The Mad Person-Who-Stitches: Inspiration Strikes! (Or Maybe Not)

A while ago, I discovered that old sari borders are sold on ebay.  But I felt guilty about buying some for my fabric stash without having any idea of what I would use them for.  Today I had an idea about using them: doing a bodice that is all about the contrasting ornamentation, like this one,

From Wikimedia.  Possibly Christina of Denmark.

using old sari borders instead of lace.  However sari borders are often wider than would make pleasing proportions on a small person (like me), and also are often directional, unlike the trim on the lady in the painting.

So maybe this idea wouldn't work after all.  I'll have to think about it

Sunlight Through Colored Glass

The handled jug, gold bottle, and small sea green vase belonged to my Grandmama.  The cobalt blue is a replacement for a close match I gave it away as a sorry/replacement for a china vase that Scaramouche knocked down and broke.  The red was just because I love crimson:

千早ぶる 神代も聞かず 龍田川 からくれないに 水くくるとは

Chihayaburu Kamiyo mo kikazu Tatsuta-gawa Kara kurenai ni Mizu kukuru to wa

                                                                         -Ariwara no Narihira, Hyakunin Isshu, poem 17

roughly,

 Impassionate gods
Even in their time was it heard
Tatsuta river
 such crimson
water dyed

Red Shoes

babouche

zori

I love my red shoes.  And as for Mr. Hans Christian Anderson, I bite my thumb at him. 

The Mad Person-Who-Stitches: Master Stitchery

Not mine, however and alas.  Elisheba recently acquired a new costume that has the most fantastic beading and sequining:

And this is the hand stitchery holding down all those beads and sequins:
That is amazing crafts-personship.

Thunderbolt Fantasy: Costuming Dreamland

As the mad-person-who-stitches, I'm still not done recording my efforts for Yuna of Final Fantasy X, translated for aerials.  But I'm going to take this week to rhapsodize over the puppets in a new Japanese-Taiwanese television series called Thunderbolt Fantasy.  Because these puppets are gorgeous.  I am hanging on every episode as they come out, oscillating between admiration for the beauty of the costumes and sets, amusement when I spot cheap hacks (or clever work-arounds, depending on your point of view) in the costume construction, and severe criticism of how fake the weapons look.