Double Elsa

My littlest wanted to be Elsa.  The oldest wanted to just be Laura Ingalls at first, but when she saw the fabric for Elsa, she immediately changed her mind.  So that left me with Double Elsas.   I had a coupon at Joanns, so I was able to snag some decent fabric for the dresses.  I also picked up glitter tulle and grabbed a pattern on the same trip.

M7212 from McCall's was the winner for this particular Elsa costume.  I didn't want to use the Disney style pattern.  I rejected it in part because Elsa's dress from the movie is so mature and I prefer a poofy dress.  M2712 had an overdress that was great for the glitter tulle.  I did View C (because of the long sleeves) that looked more like View B (because of the tulle).

It didn't take a lot of time to make the dresses, but because I'm a procrastinator there was about a month between the fabric purchase and the day I started cutting them out.   Now...forgive the photos.  The little one was a big stinker on Halloween from about 7:50am until about 7:30pm and did not want to cooperate with any part of dress up and photoshoot, so we got out a little later than I had anticipated.  Once she got some candy in her she was an absolute doll, though.  Go figure.

So here they are, my Queen Elsas:

They have white long johns on under their dresses. I had a batch of satin from the Textile Center Garage Sale that I predicted would end up in an Elsa dress.  There was enough of the darker turquoise  for the larger dress and since Trix wanted to be Elsa first, she got the lighter turquoise, which was more like the movie Elsa.  

The wig is obviously meant for Rapunzel, but that's the one they wanted.  I had a third wig that seemed more Elsa, but everyone wanted the Rapunzel wig.  Trix would not wear the hair cap and Zelda's was all black, so it looked like poop.  The crowns were pretty cheap and one of them broke early on and no amount of hot glue could repair it so we left those hanging on a gravestone in the yard.  Trix's wig stayed on for the block and Z's stayed for about 80% of the trip around the block. Not bad.

I bought those snowflakes on Amazon.  They are perfect for this costume!  I wanted to do them all along the skirt, but my mother insisted they only be used along the hem and the overdress neckline.  Since she was my handsewer for this project, I let her win.

Here they are from the back (waiting for tricks or treats).  The glitter tulle was the devil and left a trail of glitter all through my house.  And gathering tulle?!?!  Yeah, I hated that.  I already dislike gathering and then to do it with tulle.  Blaaaaaah.  But it was so pretty at night and sparkled so much!

I didn't dress up.  I wanted to, but just ran out of time.  I did wear a vintage teal cape-coat and didn't think about it until it was too late, but if I had worn braids I totally could have passed as Anna.

Things I Bought

A thrift store adventure led to a bag filled with sewing and other treasures, as follows:

First, a metal basket.  I don't know what it is, but I love these shiny baskets.  This is my third one.  I will note that I passed one up a few weeks ago, so it's not like I have that Catcher-in-the-Rye compulsion of assassins.

Basket filled with goodies:

Goodies:

I love old sequins.  They sparkle so much more than the modern ones.

Old spools.  I found an old, old mason jar and am storing my old wooden spools in there until I figure out what else to do with them.

Old hooks and eyes.  Stuff like this is good for repairing my vintage clothing.

I like the old mending kit.  I'm going to give that to a girl I know who has a whole room filled with vintage clothes.  I adore old packaging -- look at that sweet lady on the button packaging.

And these fancy buttons:

That black one is super nice.

Well, that's it for sewing stuff, but I also found stuff for the girls' play kitchen.

These silverware are fabulous.  They came in a tiny basket.

And then a little tea set:

I don't know how long they'll keep the play kitchen.  Z already towers over it and they don't play with it that much, but when they do they have tons of fun with it.

Laura Days

Earlier this summer, I thought about going to Pepin, WI to see Laura Ingalls Wilder's birthplace and museum, but when I looked up their website, I saw that they had a two-day event in September called Laura Days to celebrate her.  I turned to my eldest and asked if she'd want to dress up as Laura with a bonnet and an apron.  She looked at me and said, "Do I get a basket?  A basket with berries?"  Yes!!  

Calico fabrics!  This was about the extent of them in my stash and I had enough of the light blue and the brown to make dresses for the girls.

I used a nightgown pattern from Butterick (B4910) because of the elastic neckline.  I couldn't find any good apron patterns for the style I was looking for, so I drafted my own patterns for those.  There was no actual pattern, I just cut some fabric and hoped it would work.  I felt like I could have been on PR.

Here's the blue:

And the brown:

Forgive the crappy background.  This was as soon as they were dressed out of the car and the last time they would be in full costume (Z quickly shed bits of hers - stinker).

Instead of a ruffle - because I did not have enough fabric - I used lace for the bottoms of both dresses.   I like the back of the apron with the brown dress:

The bonnets were just smaller ones from an adult McCall's pattern that I used for my dress.

Yes, you heard right, I dressed up, too.  I used McCalls 7220.  I did not have enough calico, so I went with some gray fabric that I bought at the thrift store for $3.99.  Here I am in all of my voluminous glory:

It gets better with this angle:

Husband said they wore clothes back then to prevent pregnancy (because I am obviously so enticing in these layers and layers of fabric).

Here's my hulking back:

And another very flattering shot:

The bonnet was a white with blue polka dots.  A dress in that would have been pretty, but I didn't have enough.  

I think my prairie dress could be used in many other costume variations, as follows:

Austere Pilgrim

Mole Woman

Wolf-as-Grandma

Drab Bo Peep

Dowdy Scullery Maid

Hester Prynne (need to embellish the chest, of course) and this is currently the leader for Halloween 2019.

Problem

I bought another dollhouse.

Yes, I know, I have a Problem.  But I also have another dollhouse.  Yay!

I was out with my girls on Saturday morning and on our way home we saw a sign for a yard sale, so we stopped in.  The sellers immediately saw the girls and said that we'd stopped by the right place because they had a dollhouse for us.  The girls ran to it and said that they could get a neighbor for their other dollhouse.  I circled the thing, sent photos of it to my mom, and then walked away with this monstrosity for $25.00.

It has a third floor attic space!

As you can see, the girls promptly had a moving day from one house to the other.  They did not hand carry anything across the room.  Instead, they filled up their toy vehicles with furniture and drove the toy vehicles from one house to the next.

Look an attic flap/lid:

There's definitely some work that needs to be done.

Floors.  Bare wood throughout the house.  That's different than the last house, which had floors that were just stained and had a clear coat on them.

 Painting, both inside and out.  Bare walls on the inside, which is refreshing.  I'm glad I don't have to take off tons of wallpaper again.  That was an evil task.

 Major dusting:

Minor structural repairs.  I'll probably leave this chipped bit as is, but one of those slats on another side of the house is completely off.  I have it, so I'll just glue it back on, I guess.

 And this little gingerbreading-type detail is missing from the other side.

What else can I say about this house?  The doors open!

 The hinges seem to be the wrong scale, so I'm not sure if I want to tweak that or leave them as they are.

I love the little oblong windows.  They are on both sides of the house.

Unlike my other dollhouse purchase, this one did not come with any furnishings.  This just came with some curtains in the attic and a little wall decoration.

In other news, I also found a piano for the house at the Goodwill:

It's a music box and I need to fix it up, but it's a good size for this dollhouse.  I think it will overwhelm the other house.

Dollhouse: Finished Floors

I had to travel for work in January and again in March and somewhere before or between those trips I finished the floors on the dollhouse.  I didn't want my girls to have half-finished floors if, for some reason, I croaked on those trips.  So, now I can fully croak in peace and my mini 1:12 sized ghost will not haunt the dollhouse and its unfinished floors.

So they were previously painted white and that looked like junk and so I went with tiny pieces of basswood strips.  I think the finished result looks pretty smashing.  They look like the floors in my 100 year old house, actually - with the different hues.  Does it look like a teeny tiny real house yet?

The stairs were a challenge.  I decided to leave the rise white and the run got the basswood.  (Do I have that right?  Rise and run?  Or did I reverse them?  I refuse to google that and will continue to live in ignorance.)  

Some of the heights of the strips were a little uneven when they were all laid out, so I sanded before I put the poly on.

And here are some pictures of the house with some furnishings:

It's looking pretty good, I think.  I've been working on hand sewing some curtains and I just hate them.  I really think I should go to the store and find wide pieces of lace.  That worked well for the living room.  We'll see. 

Unicorn Headbands

For my daughter's birthday I made unicorn headband favors.  They were so pretty and it only took a little bit of work to make them all.  I think I finished in just three hours.

I used headbands from the dollar store, flowers from the dollar store, hot glue, felt for horns and ears, and silver cording to make the unicorn horn.  This is the best picture from the party of them in action:

But then here they are in their display basket:

 I don't know what it is about these baskets, but I like them a lot.  They are made in the Philippines and they are always at the thrift store.  I have three and I suppose I should stop buying them.  One came with a glass dish, by the way.