Thursday, April 26, 2007

Love this website

I carry my beloved Coach handbag everywhere I go. Imagine my distress last week when I read (somewhere) that you de-quality (my own word) a designer purse when you use it when you wear - say- sweats to the chiropractor! SO yeah I guess I need a dress-down bag!
http://www.tonicliving.com/

It is called Tonic Living and has the cuuutest fabrics. I think they are in TOronto too.

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Another suprise blown!

And I had such high expectations on this one! Mike's birthday is next week and Katrin had invited us up for the weekend. There is a $500 dollar a plate dinner with Stephen Harper and we were going to sit at the table right next to him! For free! Mike would have loved that so much. No go anymore for reasons I refuse to go into. Maybe Katrin can come down here instead.....are you listening girl?

Costume designs

My friend Barry and I have been singing together for a few years. We have evolved from a cabaret ensemble of 12, to a group of 5, to now just the two of us. We are working on a series of shows showcasing each decade from the 1920's to the present. While the vocal arrangements have taken up the bulk of time, I have started to focus on costuming for it lately. Now that we have a gig - this weekend- the pressure is on! Barry envisioned a flapper dress for me that could transform from a modest 19teen's style to the more daring - "oh dear show my KNEE?!" mid 20's. Riiiight Barry!

So I took a BWOF dress - pics later- and omitted darts to loose the image of a waist.
I added two tiers of ruffles, and fringe on those. To do the transformation, I made two additional sets of ruffles on lining fabric, and velcroed them to the main dress. Now, at the appropriate points in the show, I can take them off and "voila" - a new dress! I just hope it doesn't come across toooooo cheesy!

Some hints about my surprise.....looks like I will need an umbrella!

Sunday, April 22, 2007

I am so excited that I am wiggling!

Oh boy - big surprises for someone I love VERY MUCH are in store next week. No hints 'cause I heard through the grapevine that people I didn't know read this blog do indeed read it. Let's just say...nope let's not say a thing! Thanks to my bestest friend in the whole world for helping this one happen!

Later y'all

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Wedding Dress con't - "Creativ Festival"

The plan yesterday was to head off to Toronto to the "Creativ Festival" (what a dumb name!) to decide how best to bling up Kate's lace. Leah did not have to work until 5:30 so she decided to spend the day with her mommy. Gotta love that girl. I thought I would head off early - 7:30 am in order to beat the traffic. HAHAHA Madam Lauren missed her bus- she NEVER misses it, so why she picked today I will never know. London is a half hour the other direction from TO! So at 7:30, we headed off to London, had to stop for a train that chugged ever so slowly across Adelaide Street, then stopped and backed the entire length of the train back. We finally got Lauren to school at 8:10, then jumped on the 401 towards TOronto. I always take the 403 into TO when I am going to the COnvention Centre, and the traffic was horrible- how all you commuters do that every day- I would go crazy! I much prefer my 2 minute walk! We also had to stop for diesel - do you know how hard it is to find diesel in Oakville?
We FINALLY parked on Front Street at 11:15am- I think that is the longest Toronto commute I have ever endured. I forgot which building the show is in - I haven't actually been since Lorna (PR friend from Ottawa) and I were there 1 1/2 years ago! OH MY GOODNESS - it was not listed on the events board! I knew I had the right day, and began to have a sinking suspicion that they moved it back to the CNE grounds where it used to be. Nope- they moved it to the INTERNATIONAL BUILDING BY THE AIRPORT!!! uugghhh. So back to the car we went, and fought traffic yet again to the International Building.
We found what we were looking for right away, and it seems that hotgluing Swarovski Crystals to her lace will be a cinch - and work well. So we purchased the Bejeweller , and 4 bags of 144 crystals- size 10 which is 3 mm - of clear crystals





I think we will need more and I found an Ebay store in the UK that sells them fairly inexpensively.

Anyways, the rest of the show was really a bust. Boring with a capital B! If you wanted to buy necklaces or beads, you would be in heaven, and for quilters it is great, or if you need a new machine. Personally I will give it a pass for a long time- I only went yesterday cause I knew that I could find crystals and talk to someone about them. I was going to do a few "demonstrations"- see even the classes have deteriorated- but given my travel "problems" I had to give them a pass.

See you all later!

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

The Wedding Dress Saga - 1st installment

Katelyn's Wedding dress! How long have I waited to do this! I suppose considering she is only 21 - not THAT long. It has been forever though since I created my own.

It is going well thus far. I think the main reason is that I have been able to sit back and say "what do YOU want?" I will not say anything is impossible- although I will say "wow, great idea, I am going to have to figure out how to do that!"

For inspiration we are using this Maggie Sottero dress that she tried on 2 different times. She likes the shirred bodice mostly. She has fallen in love with an allover lace idea so the draped lace will continue to the floor.


We are using this Vogue pattern as a very rough pattern.

We made a very lovely(!) black version as a mock up. The size 10 fit her almost perfectly.
We headed off to Toronto to look for fabric - specifically lace. I wasn't worried that we would not find any thing suitable as Ann (Gorgeous Things) was sweet enough to do some looking in New York City on one of her buying trips, so we knew that Kashi at Metro had some beautiful laces. The first store we visited was Leo's. The salesgirl was soo great and recommended to us that Kate be draped in the fabric to get a better feel of what she liked. What a difference that made. We ended up loving a Chantilly lace with no beading (75/metre) and a more netting like lace with lots of bling (150/metre). I was hesitant to buy at the very first store, so off we went to the other stores. There was lots of fabric to choose from yes, but nothing spectacular - as well as the fact that we were totally ignored by many sales people. Don't get me wrong, I abhor hovering sales people, but an acknowledgment of our presence would have been nice!
The last store we ventured into was LA Fabrics - bad name great store. Very high end, european fabrics. Kate fell in love with an Alencon lace - it was 54 inches wide which makes me suspect it perhaps is not TRUE Alencon, but at 75/mtre I was not going to argue. What cinched the deal for Kate was the fact that her inspiration dress was pinned to the same lace (in white instead of her ivory) and an inspiration picture that I had clipped was pinned by another bolt. Good Karma! No bling though - so I am off to Toronto this week to the Needlecraft show to explore Swarovski glue on crystals versus sew on beads.
6 -gulp - 6 metres later, we needed to decide on the underdress. We wanted Peau de Soie - and could choose from silk - 65/yd or polyester 6/yd. Kate thought I was nuts for humming and hawing - "gees mom - it's only the underlining- no one will know the difference" So we went with poly - yick. We did get silk chiffon for the bodice. Oh yes and some stretch silk charmeuse in brown for my MOB Dress. Our last stop was a hole in the wall where Katelyn scooped a bag full of perfect sequins for 5 dollars. Kate meet needle, needle meet sequins! (actually my fantabulous mother loves handwork and has offered to help out with the beading)

Next up - the underpinnings and hopefully some fabric photos.

Saturday, April 14, 2007

Project Runway - Canadian style eh!

At least three people have stopped me this week to ask me if I knew about the Canadian version of Project Runway - and whether or not I was going to enter! As if! I know I sew well - but designing is another thing altogether. Now there is real talent. My little copy -copy act is pretty meek comparatively. "But you are designing Kate's wedding dress.." Wedding dresses are a cinch to design. Cop out? yes! I am just plain too scared of rejection on the fashion front to ever put myself out there like that.
All of you Canadian Project Runway wanna be's - the deadline has been extended to April 27- not a good thing methinks. They must be getting desperate if there are posters at! Fabricland stores. For the record I saw the poster in the Fashion District in Toronto.
So hurry on over to www.slice.ca. Daughter Kate scoped it out for me and you need a portfolio of your work - maximum 8 pieces- drawings, images or photos. You also need a an audition tape - gosh I'd need a recorder too!
I can see it now- I would be that sad little thing who they all laugh about when I leave the room!
I think I need to get satellite tv before this baby airs!