Can I just say...

...making a coat from scratch is a bitch.

A total bitch.

BUT it has been an incredible learning experience for me. So there.

I've got some semblance of a muslin worked out, sort of. And the fit is coming along better than I was expecting, given my slow progress on it. But I am terrified to cut into the fashion fabric for it. Paralyzed, really. I bought twice the required amount of fabric for it to account for screw-ups, and I still can't bring myself to do it.

I'm dumb.

Whatever.

My camera is dumb, too. I mean aside from it simply insisting on taking nothing but crap photos of me anytime I point it in my direction. It is now having a ball torturing me by hiding its cables and making the card reader on my computer crash, and blah, and other things that result in sum in my not posting for 2 months. Okay, maybe not totally the camera's fault, but whatevs. We march on.

In other news, Ms. Pearl is being a total doll -- which removes her from the list of excuses I can use for not getting around to finishing this coat. Also, Nutburgers-the-Neighbor has been in the clink for the last month or so, eliminating him from my excuse list as well. Though his spot on said list may have been replaced by the luxurious joy of drinking beer on my porch at twilight without worrying about whether I'll be accosted by the latest "discovery" that his ex-roommates are tunneling under the house and feeding him rat poison in the middle of the night while he sleeps. I could not make this stuff up, I swear. Amazing shit.

At some point soon I hope to make a decent attempt at finding camera cables and making an effort to be productive. We'll see how well that goes. Wish me luck!

In solidarity,
Ms. May

For the love of ignorance. (And slopers.)

So, yeah, that sloper link in the last post was a little technical. And, apparently, it was also wrong. Semantics can get so bitchy, eh? Hopefully my home studio will stay fashion-industry-whore-free and no one will snicker at me for using a sloper. Though, done right, a good snicker could be pre-t-ty funny.

For the sake of clarity, I'll be referring to the thing that results from the draping of a bunch of effing cloth tightly across my bosoms and gut to get my actual shape as a fitting shell. And the stupid thing that results from it, the non-pattern for chrissakes, I'm calling a sloper.

And here's where a disclaimer is due.

I have never gone to design school. Okay, I have, but it doesn't count because it was theatrical costume design and I quit so fast I never got past Ionesco or made it to the after-hours orgy portion of the gross absinthe parties everyone was always having. Okay, maybe they didn't have actual absinthe, but they totally wished they had absinthe. This lack of formal training means I don't know a lot of proper terminology. Or worse, I think I do and I don't. For example, I have no idea how one refers to the green silk I'm using for the lining. It's a heavy. It's crunchy. It's green. Taffeta? I don't know. That's all I've got. And I appreciate that it's probably more respectful of the art and practice of fashion design (or whatever we're calling this) to actually take the time to learn what that silk is called, or what the parts of a machine are named, or what the truly proper seam would be in a particular application. But, dude, I don't have room in my brain for that and generally functioning in life. I'm hoping these things will become demystified over time as I progress through this project. Therefore, the words "thing," "thingy," "whatever," and "stuff," and the phrase "I don't know" are most likely going to show up a lot around here. And, kids, maybe we'll learn together.

That's enough yammering for today. More later.

Mwah,

Ms. May