Vampire Ball!

I had a very strange weekend. Dickens workshops started, I had a pointless trip to the Jessica McClintok outlet in search of a Worthy Matron's dress, and got very stressed out and bitchy for no apparent reason. Sometimes I wonder about myself. I freely admit that I have too much on my plate just now, but it's really no worse than most Novembers. So what's my problem? Maybe it's just that I have no idea which way life will go after the New Year. That, on to of everything else, is just a bit too much. Lack of control is not something I cope well with.

Anyway, I did pick up a rather lovely dress at workshops! It was made by one of the other seamstresses who judges the costume contest, and fits almost perfectly. Yay! It's tight through the bustline, but I figured out a brilliant way to fix it on the way to work this morning. I'm going to make a placket and set in a double row of buttons. Now I just need new buttons and something to use as a placket, and I'm all set. Mrs. Gaskell really should have more than one outfit to run around in. And this one will fit nicely over my hoops. So much the better! I need new undersleeves for this one, but those are fairly easy to put together, and I can sew them in the car if it comes to that.

I did have a rather major corset malfunction at the ball. The 1869 corset that I made was done as an experiment, so I wasn't really expecting it to be without issues, but I didn't count on the fabric I used stretching as much as it did. This in and of itself is not such a problem, but when the corset stretches and your skirt and bodice do not, well, you end up in pain. So I have to re-make the corset a little sooner than I had anticipated. It's all for the good, I can do it up the right way this time (with the twill tape at the waist for one thing!), and smaller (the first version was too big even without the stretching). Luckily it's a pretty fast corset to make, so this shouldn't derail my other projects too badly. And I found a good dress on eBay to use for my Worthy Matron's dress, so things are looking up. I'm less panicked than I was this morning.

Pictures from the ball