Queen Elsa Costume

Frozen! If you haven't seen it watch it. 

These days everyone loves Elsa and singing about letting it go. Believe me - I certainly do. Recently, I made an Elsa costume for a friend (I'm also working on Anna - have been for a year - but there's just too much detail work it's taking forever).

Here's it is:

I didn't use any of the Elsa sewing patterns available through Simplicity, I kind of combined a couple other patterns to make it.  

I used Butterick 4827 for the skirt and sleeves and New Look 6480 for the bodice:

I picked these mainly because I already had them. To figure out where to cut the dress pattern to insert the corset top I overlayed the pattern pieces over each other matching waistlines and drew in where the skirt seam and neckline + sleeves would start. 

Because I used a stretchy power net for the sleeves I had to do a lot of altering to get them to work since the sleeves and neckline needed to be more form fitting than the pattern allowed for. I don't know what would have worked better but that was definitely not the easiest way to go. 

I ended up buying a lot of fabric online because they kept coming in the wrong color. The bodice is taffeta with rain sequins and coutil underneath for support and boning. The skirt is satin and the train is a glittery organza. Like I said before the sleeves are power net. 

I made the corset first and, other than the pattern issues with the sleeves, it was the most difficult part. Working with sequin fabric takes a lot of time. 

Here's my process: I started with white, silk organza and transferred the seam lines and pattern markings on to it using wax transfer paper. 

I then used those pieces to cut out the sequin fabric:

I then basted the organza and sequin fabric together to both secure the fabrics together and to mark the seam lines:

When sewing with sequin fabric you have to remove all the sequins from the seam allowance and the seam lines to sew them together.  Otherwise the sequins get sewn into the seams and poke out in all kinds of ugly and uncomfortable ways. 

Fortunately the sequins were pretty easy to remove. The were sewn on in small groups so I just removed them by pulling out the bobbin thread. It took some time but it could have been worse. 

It's also important to keep some of the sequins to use later either filling in gaps along the seams or as replacements if some fall off. 

Once all the seam lines were free of sequins I sewed the corset together. Then I sewed the train over that before combining the bodice, sleeves and skirt into the final dress:

100 Days of Doodles

I'm a pretty avid doodler. #workdoodle is one of my regular hashtags on Instagram (@mauisadie in case you want to follow) since I like to doodle in meeting or during phone calls. 

Earlier this month on of my high school friends announced that she was doing the 100 Days Project (http://thegreatdiscontent.com/100days) and suggested that I should as well. 

The 100 Days Project in a nutshell is about creating something for 100 days. The idea is that you pick something to make and make one everyday from April 6th through July 14th.

That's a lot of creating but it's a motivation which I always seem to need.

Since the idea is to create the same type of thing everyday I decided to go with doodling (#100DaysOfDoodles) because I do it quite frequently already, and it's a lot easier than trying to sew something everyday (ain't nobody got time for that).

Since it's only Day 12 here's a few of my favorites so far. 

You can track my progress through the next 88 days on Instagram @mauisadie #100DaysOfDoodles

Ass Piñata

As you may recall, a couple years ago I made a Boob Piñata for my sister's bachelorette party. Well a couple of my good friends are getting married next week and they had their bachelor and bachelorette parties last weekend. He's kind of an ass-guy so she asked me to make an ass piñata for his party.

Ideally we were gonna get a fake arm or something to hit it with because that is just hilarious.

Here's the finished product:

That's a real thong.

Unfortunately, since this was my second piñata I thought I was hot shit and decided I knew better than the instructable and tried to change things up. Boy was I wrong.

Everything worked out ok in the end, but there were a few issues. So here's some tips and some things not to do when making a piñata.

First off here's the base of the piñata:

It's a lot more tape and paper than the last one. That caused some issues later in the process so I'd suggest always trying for more balloons and less tape. Because of the final shape of the piñata I'm not sure how I would have made that work, but just keep that in mind.

I live in Hawaii where it can be pretty humid and I've now learned that I definitely need help from a fan when drying papier-mâché. When I opened up the piñata it was still slightly wet inside even though it was dry on the outside.

One other problem that I didn't figure out until my last layer was that my starch had settled so most of my layers were more watery than starchy. Which explains why it wasn't hardening like it should have. So, make sure you shake the liquid starch well before using it.

Another small issue was that the string I had was too thin. It definitely didn't seem like it would last too long so I told them not to hang it up for long.

This biggest issue that I had was totally my fault. I jumped the gun on opening it up and stuffing it. I was thinking by opening it before the final couple layers I'd be able to secure the closer so much better. What I didn't think through was that then it would be soaking wet and heavy while drying the last layers.

Because of the added weight it toppled and landed in such a way that the ass cheeks became indented. I woke up to this the morning of the party and had a slight meltdown. I had to cut it open and pop out the cheeks. Then cover up the creases and reseal up the opening.

All in all it turned out ok. It looked great but it was easier than it should have been to open up.

So lesson learned...follow the damn instructions.