Update in February
Happy Valentines Day to those who celebrate. After 30+ years of married life we don't need one special day to be romantic, every day is Valentines. Now if you believe that, you ARE a hopeless romantic, LOL. Just to update on my last entry, the costumes for the Dancing Studio show were all completed and delivered on time after many sleepless long evenings and nights. The show was a revelation, with so much of my past work being re-used in different ways for this 10th anniversary event. Christmas with the 2 grandkids was great, the looks on their little faces as they opened their gifts was worth a million dollars. A sad event though, my DD#1 had a miscarriage just before Christmas at 12 weeks gestation, normally the safe time in a pregnancy. It just wasn't meant to be I'm afraid. Then some great news, her partner FINALLY proposed in the New Year with a truly gorgeous ring he had made for her as a surprise. He asked her dad for permission to propose back in November and we had been keeping quiet, so difficult ! Now we are planning a wedding in early November this year.
On the stitching front, not too much has been done lately. I've been belatedly working on 2 international counted thread band round robbins and will begin stitching on the third sometime this week. I've drawn up the chart from an old English pattern book on blackwork with designs from the early 1600's. The 2 other bands were also stitched from this book, and hope the 2 new ones I'm to receive from overseas can also use some of these designs on them. See my blog at http://missmuffettwo.blogspot.com/ for photos.
I need to alter the TV 1873 Polonaise dress by 27th February. I plan to remove the sleeves and try enlarging the armscye by one of 2 methods, either redrawing the armhole curve to give an extra 10 cm (not sure I can do that much) or adding a gore from above the waist to armhole under the armpit. The client is rather large, so I doubt the extra panel will be noticed unless she does star jumps, LOL. I also need to remove some of the fullness in the neckline lace which imitates a chemise beneath the bodice. I made it too full and it's flopping over. her partner's Victorian shirt is also a little short and snug in the sleeve department, so I have started undoing and will recut a longer , fuller sleeve to put in the enlarged armscye of his shirt.
This month is traditionally hot in Sydney, but we've had so much rain that hot AND humid is the result. Not great for sleeping at night when the temp drops to a minimum of 22 C , and one night it didn't drop at all, staying around 35 C all night after a stinking hot day. Everyone 's looking forward to Autumn and Winter here, ours are quite mild really with minimums overnight averaging 3 C down to 0 C in the western suburbs. This year will fly past, I'm involved in organising and helping at so many functions and activities with the historic house groups I belong to, not fogetting babysitting the granddaughter 2 days per week and now a wedding. And then the middle daughter and her partner bought their first house last week, in 5 or 6 weeks we'll have our spare room back !!
On the stitching front, not too much has been done lately. I've been belatedly working on 2 international counted thread band round robbins and will begin stitching on the third sometime this week. I've drawn up the chart from an old English pattern book on blackwork with designs from the early 1600's. The 2 other bands were also stitched from this book, and hope the 2 new ones I'm to receive from overseas can also use some of these designs on them. See my blog at http://missmuffettwo.blogspot.com/ for photos.
I need to alter the TV 1873 Polonaise dress by 27th February. I plan to remove the sleeves and try enlarging the armscye by one of 2 methods, either redrawing the armhole curve to give an extra 10 cm (not sure I can do that much) or adding a gore from above the waist to armhole under the armpit. The client is rather large, so I doubt the extra panel will be noticed unless she does star jumps, LOL. I also need to remove some of the fullness in the neckline lace which imitates a chemise beneath the bodice. I made it too full and it's flopping over. her partner's Victorian shirt is also a little short and snug in the sleeve department, so I have started undoing and will recut a longer , fuller sleeve to put in the enlarged armscye of his shirt.
This month is traditionally hot in Sydney, but we've had so much rain that hot AND humid is the result. Not great for sleeping at night when the temp drops to a minimum of 22 C , and one night it didn't drop at all, staying around 35 C all night after a stinking hot day. Everyone 's looking forward to Autumn and Winter here, ours are quite mild really with minimums overnight averaging 3 C down to 0 C in the western suburbs. This year will fly past, I'm involved in organising and helping at so many functions and activities with the historic house groups I belong to, not fogetting babysitting the granddaughter 2 days per week and now a wedding. And then the middle daughter and her partner bought their first house last week, in 5 or 6 weeks we'll have our spare room back !!