This Week

This week I actually have progress to report since I actually did some sewing. I worked on my 1868 crinoline, though it was mostly non-progress. I've got the pattern in hand (ordered on Tuesday and received on Thursday - I was impressed) and boning on order. I've traced off the pattern pieces so I'm ready to cut it out, maybe I'll be able to do that Monday night. Plus I put together the pattern pieces for the petticoat to go over it, cut it out, and have run up and felled all the seams. I'll get the waistband on it sometime this week but will have to wait until the hoop is ready to hem it.

Then I finished the knitting on my first 18th century stocking. I still need to weave in the ends, but it's a stocking. Now I'm two rows into the second one, and it looks very, very small.

Cross-stitching progresses, but there's really nothing to say about it. It's slow, very slow. And something like 58,000 stitches in the project. One does see progress a lot faster when sewing.

This morning I finally managed to put the cuffs on my print sacque. I made them in June but it took me five or six weeks to get around to pulling the old trim off and putting them on. They're better than the trim.

New 18th century pockets

18th Century Pockets

When I started making a muff for the Williamsburg ball, I decided it was time to make some new pockets as well. While the brown leaf brocade pockets are very pretty, they’re too small to be practical or accurate. While these may not be the height of accuracy (after all, they're only linen-look, not real linen), they're a great leap in the right direction.



( And here's what I did... )

Thoughts after wearing:
I didn't actually finish these before I went to Williamsburg so they didn't get their first wearing until Dress U. I didn't really use them that day since I carried a basket, which gives much easier access to things. Their first real trial was on Independence Day.

These are much better than my old pockets. First they’re free on their waist tape so they can be shifted slightly to line up with the pocket slits on different dresses, though I’ll probably tack or pin them in place while wearing them because the one holding my camera, wallet, and cell phone kept shifting around to the front. Second, they’re big enough to hold plenty and so are a vast improvement over the Butterick ones.