I have been wanting to post about this but have also been riddled with shyness, haha. Last year I got really into sewing little drawstringdresses! And this spring, to combat my months-long state of inertia, I cannonballed back into doing so. It seems I love nothing more than to develop a whole workflow and produce a whole lot of something, whether it be deer hats, socks, tights, skirts, or these dresses. As a result, I have made far more dresses than I personally need, just because I enjoy the process, and I enjoy picking out fabrics and coordinating thread and ribbon colors.
Someone once asked me if I'd sell these on Etsy, so that's my intention! I also intend to have them be fairly inexpensive -- in the scheme of Blythe doll dresses, anyway! I'm thinking $12?
And only that much because all the sewing I do is by hand. Although these are super simple, it still takes a little while to do all the hand-stitching to construct one dress. While I typically work in batch mode (cut a bunch of dress pieces, iron all the fabric, sew all the dress pieces, iron them all again, sew them all again, actually put the pieces together, put all the ribbon drawstrings in -- in that order, for these), I'd estimate a dress takes about an hour and a half to complete, from cutting the fabric to finished dress.
I can sew together one of these dresses on my machine, but I feel like they don't look as tidy... I'm still trying to befriend my machine.
I think regardless of the fact that these are a) so laughably simple they barely qualify as garments, and b) hand-sewn, which they definitely look, they have a nostalgic charm to them. They remind me of scoring similar dresses and simple hand-sewn items second-hand on Plastic Paradise or Blythe Kingdom back in the day. Some of my most beloved wardrobe items are handmade and slightly wonky.
And I think there's not a whole lot of things like them on the Blythe fashion market right now. I do a fair bit of browsing for Blythe dresses, very specifically, on Etsy. The typical silhouettes of Blythe dresses I see for sale these days are A-line shift dresses (it's always that one pattern, right?? Speaking of nostalgia) or party dresses with a fitted bodice and flared skirt. Sometimes the party dress style looks more babydoll dress in style, but the silhouette is still "fitted top, flared skirt."
I am a huge fan of such a silhouette!! Clean and classic. So, so pretty. But these have a different silhouette and look, with a ribbon tied at one shoulder. While not all that sophisticated, I think they can still be styled really cutely with different colored tights or socks, sweaters or jackets on top, shoes that match the ribbon or a color in the dress... et cetera!
All this to say: I put some of these up on my Etsy. I have a lottt more to take pictures of/list...!
I did indeed get myself a chair just for my sewing table, as per my b-day list. I was all set to get the pink one, but then I saw there was a green one that was about half the price, so... duh, I got that one instead! Since it arrived, I set it up in front of my sewing table and got my machine out!!
Chair review: It's really light and was fairly easy to put together. Being able to adjust the height in order to comfortably use my sewing machine was imperative for me. It will also be adjustable for when I am filming dolly dressup videos or hauls or whatever else I need. So I am pretty pleased. But I wonder how it will hold up!
I have successfully, in the past, threaded my machine and wound a bobbin and everything. Even sewed some straight lines on some scrap fabric. However, for whatever reason, I got stuck trying to do the same, this second time. I relied on the same videos as I did last time, but it just wasn't working, for some reason. So I hung there in frustrated, intimidated limbo for a while before tackling it again. My mom's sewing a quilt right now so she gave me some guidance. And so I have been practicing, in this, my tiny sewing corner!
I have discovered that my sewing machine doesn't have speed settings. It is either not moving at all or is eating up fabric at 100 mph. I can only rarely find a "sweet spot" on the pedal where it's going a manageable speed. Rather than the pedal being sensitive, it seems like it only knows two speeds. I'm stymied by this right now. I want so, so badly to gain sewing skills and learn how to use my machine and be able to make things. I've successfully made a couple of drawstring dresses but they look a lot worse than my hand-sewn ones do!
Google says there are devices that can cap off the speed of the machine, but I don't know if it's worth spending a chunk of change on such a thing??
New girl alert! Aaahh!! I mean, you already know, if you actually read my posts, but: I gifted myself Time After Alice for my birthday. She arrived very quickly and I thought it would be really fun to post an unboxing video on my birthday. For funsies and specialness. So I worked hard over a couple of days to film a video and get it ready to go by May 7th. Unboxed her on the 5th, edited hard on the 5th and 6th, and managed to get closed captions done at the last moment!
As always, I make unboxing videos for my own memory's sake. My own enjoyment's sake. It transpired that I filmed this one and felt, even as I was filming, that I was doing a terrible, terrible job. I had nooo energy. I was like, "I look terrible. I'm incoherent. The time has come to take myself off the screen again." (I used to not show my face at all and only filmed the doll, but over time I added in b-roll of myself filmed from an additional angle.)
I recall the last time I filmed a doll stuff haul video, I felt much the same. I remember feeling like I had basically salvaged what was unusable footage. Unusable because of me and how I looked. Another self-esteem battering issue is that, by the time I am done editing a video, I am so sick of my voice, my face, my mannerisms, my sense of humor... everything. I feel so much self-hate by the time I'm exporting the finished product that it almost becomes a joke to think of "promoting" the video. I have to battle against my brain telling me how ugly and irritating I am.
Otherwise I genuinely enjoy the editing process of a video. I like pulling in extra images and referencing memes and doing audio transitions and making all the little extras: hand doodles, writing out names, easter eggs in the closed captions. (There's always extra jokes in the CC.) It is a creative outlet for me. And years later I can revisit the videos and see the dolls for the first time again, et cetera!
Anyway, I am in straight-up love with this girl!!! I named her Tiphanie (which I know is a bit OTT, spelling-wise).
I'm really excited right now because I think Tiphanie is a girl who can pull off the old-fashioned look I love so much, but also I think she can wear modern styles, and both will suit her equally! I feel like she fits in really well with my Blythe family. She and Vesper and Miette are sooo fancy to me that I really want to take a picture of them all together.
On the birthday tip, I had a wonderful day, which is incredible to me. It's rare that happens; hence my annual b-day depression. There must have been some b-day magic in the air.
Got messages from my besties, of course. L, K, E, and J!
My parents took me out to lunch! I dressed up in a favorite dress with my lace-up boots and one of my berets, and wore my hair in double braids. Favorite outfit = such birthday vibes, u know?
At the restaurant, someone else was sung "Happy Birthday" to! That was crazy because it's not a super popular restaurant and it's amazing to me that I was there at the same time as this other May 7th birthday person! And as my mom pointed out, it's as if I got sung to, but nobody was staring at me.
In the parking lot as we were leaving, and old man shuffled by me and said, "Love the beret." !!! My first beret compliment, and it was on my birthday! Usually people are low-key snarky about them but I felt a bit like if the guy had been wanting to crack a joke, it would have sounded more like a joke than it did. I think it was genuine, lol. Thank you, guy. That was a great birthday gift you gave me, sir.
Hit up knitting club with my mom, and I took a couple of boxes of bakery treats with me for the ladies in the club. I just wanted to do something vaguely celebratory, but this was an ingenious move because I raked in the birthday wishes.
One lady at knitting club told me, "You look like Anne of Green Gables." WHAT! I laughed in a flustered way and said, "I think it's the braids." But of course this was a compliment of the highest order, and on top of the beret compliment?? Sheesh.
After knitting club I got to baby-sit my baby nephew!!! I didn't know that was going to happen, and what a delight it was.
During this my aunt came by and dropped off flowers (the tulips pictured above) and it was nice to see her, and fun that she got to see the baby.
At one point I picked him up off my dad's lap and his chubby little arms came around my neck. I wouldn't say it was a hug, but he did cling onto me, and he's never done that before. I said, "This has got to be my best birthday in years." He took a nap on my lap after that. (Picture below!)
My mom made me an egg and cheese sandwich for dinner which was sooo good. I monched away on it while Nephew was sleeping.
One of my sister's presents to me was a RAT RING (also pictured above) which is just the most Jane-est thing ever. I adore it!!!
Received some lovely texts from my great aunt, who just got my digits a couple of weeks ago. Texts to treasure, honestly.
In the evening I met up with my bestie K and we watched some TV with her mom (a fave activity of mine because I like to hang with her AND her mom; her mom is my secret bestie and doesn't know it). Nice chill wrap-up to the day!
Here's a pic (courtesy of my mom!) of Nephew conked out on Anne of Green Gables. Nephew just turned nine months old on the 8th. These nine months have flown by. But all time with him has been the very, very best.
I've had a lovely couple of days since, too. Thursday was my mom's birthday and I got to spend time with her. Friday, I saw my RL friends and we went to dinner and watched a movie. You best believe I wore my lavender beret, and scooped another compliment from the waitress at the restaurant! This weekend I cooked and took the time to give Tiphanie a hair brushing and treatment with a hot water dip, then a dip in hot water with fabric softener. When her hair was dry, I also dressed her for the first time!!
Crown: made by me Dress:From the ORN on Etsy (circa 2020) Petticoat:MINIJIJO on Etsy (circa 2017) Socks: made by me Boots:HelloCoolCat on Etsy
Her hair is muuuch more orderly than it was. During her brushing I discovered she has a metric ton of hair, almost as much as Klara. She had some ringlets after her hair dried but I picked through it a bit with a knitting needle and those broke up some. I think if I give her another treatment and form the curls by hand, she'll end up with ringlets like Holland! Holland had a totally wiry bush and now she has calm little ringlets! So, I may do that, and I might give Miette a similar treatment at the same time.
This could have been two posts, but like I said, Tiphanie was a birthday girl, so she really overlapped with all this! And anyway, it's my blog!
