Patch Jacket

I've collected patches for a while now, but they have just been affixed to random items or sitting in a drawer. I have been looking for a jean jacket, but every one I try on seems too heavy or not to fit right.

Recently I was out shopping with my family at an outlet mall when we happened to go into the Columbia outlet store. If you don't have one around, they sell outdoor clothes, coats and shoes. They had these really comfy canvas jackets and after trying it on three or four times in that same trip, I figured I'd better get it, or regret it. I can't tell you where to get one if you want one, as the outlet store sells stuff that isn't on their regular online store.

the jacket. teal lining was a big selling point.

For being an outlet store, I was still thinking that $35 for the jacket was a bit much, especially as I wanted to modify it. I love the length on it, but there is this odd string in the center, I guess to make it gather at the waist, but it's annoying, so I pulled it out. Second, it has two really good pockets for your hands that have two different pockets in one. However it also had two pockets up over my boobs, which were odd, so I removed them carefully. Now that I had a more blank canvas (ha!) to work with, I could start planning out where I wanted to put the patches.

Thankfully I had gotten a bunch of Amazon and Etsy money, so I was able to make a huge list of things I like, figure out what I was missing, and find patches for them without going broke. I also got a custom patch to put where a name would normally be embroidered, but of my twitter/tumblr/instagram handle. In total, I probably spent a good $80 on patches alone, amassing forty some odd patches.

Figure I will give a shoutout to those Etsy shops that I bought from:
Steven Universe Gem Weapons: Coey and Shy
@Khyarete patch: The Applique Patch
Pacific Rim and OtGW Rock Fact: CuddleTurtle
Better Be Dogs: MonsterOutside
White Lotus/ATLA and The Prince from Katamari Damacy: Cherriesama
Animal Crossing Leaf: Kawaiian Pizza Apparel
Happy Milk: PatchNation
Coraline: Craftsylvania
Ash from Fantastic Mr. Fox and the Bigfoot: For the Love of Patch
I have to say, For the Love of Patch is a truly excellent store. He has and is working on some really nice designs and I really love the ones I got. I've got three or four patch ideas from shows I love, that I can't seem to find anywhere. As he also can make custom patches, at some point I am going to send him my designs.

Others I have collected include:
two Terlingua, TX/ Day of the Dead
three Big Bend National Park
Camp LaJita (Girl Scout camp near San Antonio)
Soviet Space and Recycling (from husbands old cub scout vest)
Kwik-E-Mart (Simpsons from Universal Studios, Orlando)
ThinkGeek Starbase: Texas from the Hurst Mall Location
Jukebox the Ghost (band)
Sailor Mercury symbol and Chibi figure
Ravenclaw house emblem (Wizarding World of Harry Potter, Orlando)
Rebels Against the God crest (Angel Beats anime)
BPRD patch (Hellboy)
Ouran Acadamy crest (Ouran Highschool Host Club anime)
Eternal Scout patch (Welcome to Nightvale podcast)
Stargate SGU
Jurrasic Park
Planet Express (Futurama)
Meat Popsicle and Council of Federated Territories (Fifth Element)
Totoro with a mushroom

thread box borrowed from mom in law

As for actually applying them all to the jacket... well I hand sewed each on. Some only after removing as much iron on glue as possible, or where not possible, doing both ironing on to soften the glue and then hand sewing. As I suck at sewing this was slow going, especially on the arms. I'm sure I did it all wrong, but I used a small, thin and very sharp needle for getting through the layers of canvas, glue and embroidery and by the time I finished it was a C shape from the struggle. My fingertips will never be the same.

the finished front, for now. mostly used for odd size and my favorite ones.

I decided it would be more fun to just have them all mixed up together as best they fit, so that I wouldn't need to worry about having all the scout ones together and camping ones together, especially if I have room to add more. Instead I started looking at size and shape similarities, laying them out so they looked somewhat symmetrical and organized. 

finished back for now. symmetry emphasized

At the time of writing this, I am still collecting more patches, and have at least two more out on order. Not to mention ideas for my own custom ones I want, so I guess keep an eye out for updates as I add more.

the two sleeves, figured crests of organizations would be coolest here.

I am super in love with this jacket now. I wore it out in Austin, with only about 15 of the patches on and got compliments and smiles wherever I went. It is a great piece to start conversations and attract like minded individuals, if the blue hair wasn't enough. Can't wait for fall.

Time to complete: 80-90 hours

Update: Got several new patches. Cryptozoology as part of the set of alternative scouting badges from Luke Drozd. The tornado to my love of the movie Twister and weather science in general, from Patchtown on Amazon. Pawnee Goddesses from Parks and Rec from Ferdinand Works. 'Za Lord's Guard from the Dresden Files novels from Pop Culture Patches.

Halloween Costumes 2015

I always like to do a post for Halloween. It's the best holiday.

On Friday my husband's school also let seniors and teachers dress up. He actually suggested Greg Universe, Steven's dad from Steven Universe the cartoon. Greg is a pretty low effort costume. So I quickly worked up a black t-shirt into a Mr. Universe shirt seen in the episode Lion 3, by making a stencil out of paper and an xacto knife and then using some acrylic paint on it. (You can make acrylic stay on clothing by heat setting it with an iron.) Along with some ripped jeans, his hair down, and some sandals, he looked the part. He took my Lion with him to school.

paper stencil

finished shirt painting

But I also wanted to share what his mom made for me: A Lion Hoodie!
Lion is also from Steven Universe and I had the idea to turn a hoodie into a costume, which turned out to be harder than I thought. I bought a 2X pale pink Hanes hoodie from their website. I still feel like it might be a little small but it fits ok. We used it for the base and then got 2 yards of this really soft swirl fur stuff in pink from Joann's. I really like how it isn't long hair-fur that will get matted, but short roses of really soft fur. Seriously, people kept petting me.

I'm really awful at sewing and of course I had no pattern to go from. So I started just pinning it around the hood to see how much I had to work with and if I could kind of just shape it as I wanted on the hood itself. This might have been easier on a mannequin I think. About an hour into pinning I realized I would need more help. Thank goodness my mother in law lives nearby and has access to a really good sewing machine, since mine was not going to get through this much fabric.

trying to lay out the fur onto the hoodie directly

bear served as mannequin

pink felt shapes were stuffed, the idea was to add it under the fur

We decided to use the extra yard of pink felt I bought for ears and a tail to also make petal shape pillows to stuff with fluff and add between the hoodie and fur to give it a full shaped look. Then we could tack the petal shapes to the hood and then cover with the fur to make it look right.

Unfortunately, once we sewed the shapes, stuffed them and put them under the fur it was all so heavy and fluffy that the hood no longer even worked as a hood and it just pulled itself off my head.
It took a few evenings of work, trial, and error to figure it out.

In the end we decided to go back to the original idea, of just sewing the fur down to the body of hoodie in ways to get the overall shape of Lion's mane, which is a big sort of star shape, rather than try to make 3D shapes coming off the head. We did add a little stuffing in places between the hoodie and the fur. And once the ears and tail was added it was pretty cute. The only place I helped sew is the pink bulb on the end, which I hand sewed down onto the tail.

I got a pair of Hanes light pink sweatpants at Walmart to complete the outfit.

I even made a little Lion Licker to keep in my pocket. If you don't know a "Lion Licker" is an ice cream treat Lion really likes in the show. It is hand sewn by me, as you can tell, and made out of felt. I added a little slit to the back side so I can keep stuff in it if I want to... like headphones... or candy corn. Not long after having this thought, I added a cotton lining to the inside for that very purpose. Took me about 3 hours of sewing to get this done.

So there you go. Another year of super fun costumes.
What did you go as?

The Ponyo Dress

And now for something a little different.

I keep seeing more people online turning costumes into fashion, by making the recognizable features of pop culture on dresses: The Totoro dress. The Dalek dress. The Nightvale dress. The Marauders Map Dress.

I had the idea for a Ponyo dress. Not her exact outfit, which is easy enough to make (and would make a perfect future kid/mom cosplay set), but the art of Ponyo, or more specifically, the opening credits.
Warning: Long Post Ahead

I could just see the colors and shapes in my mind, flowing around a white A-line skirt. It would be insanely cool to do this kind of thing as a quilt or embroidery, but I do not have those skills.

I bought myself a set of 20 fabric markers from Walmart. I then had to find a reasonably priced white dress. This turned out to be much harder than anticipated. With it being fall when I decided to start looking, white sun dresses were pretty scarce. I had this idea in September 2014 and didn't find a dress until April 2015. I went with an Old Navy eyelet sundress because it was both relatively cheap and lined! I wasn't too thrilled with the eyelet design on the bodice and around the hem, but there was a large smooth area to work on the skirt. Turns out that the edging limited the area I would have to paint and contained my design nicely, so it ended up to be a big benefit.

Putting these scenes all together was a bit tough, so I first sketched out how I wanted it to go on the dress in pencil. I tried to have some large element to focus on, on each side of the dress.

Kind of an idea. Didn't stick to it too close.

After that I slipped a large plastic lap desk between the outer layer and the lining. This way I could stretch the fabric and draw on it with pencil and keep the lining from getting anything on it.

Kind of hard to see the pencil drawing.

After I penciled out the design, I went back over with the black fabric marker. I did it in four sections leaving each area to dry over night before rotating the dress to the next area to outline.

Initial outlining. Can see a little of the pencil up top there.

More of the design outlined.

Once the main outlines for the details were done I had to go back over and add the current lines that flow in all the water areas. In each stage of this I kept getting nervous. I was nervous to mark up a dress in such a permanent way. Then once the pencil was on I was scared to put the ink down. Then once the ink outlines were down and I had gotten used to seeing the design and liking it, I was terrified that adding the current lines would ruin it. I had to add them though, if I was going to be true to the movie.

The back, with current lines.

Now that the dress was fully outlined, it was time to figure out how to color it. The movie has kind of a watercolor look to it, but I had these fine tipped markers. My options were:
a) color in the whole dress like you would normally
b) try to open the markers, get the ink out and paint it on
c) go buy fabric dye and try to paint with that (unfeasible since I wanted to many colors)
d) find some other option for water color painting fabric that is permanent.
e) none of the above

I tried out the normal coloring idea on a scrap piece of white fabric from one of my husbands old cotton dress shirts. Luckily my dress is also cotton. I found that if you draw a line or shape then add a little water to the center and brush it around you can get a pretty passable watercolor look. The trouble is that the colors tended to bleed a lot.

just coloring bled out a lot

Coloring lightly then using a damp brush in the center and letting it bleed to the middle.

When starting on my dress I tried to use as little water as possible since I was worried the black lines would smudge, but since they had plenty of time to dry before I started coloring it in, their bleeding was minimal. Unfortunately controlling how much water went on was tough. I colored shapes that would not touch even if they bled so that they could dry and I could go back over and color new shapes with little fear of the first colors bleeding away or messing up the new colors I was adding on.

no touching for first round of colors

This meant that I could color a few elements, then would have to wait overnight for the areas to dry so I could color more the next day. This made it really slow going, which made me impatient, which made me use to much water.

this will take forever.

starting to come together

Luckily, even though nearly every element bled out a bit, once I started working on the solid background water colors, I was able to make it look a little cleaner around the edges. The watercolor effect started looking really cool once I got larger areas colored too.

getting so close to done

just a little more to go.

I tried to go back into each little element as well to give it a little depth and detail. The islands have a few colors and there are little dots for sand in places. I tried to darken the outlines around each item. Added shadows and shading. Added a sun on the horizon of the water too.

Once that was all done, I went back to the area along the top of the water and added a little blue outline that I blurred into the sky. It helped to transition the dress from the designs and colored areas back into the white of the bust. It was a mess in some places but looked ok I think.

Finished front. 

Finished back.

If you are going to attempt anything like this I recommend starting on the back and working to the front and not the other way around like I did. This means that when I got the hang of coloring on the back towards the end of this project that the back is now nicer than the front in my opinion.

Hanging in front of the window. The light coming through makes it look cool!

The markers are permanent and intended for how I used them, so the colors should stay. This dress should also be washable in color safe soap, but might fade a little. I really don't want to have to wash it more than necessary. So, after letting the finished dress hang and fully dry for several days, I put a few coats of Scotchgard Fabric Protector over the top. That way if I ever sit on anything or drop something on it, I won't have ruined all this work.

This is certainly now one of the longest projects I have worked on and is truly a one-of-a-kind dress. I plan to wear it out to conventions, I think, or Ghibli movies (should there be any more).

Difficulty: Advanced
Time to complete: Concept: September 2014
    Work started May 23, 2015 - finished June 20, 2015, about 65 hours

Senketsu Beanie

Some days you get an idea and have to make it. Right then.

A good friend's birthday party was coming up... well to be frank, it was the next day. And there I was sitting on the couch wondering if I shouldn't bring a gift. I started thinking about anime, which is an interest we have in common. Then I thought, huh, do any anime characters wear scarves... could have sworn there was one... Natsu's from Fairy Tail, came to mind, but I wasn't sure if he liked that show.

Instead I thought, well I know he liked Kill la Kill. What if... ha! Ok so, if you know that anime, in it there are clothes that are alive cause of some magic life fibers. Well it might be cool to make a scarf with the eyes of the main clothing sidekick, Senketsu! So I ran out to my stash with an image in my head and set about finding the colors to make it.

First thing was to even see if I could make something that looked like his good eye. I kind of just cobbled together the right shape, layering the colors and outlining it. Came up with something I was happy with. With a little stretching, I thought I could sew it down to a basic black scarf with no problems and get a shape I was happy with.

Next was the boring part, making the base scarf to put under the design. I knew it had to be black. And I decided I wanted it to have a red stripe on the other end of the scarf from the face. So I did a simple chain 31, turn and sc 30 across. It made a really thick scarf and after about 3 hours of working I didn't have much to show for it. Plus being so thick it would be odd to wear right.

Instead I decided a beanie might be a better option, it had the nice width to have the eyes on and would certainly be something more user friendly. I went with a normal double crochet hat, widended out to 69 stitches using a 5.00mm hook and Red Heart super saver yarn. I added a brim at the bottom and am pretty happy with how it came out.

Now came the time to sew the eye on. I positioned it just above the band and tacked it down. For the damaged eye, I used a surface slip stitch technique to get the lines on.

I really like how it came out. I hope that it goes over well.

Time to complete: 6 hours

Halloween 2014

A bit late I know, but I wanted to share my costumes for this year!

Coraline
Obviously it isn't super on model but I think it gets the idea across well and is recognizable! I wore this Halloween day to Chipolte to get my $3 burrito and to the school football game. Turned out this coat is not warm and we had some of the first cold weather in Texas that night.

With my blue hair, a little makeup with added freckles, and a few pieces of clothes I think the transformation was pretty good. I will have to keep an eye out for yellow rainboots and a stone with a hole in it, though.

Yellow Rainjacket from L.L. Bean
Navy Camisole and Navy and White Stars sweater from Old Navy (from 4th of july season)
Dark wash Jeans from Target
Polka dot Rainboots from Target
Dragonfly hairclip made by me from felt, hot glue and a clip
A Little Me made by a good friend (made to really resemble real life me)
Crazy Gloves made by me

My Little Me did not have a raincoat, so I made one for her in about an hour and a half.
Two tiny sleeves, a body and a hood, sewed together, made for one cute tiny coat.

So there you go! A little money, a little work and a little wardrobe plundering equals a pretty good costume!

Oh and here's a pic of the pup! She's a skele-dog this year. It glows in the dark too. Got it last year on clearance at wal-mart for like $2. :)

So spoopy.

Saturday, the 1st we had a belated party because I really do like to have a Halloween bash. We have a great fire pit in the yarn and the cooler temps made it a really pleasant time. Since my Coraline outfit was dirty, I decided to throw together a second costume for the party.

I know most of you will not have seen the anime, Chobits, but it has robot girls called Persocoms. They have these big robot ears and are often dressed up. So I threw on my ears that I made, several years ago, from two pieces of craft foam. I used a clear bra strap and some bobby pins to keep them on my head and added a large flower to keep the strap hidden and add to the dressed up feel.

I went a little heavier on the make up than I normally do. I had shades of purple, blue and gray eyeshadow on and managed to line my whole eye. I also used a blue soft eyeshadow pencil to color my brows blue! A little pink lipstick completed the look.

I collect kimonos and this one is a purple pattern with cranes. It is a lighter one made of washable cotton (important since I was sitting around a fire all night). I had a yellow accent wrap and my bright green patterned obi to complete the look. It was really fun to do this look. Perhaps I will wear this out to an anime convention sometime... anyway.

Hope you all had a Happy Halloween.

Crazy Gloves

Last post I mentioned I bought some colorful new yarn for a new project based on an inspiration piece... that inspiration is Coraline's crazy gloves!

Those tiny gloves were really hand knitted by the same lady who made her star sweater. O.O

Those bright, striped gloves have stuck with me, and yes you can buy more accurate versions on Etsy, but I wanted to test a fingerless glove pattern and thought I could make myself a pair at the same time.

The Koigu yarn I bought was really spot on color wise I thought (if a little brighter). Same tones of orange, yellow, green and gray. Yes, it would not make the same kinds of stripes, but I am already getting away from their actual look since my pattern has open fingers too. That's ok. Hence Inspiration Piece.

The Koigu yarn...

Scrapped: Arched Cuffs pattern... too small I think.

The pattern I first tested is Arched Cuffs Fingerless Mitts by Cascade Yarns, I found it just doing a google search and since it was free I thought I would give it a go. Unfortunately, their "average woman's hand" size did not look like it was going to fit once I got about 7 rows into the pattern. I tried slipping it on and even though I could get it past my knuckles and to sit on my wrist it was a very tight fit. So, worried that I would put hours in and not have a product that I could use I decided to stop and try another. Now that I look back perhaps it could have been ok with a larger hook size as it called for a D hook and in the next pattern I used and E hook.

So I decided to go back to the first pattern I found for half finger gloves by PlayingwithFiber on Etsy. This one has two sizes so I know I can make the larger size and be assured it will fit. It's probably what I should have done from the start...

About halfway through, no thumb yet...

I had a little trouble with the foundation double crochet as it was new to me, but quickly picked it up after watching the video she links to. I am not sure why you couldn't just do a chain and then double crochet into it, like you might with other patterns, but I do like the way it turned out because it looks very polished. It was nifty to learn something new. Her modified half double crochet was also pretty cool and not too hard to master. It is important to know that the modified half double is not the same on both sides. There is a textured side and a smooth side, so I simply made sure the smooth was on the inside of the glove.

Almost done. Second needed knuckles and four fingers.

Although the variegated yarn did not stripe like I hoped it might, I think they came out great and will look lovely with the yellow raincoat I ordered... Even if they are a tiny bit too tight on me. Perhaps at some point I will make more accurate versions if I can find solid colors that match the movie gloves.

Kind of reminds me of the cover of a VHS or Beta cd...

Time to complete: 5 hours (10 hours for the pair then)
Difficulty: Intermediate

BTW, my 50g skein was more than enough for these both, so much so that I made a new chain for my yarn cutter out of the same pattern as the bracelet for my mom, just shorter.

After that I had a small ball... too much to throw away for sure. Not enough for much of anything... but maybe... a Headband!! Couldn't get one made that I liked though, so maybe I'll just make a few more long chains like this and wear em in the summer.

Also, one final note: From here on out, updates will be Monday only. That gives me more time to work on projects between posts and lets me keep up a nice buffer time. That means I can get ambitious or work on longer projects!