thecelticmaiden

Life is not boring to say the least, however it keeps throwing one curve after another. I find myself embroiled now in the middle of a heated custody battle for my 16 year old sons after their fathers INSANE girlfriend tried to attack one of them. She is a total nut-job and has been a serious pain in the ass for the last year. Where does he FIND these women??? So anyway been spending many hours dealing with that nonsense, though things seem to be settling a little as there isn't much more to be done until we reach our court date at the end of July. With all of this going on I haven't made any attempts at going to fashion shows or working on any films as its not possible for me to be gone for any length of time, and really I am im this place where I don't have much interest in doing so anyway.

Taking some of my at home time I have sat down and made myself start writing again. I have several novels in various states of doneness but like many of my designs just don't get around to finishing them for some reason or another. Except there was one story that had been playing in my mind for over two years. So with the arrival of my new laptop... and my need to be around constantly, I set to work on it. SERIOUS work no messing around this time. I am almost halfway through in the space of only about two weeks!  I am very proud of this and unlike the other ideas which I think would probably have a 50/50 chance of being published I am VERY optomistic about this one.

Went garage saleing today looking for what-nots and found a sale that had material for $1.00 a shopping bag! I came away with 10 bags and was very happy with my finds. Some being better than others of course. Going to have to cut into it soon!
 

Here is a photo of my Mrs. Lovett hat, the one I wore and am keeping.  This is made from that 1940's knitted hat then I added vintage felt mum's in different colors of purple, an old plastic multicolored leaf and FABULOUS netting from Paris-1930s with little pieces of fuzzy/colored popcorn. I really really really like this hat!

Okay okay, I am horrible. I cannot keep up with something as simple as this blog but I have a very good excuse! I won't go into details here but let me say that I trusted the WRONG person who stole from me, skipped town, and tanked my business (which had serious repercussions on every other aspect of my life) in one swoop. After some months of mania I am almost out of the hole in which I find myself and with spring hopefully not TOO far away some good things might be on the horizon. I still have far to go to get things back to some semblence of normalcy but they ARE getting there. I hope to get some pictures of the Halloween costumes up like I was supposed to do MONTHS ago and some other goodies as well. I want to actually start an online dress diary as I have been saying I am going to do since forever and am going to give it my best shot. However I will be having to move before long-another symptom of the above disaster-but we are hoping to find something decent that will fit myself, husband, 4kids, a cat with too many toes, and my TWO WHOLE ROOMS OF MATERIAL! Not an easy task. So on the to do list which I HOPE to get completed soon-
    1:Finish off the financial obligation from the crook stealing my money
    2:Find a house and move
    3:Get my crappy van fixed
    4:Start a dress diary
    5:Get a new business plan and figure out what to do now? I had thought of just throwing in the towel and never sewing again (that was after my idea of just laying down and dying didn't work out) but I refuse to let what this per%$@&#! did keep me down. I will eventually come out of this. I swear.
    6:Get off my ass and lose some weight like I keep promising myself I will
    7:Make myself something
 

HOPE ALL MY LJ FRIENDS ARE HAVING A GOOD YEAR SO FAR! 

Seeing how its getting very cold here already -- its supposed to SNOW TOMORROW-- and I have no coat I thought this would be a good place to start on the list.  I will have to go through the boxes upon boxes of material that is stashed away and see if I have any material I like. I am not sure if I am going to do it in purple & red, though I really like the combination. I am going to do the different mismatched buttons though as it gives me a chance to use some fabulous single antique buttons I have had sitting around forever and never used since there were no matches to them.

Ok this is my last post then am going to bed :)

My city has this little Halloween party down the old Main Street. They have trick-or-treating at all the stores, and games such as pumpkin rolling, and free snacks like cotton candy and apple cider. I found out about the date the day before the event so there was a flurry of costume making! My three year old daughter is NOT the typical 3 year old and wanted to be Mrs. Lovett. She likes the music from it and has seen (the NON bloody) parts of the movie. My 11 year old also wanted to be Sweeny Todd. My camera wasn't working so I had to use my cellphone which was hard with the throng of people. But here are a few photos and I will post more of the outfits between now and Halloween.
I wanted to get away from the "dark" of Sweeny Todd since she IS only 3 so I chose different fabrics and made the outfit more modest. The pieces she had were:
1:Embroidered linen bloomers in white. I put red tights on under these and she wore patent leather shoes since we didn't have time to find boots.
2:Two-tone skirts. I didn't want one solid color so I mixed a nice deep olive green with this autumn leaves fabric. It is vintage and came from an auction. I really like the colors especially since it is fall.
3:Her shirt is made of this odd slightly stretchy-pilly-faux wooly faibric. Its a deep pinkish orange. And I think it was kind of eccentric looking so it made a perfect shirt. I frayed the sleeve/neck edges a bit. The white turtle neck isn't meant to be part of the outfit but it was cold out.
4:Corset. This is truly vintage fabric! It was meant to be a coat my mom cut out for me when I was her age! So I repurposed it. It is a quilted fabric with floral cotton on the other side. I had some interesting burlap-like trim. It is very lightly boned with plastic boning in the front only to help it hold its shape. Its laced to close very loosely, only tight enough to stay on.
5:Hat. I LOVE this hat! It is old, my great-aunt started making it in 1949! I took the form along with all this vintage hat supplies/decorations and this is what I ended up with. It ties on with silk ribbon. I would have liked not to have had to do the ribbon but there was no other way this was going to stay on her head.  Also the same green ribbon is fashioned into bows around the "horns" made with her hair. She is sporting the Mrs. Lovett-do though its hard to tell with the hat on.
6:Gloves are fuzzy black/pink striped that I cut the fingers off of from the dollar store.
7 & 8: The small rolling pin was bought at an auction along with the little basket.

Sweeny Todd was part made/part bought from pieces I hurriedly found from Salvation Army. I will post more about him as I get him put together properly.

OH!! And the pink around her eyes is makeup :) (and the blue is cotton candy lol) she really isn't malnourished!

Some of my gowns were worn for a small fashion show in NYC. Here are pictures of a few of the girls in them including the one that was actually inspired by the movie Sweeny Todd and is affectionately called MRS. LOVETT. I am sure you can tell which one it is!

        

I have been going through the MILLIONS of designs I want to make myself- which is amusing cause I have NEVER made myself anything. I keep swearing I am going to do it but never do. But I am determined to NOT be disuaded this time and to at least start on something with the view of actually finishing it! Here is a list of some of the first things I would like to/need to make. Of course the list could (and probably will) change but here it goes anyway....

(in no particular order)

        1:Mrs. Lovett outfit. Don't care which one, wanted to do this for Halloween but oh well.....
        2:Something for SCA events probably ELIZABETH styled. I like the smaller skirts.
        3:Victorian outfit. Either something Moulin Rougish?? Or from Dracula maybe??? Stay tuned!
        4:Anything from Lord of the Rings which also can be used for SCA depending on what I choose
        5:Somthing 1940ish
        6:The coat from Penelope & maybe some of her outfits. Oh so cute!
        7:Regency gown with spencer. The Spencer is a "finish" since I have had one done with the exception of the lining for like 8 years????
        8:Set of victorian underwear
        9:Flemish outfit. I know everyone is doing them but they look so comfy :)
      10: And of course my bustledress from this picture I had posted before. It is my goal for spring!

 

I am re-posting photos of some of the gowns that were created for last March's DETROIT FASHION WEEK. Some of the gowns were also used by photographers and you will see pictures from the event as well as those used for the photoshoots. The red gown and the silver gown were also used for one of the movies I costumed which is set to release sometime in 2009. All images are copyrighted and any reproduction of any of the designs is strictly prohibited.