G-L-A-M-O-R-OUS

One of my favorite things to do sewing-wise, is to recreate things I see in a movie. I love the challenge. So when my friends (or even strangers with my business card) come to me and ask me to make something like what they saw in a movie I usually jump at the chance (unless it is WAY beyond my ability... a seamstress must know her limitations) and recently a friend of mine who is doing a vocal competition next week and she wanted/needed an evening sort of gown for it. (gotta look good) She asked me if I could recreate a certain dress from the movie Burlesque (fun movie, lots of fantastic costumes) this particular dress is a form fitted evening gown, now normally I stay away from evening attire (too many bad experiences with prom dress BS... Like one time a friend thought it would be hilarious to play an April Fool's joke (because her prom fell on April 1st) on me and tell me her mom burned the skirt I had made while ironing it. I was less than amused and I didn't talk to her for weeks after that)
Anywho, Normally I stay away from this sort of thing, but I haven't made anything like it in years so I decided to remind myself why I don't make formal wear.

This is the dress I was asked to recreate...

 Gorgeous, no?

We decided that red was a better choice for my friend's skin tone and we managed to find a lovely shade of red that was shiny and eye catching.
I started with a base pattern

and altered it a bit, made the panels skinnier to get a more straight cut rather than going for a circle skirt (since it's supposed to be fitted, not poofy) and I decided to give it a good heavy lining to support the shape of the top of the dress and so I could have boning in it if need be (turns out that once I got it skin tight on her, there was no need for boning) here it is after the main alterations and before the minor alterations and adding the arm bits.

Best invisible zipper I have EVER done thankyouverymuch!

It took 2 rather lengthy fittings to get the dress to where I'd let it be seen in public, but I'm quite pleased with how it turned out in the end.

She looks amazing in it, don't you think?

~*~

On to Spartans!

this week you get #s 25, 26, and 27

#25 (I a now one 12th of the way finished!)
his name is Lentalus and he is unclaimed

#26 his name is Crixus and he is also unclaimed

#27! This little guy is going to my friend Lynette, his name is Duranious

yes, that is in fact an ipod (it was suggested that I give him a ukulele, but that seemed really involved, the ipod was easy... and I even gave it a purple case!)

Group photo!

This turned out to be a bit of a grumpy batch, except 27, who got an ipod. It really never does cease to amaze me the personality that shows on these guys as I make them.



In other news, I am pleased to announce that I am crocheting something besides Spartans! (in addition to the spartans, because really, I don't have enough to do already) I'm making a hand towel out of some great variegated cotton yarn, given to me by Brenda (thanks!!!)
You see we lost a kitchen hand towel to the Great Laundry Crisis of 2011 (just about a month ago) and I figured I'd replace it with one made with love (d'aaaawwwww)

I'm not terribly far along on it yet, because Spartans do take up most of my time, but you'll get to see it as it grows (so exciting, I know)
Here it is so far

do you see the love going into this thing? it's totally there.

hehe

well til next week! Stay crafty all

Sometimes I wish I was Mary Poppins

Because then cleaning and organizing would be so much easier, (and I'd have an awesome carpet bag of holding) I mean, how lovely would it be to be able to just snap your fingers and have a room clean itself, I'd even settle for a small space at a time, like my sewing area. It kind of looks like a tornado hit my craft space and danced around a bit, possibly with an Irish step dancing troupe and a polka band, before moving on...
No really. It's that bad.

I ask you, how the hell am I supposed to be able to do anything in that space??? (and this was cleaned up a bit) So I decided that my crafty space needed a makeover and it needed it bad.

I allotted myself an allowance for new shiny organizing bits and then spent a day at IKEA (no really it was pretty much the whole day, we started out with breakfast in the cafe there and then left for a movie, came back and had lunch in the cafe and finished our shopping) I acquired shelves in several forms and drawers for my patterns and trims and the ridiculous amount of yarn I have purchased for the Spartan project. It was a blast! and I stayed in my budget, which is always nice.

So *snaps fingers* TADA!

  I love it! it's so much easier to work now that I have a space that is cleared off and it's easy to find all of my tools and I even had my dad make riser blocks for my sewing machine cabinet so I'd stop sacrificing the skin on the tops of my knees to the sewing gods.
If you look you can see my small, but growing, army of Spartans on the shelves. Once they are full I will box up those Spartans and fill the shelves up again and again until I have reached all 300 (223 days down, 658 days to go) Which actually brings me to the Spartans this week! These are some of the farm Spartans, unfortunately I wasn't able to crochet as much as I wanted because my hand was hurting really bad all weekend (probably from the crocheting I did do)
Here are numbers 22, 23, and 24 (one more and I'll be a 12th of the way finished!)

22 is going to a friend from my days working in St Louis, Anjle!
His name Rhaskos.

Number 23 did have a home, but the guy who was supposed to get him has disappeared (and I'm really ok with this, he was an immature ass) so now poor 23 is homeless.
His name Ovidius

Number 24 is going to my friend up in NY Allyson! (miss you!)
His name is Erebus

Well folks that's all for today, I'm going to go snap my fingers at the dishes in the sink and see if maybe, just maybe, I can make them wash themselves.
Stay crafty everybody!

P.S. don't be shy! I promise the donate button won't bite, especially if you feed it a dollar or 2 *winkwinknudgenudge*

Can't Brain, Have Dumb

I really need a vacation.
I had planned to show y'all the pirate sashes I made for a crew that goes to Scarborough Faire, I hurried to finish them this week so that I would have something to show you besides the Spartans... aaaaand then I delivered them without taking pictures first.
In place of sashes I will give you weapons, Spartan weapons. These little guys are armed with a sword or spear (or the occasional outlandish weapon, such as a ball of yarn and knitting needles...) and making them, though not hard, is time consuming. I keep forgetting to make them before Sundays when I need to be able to attach them to the Spartans to complete them. I decided that since I was a little ahead, I'd make a few extra weapons and while I'm on the farm I plan on making a whole mess of weapons so I won't have to worry about it for a while.
soooo yea, weapons pre-detailing

Anywho, here are the Spartans for the week, only 1 of them has a home this time.
I give you numbers 19, 20, and 21
All pretty basic fellows, they need no special weapons, only their wit and adorableness to fight the good fight.

#19 is going to Johnny Bosse  
Here is Medicus!

#20 is named Solonius, poor little guy is homeless, somebody give him a home!

#21 is named Pietros, he is also homeless. Poor little homeless Spartan...

Group photo!

Well there you have it for this week and remember there is no post next week (I'm sure you'll all be out partying anyways) I'll see you the week after!

Stay crafty my friends.

P.S. My wonderful boyfriend proposed last Thursday and now I can call him my amazing fiance! *SQUEE*

Trying To Find Balance

Last week I decided that it would be a good idea to make 3 Spartans a week (how hard could it be? I mean, really?) in order to finish this project by my 27th birthday (instead of my 30th) but now I am realizing that it is taking up ALL of my time outside of work and sleep, though it's still imposing on both of those. So much so that all you get for a post today is the three Spartans I've made this week. I'm hoping that Labor Day weekend will give me a chance to get ahead and things will mellow out (no post September 4th, I'll be on a farm out in the middle of BFE where with no internet access or cell reception) because I have other projects in need of my attention besides this insanity (and those are paying gigs)
So without further (time consuming) adieu, here are this weeks Spartans!

#16 #17 and #18

#16, who's name shall be Thelonious, is going to my friend Megan Y.

(paint brush of DOOM)

#17, who's name is Nake (why? because I can) is going to my friend Blue

(I briefly considered doing everything blue, but thought it a bit excessive, so just the cape got to be blue)


and #18, Astinos, is yet unclaimed, but less dejected than poor Stelios the unloved

Group photo

One of these things is not like the other...

In other news I found out last Thursday that I have a Ganglion cyst (also known as a Bible cyst, because people used to "cure" them by whacking as hard as possible with a bible. For serious; google it if you don't believe me) in my left hand, attached to the tendon that allows me to bend my thumb. It is causing me great pain and to help with that (along with the hefty anti-inflammatory meds) I have gotten a crafters compression glove.

Isn't it stylish? (Note: I had to take the picture in my mirror because my camera didn't want to focus on it otherwise) Unfortunately it only comes in Electric Snot green, if it had been black or brown or anything else really, I could work with it, but the only thing I can do with this is possibly attack it with puffy paint and hope it doesn't kill me in my sleep. My other option is letting a doctor cut into my hand, which the very idea of makes me twitchy. I don't hurt that bad yet and until I do I will suffer with the ugly ass glove and when it gets cold outside I can wear both and look half as dumb but twice as ugly, hooray for me.

That's all today, I'm hoping for next week to have some crafty organizational magic for you, we'll see how that goes. I might actually get to have a bit of time to work on other things this week, but you never know.

Stay crafty kids

The Rule of 3

Hi all, sorry for the late posting, but I was at home for a grand total of 5 waking hours collectively Sunday (or there abouts) and there just wasn't enough time in my day for finishing everything for the blog to get posted, especially with my new plan of "How the bloody hell am I going to finish this project in a decent amount of time?".
I've done more math (I know, scary) and if I can crank out 3 Spartans a week (that's right 3!) then I will finish this project in less than 2 years, which to me seems way better than 5 years. So I am going to set an end date for this project (dun dun DUUUUUUN) and see if I can not only be finished by then, but well before then!
The end date will be July 1st, 2013
That is my birthday in 2 years (minus a bit)
SO I have to finish 285 Spartans in 685 days (which is about 98 weeks and if you multiply that by 3 then you get a higher number than the number of Spartans I have left to finish. It totally works out) and while on the topic of math (it's not often I use it, but when I do I go all the way) I figured out roughly how many stitches are in each Spartan (crochet stitches, not assembly stitches) there are 998 in 1 guy, if you figure up I'm doing 3 a week that's 2994 stitches per week and when I finish my 300th Spartan I would have done 299,400 stitches... my hands, they cramp at just the thought.

I have also figured out that if I do certain pieces on certain days I can definitely get the 3 guys done per week, as long as I don't have a day completely filled up by other things (like last Sunday) but I will also have "catch up" (or ketchup) days where I will get to spend more than the normal amount of time crocheting. We'll see how this all plays out.


anywho

Today I have the first of the 3s for you. 13, 14, and 15

13 is going to my friend Aquino (though he's probably forgotten about it by now)

14 is going to Shelley, I hope you like his weapon of choice, heeheehee

15 is unclaimed so far

And here is #13 his name is Astinos

#14 his name is Daxos and he's the pride of Sparta. (and has deadly sock making skillz)

 Tiny ball of yarn is actually embroidery floss and the knitting needles are straight pins

and last but not least #15, named Stelios the sword less (the glue on his sword is not dry yet)

he is the unloved Spartan, he gets no sword, he gets no owner, won't someone find room in their heart for this poor dejected soldier???

My first batch of 3, this is going to be a lot of work unless I can get even faster at this



aaaaand that's all you get this week.
Til Next time!


P.S. You may have noticed I've made another addition to my blog page (other than the fishies) I now have a Donation button, because I am unable to technically sell these little guys (copyright issues) I can however accept donations for them (love the loopholes) So if you have a spare dollar please feel free to encourage me to crochet faster, the sooner I finish this project, the sooner you lot get your Spatans. It's a win win situation!

Whistle A Happy Tune

Once upon a long ago I was going to try to teach myself how to play the Irish Tin Whistle. This ended poorly because my family did not approve of the first stages of learning... because it was loud and sounded a bit like strangling a bird... I gave it up because I could not deal with the teasing. Well now I have a place of my own and can try again (I've also finally found my whistle) I've found some Youtube classes and I'm going to make a point of working on it almost daily (if not daily) because obviously I don't have enough on my plate as it is...
You may be wondering why I have brought this up (if you're not, then well, you're special...) well you see, the reason I have is because I bought touch up paint for my car, very high quality metal paint, it looked like the closest thing to match the paint color and yet it is too bright and doesn't match (dammit) so now I am left with this paint and nothing to use it on (this never lasts long) Matt has a tin whistle too, it is an ugly yellow color, he doesn't want it (possibly because it is ugly, but most likely because he doesn't play it, he plays the Bodhran, which is a drum) so I have sort of claimed it, it is the same key as mine (but uglier) and my thought process went something like this.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*looks at whistle* damn that's an icky color
*looks at paint* pretty sparkly blue
*looks at whistle* it's metal...
*looks at paint* it's metal paint!
I need something quick for the blog and it's something for me, which makes it even better! and then I'll have a practice whistle and a pretty whistle. How is this a bad thing???
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So there you have it. Perfectly logical if you ask me.
Anyway, I started painting before I thought to take pictures of the process but as you can see here it really is an awful yellow color

the first coat was streaky and you could see too much yellow through it, so after about an hour and a half I put on a second coat

 which covered up a lot of the streaky but not completely, so a third coat is in order and then a few touch ups
and now... hooray pretty blue whistle!

and of course, I have the next Spartan for you! I'm barely into the double digits and I'm already getting a bit silly with them. This #12 is going to my friend Mimi (of Meandering Mimi Creations go check her creations out!) and Mimi is a Hooper (hula hooper that is) so I thought it only fitting that her Spartan have a hoop as well and it was interesting figuring out how to make a crocheted hoop! So here he is Vortix the hooping Spartan!

TADA!

I've just done some math on how long this project will take at 1 Spartan a week from hence forth... it will be 5 and a half years before I'm finished O_O
I do believe I'm going to try and pick up the pace a bit, I'd rather not be doing this for the next 5 years, mkay? And I'm quite certain no one wants to wait that long for their Spartan.

I am getting faster at them, but I'm thinking I need to be even faster if this is going to get finished before I'm 30.

I shall leave you now, on that sobering thought, and wish you a good day.

I said good day!
;-)

P.S. be sure and check out the changes I've made to my page. You can now sign up for email updates when I update and you can share my blog via Facebook and Twitter (please feel free to share it all you like!) and there are fish, because well I wanted them and they amuse me.