CATS AND KITTENS AND FULL SKIRTS

The internet, oh, the internet. A never ending source of information. And inspiration! And - disinformation, crap and bullshit. A space to spend time well worth, and also waist it. A place of gain and ruin. Heaven and hell. Hallelujah!

But. Although I might spend a little too much time and money online from time to time, the internet is very useful for me. Often thanks to my Freelancer's Fashion Facebook page - and to all of you. Why? Because you help me find the stuff I want!(A desire and need most likely created by the internet in the first place, but hey, that's peanuts at this point).

The most acute Must Haves are stuff that I realize I can very well live without if I wait one week and decide in fact not to give in to the desire.

But sometimes again the quick compulsive need to buy a certain thing can turn out very well, and become a long lasting well used item; I am mostly referring to clothes here now, but this actually applies to about half of my tattoos as well.

The latest in this case was a kitten dress - a dress with kittens on it! Not spotted on the web actually, but in real life, on a girl. And then it struck me - what the hell? A kitten dress? Of course! How had I been able to live my whole life without one so far? So I asked her about the dress, she told me the brand name, didn't quite catch it, then forgot it. As you know, here's where the internet comes in handy. But my friend Google was not able to help this time. The game wasn't all lost at that point though - post it on the Facebook page and woah! - some moments later I have the link.

Ta-taa! Kitty dress found.

However, after thinking about it I for a while I decided the dress perhaps was a little bit too expensive considering all the other things I am in a totally and very desperate need of (yes) and considering the fact the the cut on the dress was nice but not that extraordinary _ I should perhaps not buy it after all. But, in the same time I also realized I really had to have a dress with small furry felines on it. Well, now I needed to get my hand on the fabric instead; which I eventually did (also trough the help of some followers), after first browsing hundreds of kitty fabrics on ebay.
In the end I did go for anohter fabric instead, with retro kitties on. Meow meow!

This one right here, on it's way to me now.

I'd love to turn it into a two piece dress, or perhaps a shirt and circle skirt. Or a shirt waist dress.

Hmmm...

Now of course, another question is; will I actually ever fix myself that kitty dress?Knowing me, those of you who do, might have your doubts.

So, a little poll:
A. I will get the two-piece dress done in time for summer
B. I will skip the original idea and go for an easier version, but get it done.
C. I will get the dress done in time for summer 2012
D. I will have the dress done by someone else (which will make it a very expensive kitty dress in the end)
-or-
E. The fabric will end up looking really good among the other fabrics that are waiting forever in my fabric box.

What do you think?


PS.The kitty dress I did not get was by Limb clothing and the kittens-fabric by Micheal Miller Fabrics (great fabrics!).

KITTIES

How many cats can you spot in the picture?


Eight altogether. Well the point here being that I got a kitty blouse from VintagEija's at the Ofelia market last month. It has cat patches on the pockets, which are both hideous and adorably kitch at the same time!

Now this is something you could pimp up any old blouse with rather easily yourself I guess. You just have to find the patches first of course, but they do have a selection of the weirdest such in haberdashery shops...

QUEEN OF HEARTS

I want lots of clothes with Queens of Hearts on them in prints and patterns! Why aren't there any?




I will most likely get myself something with the The Queen of Hearts in it during spring anyway but not as printed on fabric though..

DIFFERENT SHADES OF PINK / DIFFERENT SHAPES OF A TEE

I got challenged by Vasiliisa to go all pink today, as today is the Wear Pink Day and October is the breast cancer awareness month. The Wear Pink Day is a gesture to spread breast cancer awareness. I won't pass the challenge on to anyone specific but to everyone who feels up for it! If you don't want to go pink all the way, you can always do it with noticeable details, or wear the ribbon.

Since I have and will be spending most of the day at a place where I am required to wear certain clothing I'm not sure if I'll be able to make the whole pink thing properly, but I will go for some different shades of pink in my mini-tutorial on How to Alter a Basic Boat/U-neck Tee!

I think a round neck lining is nice, its very late 50's early 60's classic and goes well with skirts, capris, shorts and whatever. I jave lot's of basic H&M ones (in cheap material) but sometimes that kind of a tee can feel a bit too plain paired with certain garments. That model can also make someone who boxes (read: have big shoulders ands arms), especially someone whos has been boxing and do not box that regularly anymore, look kind of heavy (xenia warrior style you know). Changing the lining draws the attention away from the shoulders and gives the tee a whole new look, and it's really easy to do so!

One way is to grab some fabric (about 5 cm) in the middle of the lining and sew it togheter tigh twith a few stiches (ummm, but opposite of my drawing, you might want to sew it toghether on the inside for the right result :). I've done this to a dress and it changed it from plain to fancy, giving it a more feminine look. Why not add a brooche or bow in the middle too?


Another way to change the shape is to fasten the neck lining togheter with the sleeve opening (it requires the sleeves to be rather short though!). The reslut will be a bit reminding the lining of a galaxy dress. I've tied the sleeves and the lining toghether with a thin black ribbon on the black tee I have in the post below. That way you can alter the tee for just the time that you wear it, but I'd still recommend some stiches or a safetypin on the inside since the bows might not stay in place. For a more clean graphical finish, just sew it togheter tight, skip the bows!


If the shirt is not too skin tight you can also combine these two and the reslut will be really pretty! Try adding a big bow or a flower just to one side if you want some extra flair, even though I think this lining works best as it is.

SAME SAME BUT DIFFERENT

Ok, no, it's different.

See, the dress to the left is a Stop Staring dress that I really wanted and that fit me nicely except for in the back where the fabric was hanging strangely loose. Surely it would've been fixable somehow, but if you buy a dress for one-hundred-something euros the first thing you want to do is not to sit down by the sewingmachine, but to wear it straight away and hit town (in your nicest shoes and deep red lipstick).

Well, the dress to the right is from H&M and you can get it for 34,90€.
And oh yes I know, it's almost a crime to compare these two but there are still some similarities that might make me get over the "loss" of the Stop Staring dress. Perhaps. And for a dress under for 40 euros I'd be fine with sitting by the sewing machine making it a bit longer (adding some black fabric at the hem, with pleats in the middle or on the sides to give it a more 30's-like silhouette, would be qutie nice).

*******************************************************************

First this post was only going to be about those two dresses, but as I was thinking about this I realized that I really do not need another dress. Ok, I have proclaimed that a girl can never have too many dresses yes, but my wardrobe certainly can. (For example, I have some dresses I have only worn once. And boxes full of stuff to be ebayed away, some of which I took nice photos of a year ago already. Still there.)

Remember K and her quest from this summer, about the shopping-ban? Well, she failed. Not miserably, but still failed. Now it's my turn. Sort of. (To try that is, not to fail).I put no more new clothes in my wardrobe until I get some out first! Then there is also the economical aspect related to this; I have some travels I want to do later this autumn. Selling some old stuff on ebay wont pay me a ticket too far I guess :) So - no eating out for a while either, I'm going to cook at home! Umm, for next week atleast. And on weekend it might be ok to dine out...
(oh I feel myself failing already).

POSING WITH PEACOCKS

I know there is a risk of me sounding like a new age hippie, but really, every now and then it strikes me how amazing the design of nature is. Just think about it - the ornaments on butterflies wings, the construction of a flower or a seashell, the patterns you see in a leaf if you keep it up towards the light, a peacocks feathers... I bumped in to some peacocks lately and was reminded again that they are some pretty fine looking birds.

(the images above are just googled up, they're not mine)

I've always been fascinated by peacock feathers, and so have also many others - the peacock pattern have been used to decorate buildings, fabrics, jewellery and many more objects for thousands of years. Not to mention skin. I've thought about a peacock tattoo from time to time, on the back perhaps. Who knows, I might still end up with one one day.

While clothing with peacock patterns can look delicious and great, I feel that on me they could be a little bit too much of that "too much" I normally say can be just right.(It's the Christmas tree effect you know, when you're not sure where the dress ends and the tattoos begin...). I'd still love to have some clothes with just small details inspired by the feathers - on a skirt, the back of a dress, somewhere on a shoe, around the collar...





Look! Me on a wlak with the birds.
Ah Helsinki- it's like paradise on earth, were the peacocks just wander around.
(The top is from Carlings, cardigan from Gina Tricot, bag and shoes H&M and skirt selfmade. Not so interesting stuff perhaps, but I kind of match the peacocks a little bit :)


Mr.Peacock.(This one followed me around all day.)

Ok, peacocks do not really walk around everywhere in Helsinki, if you actually believed so. Helsinki is not really that much of paradise on earth either, in case you fell for that too.
:)