLY). S’mores and margaritas after the kids were in bed…
Friday: Cooked. Cleaned. Took care of nephews (did I mention the one-year-old can walk and is ENORMOUSLY curious?). Party. Ate. Too. Much. Drove back to Ames just in time for fireworks at the Colosseum. Fell into bed at midnight, but couldn’t sleep.
Saturday: FIXED the underskirt!!!! Straightened the front sides, which meant repleating and resewing about half of the cartridge pleats. Well worth the time and effort, because it is PERFECT. Exactly the way I wanted it to turn out. Started sewing snaps to forepart.
Sunday: Could NOT sleep last night. Went to bed at midnight, but was still tossing and turning at 2:30… Woke up at 8 for good. Got a lot done. Finished all snaps on forepart and skirt. Snapped everything together, threw it on the dressform, and it looks great! The edges of the forepart will be covered in trim. Wasn’t quite happy with the line of the forepart, though, so I adjusted the hoops, turned down the drawstring channel and sewed it (my son helped hold the hoops – never want to do that again). Much improved. Tried to figure out what the hem needs to be on the forepart, so I could start working on trim placement. Wanted to get the overskirt ready for pleating, so I cut the facing strips (there will be a 2 inch strip in a darker purple on the edge of each side of the opening, and at the hem). Pressed facing strips in half, and pressed up a half inch hem on one long side. Sewed the other side to the skirt openings, pressed the seam towards the facing. Finished the top edge of the skirt, and will soon be hand sewing the pressed edge of the facing to the seam. All raw edges will be contained. Taffeta makes a HUGE mess, btw, and the threads are nearly impossible to clean up. They will kill a vacuum, so I use a lint roller.
Still wish I could get the pleating strip sewn to the skirt tonight, but I think I am getting too tired to attempt that tonight. The other thing about taffeta is that you cannot rip out seams once they are sewn. Holes will be left behind, if not outright shredding of the fabric. No room for mistakes at all.
In all, I feel like I accomplished a lot the last couple of days. Everything just takes a lot of time at this point, and there are some things that just have to be hand sewn. This week should be much better. I should be able to at least START the bodice by the end of the week.
Sunday update, and BIG problem solved!
Whew. My arms ache right now, but I finally managed to salvage the new farthingale silhouette problem. The Queen’s new farthingale arrived last week, and after throwing it on the dress form, it became apparent that whoever made it either goofed up, or had no idea what a hoop slip, let alone a farthingale, looks like.
WTH???
There should be a smooth line from waist to bottom hoop, to create a cone shape. The only thing I can think of is that the top part of the farthingale came from a smaller sized pattern, as it is so far out of proportion.
Luckily, I discovered that the hoops are easily adjustable! Except, I can’t increase the top hoop circumference, because the top part looks like it was a separate pattern piece from the bottom (which is gathered into the top part). That top hoop channel has absolutely no more width to it. So, I think I will have to sew another channel just under it, in the gathered area if I can. Or, it may be easier to just turn under the drawstring channel a couple of times, since we’ll have to have the hoop a little higher off the ground anyway. In any case, it looks a million times better than it did before…
I also solved the cording problem on the doublet fabric: I found an adjustable zipper foot in my little box of assorted sewing machine feet that my mom found at a garage sale for me about 7 years ago. Best 50-cent gift I’ve ever received!
Speedbump (s).
Erg. We’ve been waiting for trims to show up, and there was one trim that I was really anxious to see in person. It was listed as black/grey/gold venise lace, and looked really pretty. Well, it got here, and it is nearly all grey, very, very little gold. Not going to work. The photos looked more gold, which is why we bought it.
So, very disappointed here…
I ran into another problem when I was testing piping the fabric for the King’s doublet. I think my sewing machine zipper foot just does not allow me to get close enough to the cord to pipe tight enough for it to look good. My sample looks wonky, although once the fabric is under tension, it looks great. I may have to do more tests with my other sewing machine (which has a more traditional, old-style foot for making piping) before ruling this out entirely. Or we’ll have to use bands of narrow trim instead…
Oh well, back to work. The week is half over, and I still have not gotten to many things on my list…
