Elizabethan goes Oriental

My bead and sequin collection proved to be a little goldmine and I'm unashamedly going to "off piste" with my decoration.  It's all the fault of the beautiful red "bamboo" beads that I found in one of the boxes, which match perfectly with a set of multi-coloured carved beads with gold detailing.  I couldn't resist a nod to my childhood, quickly strung them onto a narrow black ribbon, pinned them onto the kirtle front and voila!, they're staying... it wasn't a hard sell ;o) 

Somewhere I have handfuls of faux black jet beads which could have possibly been pearls but they allude me so, one very successful bid on ebay later and for 79p (!) I will soon be in possession of 100 or so 6mm black glass faux pearls.  I also have hundreds of bugle beads and some 6mm brown gauze ribbon; I am toying with them for the bilament - though I am still toying with the idea of having a bilament at all; perhaps the pearl edging and necklaces will be enough... I'll see.

Meanwhile, I need to stop fiddling and get on with the smock. 

Elizabethan embelishments

It's time to start thinking about the finer detail of the kirtle and having looked at picture after picture without much luck or flashes of inspiration I decided to go back to my favourite Holbein and see what the Unknown Lady had to say.  As ever, she had the answer.  

She appears to have pearls sewn to the kirtle edge, as well as the pearl strands across her bodice, and a narrow bilament across the front of the kirtle.  I also love the ribbon ties to the sleeves, though I won't be copying the furlined sleeves.  Best detail of all (and this is a total copout on my part, to which I am perfectly ha[[y to admit), she does not have any blackwork embroidery detailing on show.  Phew!  I have pondered the prospect of embroidering the cuff sleeves since I started this project, but don't really think that it would suit.  It would be more of case of doing for the sake of doing.  

The Tudor bilaments that you can buy, tend to be a little too "bling" for my tastes.  I have boxes full of beads that my mother gave me a while ago, I'm going to raid them in the first instance.  The pearls are a definite must; black or white, I need to decide.  My instant thought was that black pearls would look amazing.  White ones however, might work to tie in the other white elements of the outfit.  It's time to browse, surf and maybe do a little shopping,,,

Kirtle Sleeves

This weekend I made the upper sleeves of the costume, the ones that can be sewn or laced to the kirtle shoulders.  An outer layer of black cotton was lined with cotton drill and I ironed on 1" wide strips of interfacing along the sleeve edge, where the eyelets for the bottom sleeves will be.  

There are benefits to waking up at 5.20am on a Saturday.  You can garden in your dressing gown and Birkenstocks and the neighbours will be none the wiser!  And you can handknit the piping cord for the top shoulder of the sleeve.  Pinning it to the top of the shoulder was not working, the pins couldn't work through the piping, so I carefully sewed it in place by eye; using the zipper foot on my machine and sewing inside the stitching line of the piping.

Following Margo's instructions to the letter, I sewed the arm seam together; folding down the piping so that it lay flat - as there was no instruction either way.

I followed the 1.5cm seam allowance for the lining and sewed a narrower seam allowance for the outer sleeve so that they would sit smoothly.  Margo's instructions left me with just one problem... the top, piped, edge does not join (below).  I unpicked it and resewed the piping so that they did.

I then happily set aside the rest of the instructions to handsew the lining to the outer sleeve.

Pining the top edge

Folding in the lining and the outer sleeve over

Top seam finished

Bottom seam finished

And I have two sleeves.  Margo suggests stitching them to the the kirtle but I am undecided.  A laced eyelet would be more adaptable but bulkier; I'm going to decide later on in the outfit.

Rascal, meanwhile, made himself at home :)

The hosepipe ban that bought the rain

If there was ever an English equivalent to the consititutional belief held by some Americans in their right to bear arms, it would be the right to use a hosepipe; so ingrained is our belief in our innate right to keep our grass green and our gardens growing!

Thus, the announcement of another, highly unpopular, hosepipe ban in the South of England has been met with great derision in some parts of the press over the last couple of weeks as, shortly after it was announced, the country experienced some of the most sustained and determined rain that we've seen in a good while.

Far from wondering about how to keep my plants watered and alive, I have been worrying about how to keep my newly planted veggies from drowing, being pummeled or succumbing to the very cold nights that have accompanied the rain.  I've not done very well.  I think that we'll give it a few weeks and try again.

The chooks have hated it too.  Although well covered, the rain still gets in at the sides of the run and, as I look at them from the kitchen, they stand together, all puffed up and glaring at me, all dry and warm!  Their favourite response is to retire to the coop; which pays dividends for us, we are overflowing in eggs. Those two have never laid so well!

Walking the dog has also been fun, I have been lucky and have managed to time our evening walks with the rare breaks in the rain that we seem to have early evening.  Of course, we prepare for the rain.  Most nights though, Megs has made a mockery of my "you will wear your coat" attempts to keep her dry; charging round the fields, slipping and sliding in the mud and coming home so happily filthy, I almost wish we'd been rained on instead. 

Another delight, has been the family of ducks who have moved into the bottom field, which is so waterlogged that it becomes a pond in a matter of hours.  They are quite the characters and seem to be very happy with their lateral thinking.  We've had no significant rain since yesterday afternoon, so the pond will be gone now but as I drove to work this morning I spotted one of the drakes stood by the road in the field of rape; his head and neck craning up against a blaze of yellow.  It was one of those moments that you commit to memory and wish that you could have somehow commited it to film too.

But the rain won't last, and it hasn't been enough, the ban is necessary for the greater good.  I shall remind myself of that when, in a couple of month's time, I'm worrying about dry plant beds and overheating chooks and dobes.  At least the grass, being fake, will always be beautifully green!

Love is in the air!

I think I've mentioned before that the wonderful Mr S is making an honest woman out of his lovely fiancée later in the year, and that I was lucky enough to be able to build them a website for their wedding.  Mr S and I finished it last night, with the obligatory (as far as I'm concerned anyway) mix of amusing, endearing and downright funny photos of the happy couple.

Now, I can't give too much away.  It is, of course, a private site and there's no way that I'm going to trample on their priavcy for the sake of a blog post, but  they won't mind my sharing just a couple of the details.

I love the combination of fonts in the main banner, and the crafted heart ampersand, in honour of Miss O's amazing crafty talents.  As for the silhouette; for all those that know C&G, it is them.  In fact, it couldn't be more perfectly so.

For the bottom of the site, I chose one of my favourite Robert Heinlein quotes; I think he describes it perfectly!

It's been a honour to be just a small part of the preparations and I am very much looking forward to the day itself; it is always a delight to see two people so perfectly suited share that with the rest of us.