Crazy Hectic Pre-Coronation...and a MOUSE!!
Being without job has allowed me to be on Eskimo time. This is what my body wants to normally do. Imagine it's winter and no sunlight for days on end. You sleep when you are tired you stay awake till you are sleepy.
In my youth it was 24 hours on, 8 hours sleeping. I'm older now and seem to need less sleep. It's about 24 hours up and 5-6 hours sleeping, with every seventh cycle being a normal 8-10 hours.
So I'm in the upside down part of the cycle....
I stayed up all night last night scouring a fleece. I was in the bathroom with tubs and tubs of water trying to get done before the plumbers showed up. So I completely lost track of time. It was 7:30 AM when I finished.
It's drying now. I have to card it when it dries and have it ready to return to it's owner on Sunday. Probably a good thing I'm daytripping coronation. Guess what I'll be carding Saturday night and Sunday morning!
I slept from Noon till 5PM. I'm wondering if at t this rate I'll be back in a normal hour cycle by coronation.
OK. I still have cold water, and the floor under where the hot water heater was is drying out. K will be working on replacing the floor this week. In the meantime my stockpots will be put to use for hot baths, and my teakettle for hot dishwater. All the laundry is done, the fabric for the entourage bags is washed, the fabric for newcomer tunics that was donated is washed. And I still have wrinkled pruney fingertips.
AAAAARHHRRRRHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!! I HAVE A MOUSE!!!!!!!!!!
I just frikkin saw it run across the kitchen floor !!! Oh, that's a riot. Little bugger heard me yell and ran back the way he came...
All this disturbance with the hot water heater must have brought it in from outside. I had to empty out the laundry room when they pulled it. God knows what I disturbed.
I thought I heard something rustling around this afternoon in the walk-in butler's pantry. Never heard anything before.
So glad no food is stored there. It's all dishware and hardware.
MMM. Must buy D-con tomorrow.
OK. forget mouse for now... on to the costume. I dug out the black linen, and worked on the collar. I'm being wishy washy and making the collar a separate item. I just can't stand the thought of embroidery and beadwork having to be washed while attached to the rest of the outfit.
I worked out the pattern on posterboard, fiddled with it countless times, and made it into a slight oval (with the long straight part of the oval falling front center and back center) which made it lay better. I then cut out a dummy on some synthetic fabric to see how it would drape and it did fine.
I'm fixing it so it will open to the right, but i've got to look up the source that said that was how they were attached, Trying to remember if it was in my Milla Davenport book on costume. Who knows if it's outdated info, but the picture I'm looking at, I thought it was her hair, and yes her hair is draped on her shoulder on her right side, but id does not explain the bit of white which is showing, which would show if you had it open on the right (just attached at the upper neck. It makes sense to have it there, just like a side clapsing cloak, it makes it easier to raise your arms without it bulking up around your neck as much. I tried it on a put my arms over my head, and yes, the side opening made it behave more. So I'm going with that.
Beading pattern. Oh, this is the most fun part, playing around with different arrangements. I came up with a design, and laid it all out to be sure I had plenty of what I needed plus a few extra if I dropped any or needed to have replacements. Then I drew up a sketch so I'd remember how to lay it out.
I'm kind of tired now, so I'll wait until I've had some sleep to start the beading. I just want to measure and mark my spots so everything is centered properly. It's gonna be so Shiney...!!
I'm real tempted to squish in some little gold bee beads I have. They'd look so Kewl, but I'm saving them for another costume I'm working on.
OH, and there was this awsome cool needlework frame that THL Juliana de Florey gave me years ago, and I've got the collar stretched out on it.
It's an awsome frame of unique construction.
Imagine each of the 4 sides are crennellated, 2 on their underside and two on their topside, so they can interlock together in a variety of sizes - and it's fair sized. Along the top of each side are evenly spaced headless nails, really small but strong. You pop your frame together, and the instructions say to wet your fabric and stretch across and let dry before working, but I did not want to do that, I just stretched it over the frame and pushed the fabric down so it popped the nails through. I had to use a skinny dowel rod to press between the nails. This linen is nice and strong and it looks really good. So much easier than a slate.
It RAWKS! I don't know why I didn't break it out years ago, but it will definitely be getting some serious use now!!
I'm tempted to make some sort of Hammock like hanger for it so it can float off the surface for easy access to both sides of the fabric. I'll take a picture later when I do my next progress photos.
Well, time to go to bed. I'm going to try to go to bed a little earlier tonight. and creep my way back to a semi-normal schedule maybe...we will see...