Faerie costume: Day 4

I will have you know ahead of time, that in the making of these photos, I dropped my camera and did something to the lens. This is why the left half of the photos are blurry. In trying to fix the camera, I am pretty sure I broke it for good, and now it will take no pictures…..so that sucks.

I basically finished the dress today. I sewed the overlay skirt together and made the hems of both skirts jagged. I attached the pearl strand, but I’m still trying to figure out a way to keep it taut. I will probably loop it through something on the wings to keep it in place.

I have my elf ears on in these pics, but forgot to fix my hair to show them.

I don’t know when I will have pictures next, considering my camera is now broken.

Faerie costume: Day 3

I went to Joann’s yesterday and bought fabric for the base of the dress, as well as a bunch of stuff to decorate the wings with. I can’t start the wings yet, since the light blue stockings I ordered haven’t come in yet. I did, however, get my elf ears in the mail. I began work on the dress. I’m using a pattern for the basic pieces and modifying it.

Here’s some of the random stuff I bought:

The pieces are ready to be sewn:

Progress so far:

I still need to make the hem of the skirt jagged and hem it and add the sheer overlay. I also need to add loops for the pearl strand to go through, and then that is it for the dress. I wish those stockings would hurry up; I’m so ready to start work on the wings!

Faerie costume: Days 1 and 2

I thought maybe some people would be interested in following one of my costumes from beginning to end. So, I’m going to try to keep this updated on the progress of my faerie costume. So far I have bought: 3 yards white silk chiffon, turquoise acid dye, 5 light blue clip-in hair extensions, glitter lip gloss, shimmer eye shadow, 2 pairs of large light blue nylon stockings, elf ears, and some body jewels. Not all of this has come in yet.

I pretty much started on the costume last night. After pricing silk chiffon, I determined it would be cheaper to buy some white and dye my own. So this is what I did last night. However, I am used to dying polyester blends that don’t take dye very well, so I was very surprised at how well the silk took dye after only about 2-3 minutes in the dye bath. I had cut the fabric into two sections and wanted one piece (the larger piece) to be a lighter color. But after only 2-3 minutes, it was already too bright.

So after doing some googling today, I learned that I could lighten the silk by heating it up in a mix of water and hydrogen peroxide. So I did this tonight and was pleasantly surprised at the results. After about 30 minutes of cooking on the stove, my two pieces of fabric now look like this (they used to both be the color on the right):

Now the lighter piece of fabric nearly matches the color of the hair extensions, which is what I was wanting.

My next task: take a sample of the lighter fabric and buy the main dress material (something not sheer) that is close to that color.

A few quick updates:

The videos from MTAC and Brina’s shower are now up, as are photos from both events.

Some pictures of our costumes from last weekend are up in the cosplay section, but more will be coming since the official photos haven’t been posted yet.

Samantha has talked me into doing a faerie costume for the Tennessee Renaissance Festival, so I will apparently be working on that instead of taking a break from costumes for a month like I had planned. I drew up a preliminary sketch, and hopefully it won’t be too time consuming.

I need to take my bridesmaid’s dress for Jason and Becka’s wedding to be altered, as I don’t trust myself to take in a fully lined bodice on a dress.

Post-MTAC cosplay schedule and tasks:

2007:
Fall
Jessica Albert (Dragon Quest VIII)
Natalia Luzu Kimlasca Lanvaldear (Tales of the Abyss)
Kefka (Final Fantasy VI) - Ben

2008:
Spring
Presea Combatir (Tales of Symphonia)
Lloyd Irving (Tales of Symphonia) - Ben

Fall
Celes Chere - Opera (Final Fantasy VI)
Eirika (Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones)

2009:
Spring
Leanne (Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance)

Fall
Rosa Farrel (Final Fantasy IV)
Ariel (The Little Mermaid)

(more…)

My obligatory MTAC post…

I spent most of Thursday night running around trying to finish up everything before Friday morning. I had decided that the boots I had purchased for my Celes costume were too tall and went on a fruitless 2.5 hour search through Opry Mills and Cool Springs for mid-calf white boots with a narrow heel. They don’t exist in April. However, Charlotte Russe was having a $4.99 boot sale and I did find some brown boots that I decided to cover with white fabric. So, then I had to make a trip to Joann’s for the fabric. I also went to Target for a few things, then went by the Marriott to pick up our passes for the con. After I got home, I had to cover the boots I had bought, finish painting Ben’s knife for Locke, do laundry, sew Ben’s belt for Locke, pack, and other various little things. I need to teach Ben to sew. I finally went to bed around 2:30 am.

I got up early Friday morning and drove to Clarksville to pick up Sabrina. Then we went back to the apartment, packed up both my car and Ben’s and then were off to Franklin. We arrived and checked into the hotel. The room was ready and on the third floor, right next to the elevator. Perfect. I went with Sabrina to pick up her pass and to get a schedule. Ben and I changed into our Wallmarket costumes and then went back downstairs. We ate lunch at the restaurant in the hotel, Lorraine’s. I had some very yummy chicken, pork roast, and cheesecake.

Wallmarket Aeris and Cloud were a big hit. Everyone seemed really surprised and happy to see cross-dressing Cloud, since it is so rarely done. At 2:00, we went to the Make Your Own Movie panel. We watched a short film on how to get rid of a dead body, which was pretty funny. They explained how to do some different camera angles. It was pretty interesting. After that, we changed costumes into Black Mage and Misa and walked around for a bit. Around 6:30, we decided to make a run to Kroger to get some snacks and soda, and also went to McDonald’s for a bite to eat.

Ben and I got in line to see the Protomen at 8:30. Sabrina didn’t think she could stand up for very long, so she decided to go back to the room. Which turned out to be a great idea, since we waited…..and waited…..and waited…..and waited. After 10:00 passed, we were so fed up with waiting that we left. I have no idea what time the concert actually started, but an hour and a half late is WAY too late.

On Saturday, Sabrina and I got up and went to the con suite for breakfast. I had a yummy egg, cheese, and sausage croissant and a banana. There was supposedly a Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy photoshoot at 1:00, so we went to get Ben up. We put on our Celes and Locke costumes and went downstairs. We found the photoshoot, but it seemed to be exclusively Kingdom Hearts, and we thought we would look a little out of place, so we decided to do something else. We went to the Build Your Own Mecha Workshop, in which four teams were competing to build a mecha out of random scraps of things, like keyboard parts, circuits, aluminum foil, and duct tape. It was pretty interesting to see what each of the teams created.

Then I drove Sabrina back to Clarksville while Ben hung out with Wayne. When I returned, we put our Wallmarket costumes back on and went downstairs to get in line for the cosplay competition. While we were walking past the people who were already in line, everyone broke out in applause for Ben’s costume, hehe.

The competition was pretty good, and the skits (ugggh) didn’t go on too long. At cosplay half-time, they announced the theme of next year’s MTAC: giant monsters (like Godzilla). They also announced that Kaiju Big Battel would be there next year. Ben and I freaked out about that. If you’ve never seen it (it comes on G4 in the mornings sometimes), it basically involves people in very weird costumes fighting. It’s hilarious.

After the cosplay, we hung out with some random people and ate Domino’s. Later, Ben and I went to check out the Random Battle Group. Ben got asked by one of the participants to be a summon (he was in his Black Mage costume again) and he agreed. I got this all on video (which will be up at a later date).

On Sunday, we didn’t do a whole lot. We ate breakfast in the con suite again (I had generic Froot Loops this time) and then packed. We were planning on going to watch the Ramen Eating Contest, but didn’t make it in time, so we went home after that, since Ben had to be at work and I had to go to Sabrina’s baby shower at 4:00.

It was a pretty good weekend….I definitely can’t wait till next year.

Less than two weeks until MTAC! :O

Costumes are coming along. I shouldn’t have any problems finishing in time, with little to no last minute rush, so that’s good. I need to run out to Burlington Coat Factory (the only place that sells gloves when it’s not winter) and a few thrift stores to find some things. Does anyone happen to have knee-high white 2″ narrow heel boots in a size 7? Hehe.

Here’s what I have left to do (taken from this post):

Celes Chere - Amano - 100% done!

Locke Cole - 95% done
• Purchase shirt - plain white, forgot it on my Wal-mart run yesterday
• Paint knife

Misa Amane - 100% done!

Aeris Gainsborough - Wallmarket - 100% done!

Cloud Strife - Wallmarket - 100% done!

At least now the air is back on…

Edited to add: There’s also a couple things I need to update on my Terra costume. Mainly, I need to size the gloves properly, glue the claws back on, and get some better shoes. There’s always shoes….