In case anyone reading this blog doesn't know, at the end of February, I started working at a certain well-known community organization and workout facility (you might know its name best as the Village People song that is overplayed at weddings - if this seems like I'm being coy, it's because I think it's best to keep work and social media separate). I work in the Child Watch area, where members can drop off their kids for a couple of hours while they use the facility). Ziva comes with me to almost all of my shifts, and she can just play and hang out with the other kids while I'm working, which is great for both of us. It's not a huge space, so she's happy that I'm nearby, and she'll occasionally check in, but she's usually keen to do her own thing. That's really the best benefit of working there. See, employees who work in other areas get 10 hours of Child Watch during their work shifts (whereas I get to have Ziva with me for all 25 hours if I want to), and then all of us get a discount on the daily or monthly rates to have their kids in Child Watch beyond those hours. Also, employees get a free membership. And with that membership comes things like swim classes, so I do a parent+child class with Ziva twice a week. The kicker is, it's 2.5 hours after my shift ends, so I've just been paying for the day rate so she can keep playing and I get some uninterrupted sewing time. Most of the other staff use their Child Watch hours for exercising - but you know, I'm just that special that I use it for handsewing 18th century stays. I wish I'd started using that time between work and swimming for sewing when I first began this project, because it's super cheap and an excellent use of time! Ah well.
When I last blogged, I had just finished tracing down the boning channels. Since then I have:
1) cut and rounded off my cable ties into 28 individual "bones" (all in different lengths, of course - it would have been far too easy if they were all uniform, right??)
2) inserted all of the bones
3) stitched binding by hand down to the top openings of both halves of the stays, and
4) trimmed the tabs at the bottom of the stays so they are rounded instead of squared.
I was going back and forth about that last one, because there are period examples with square and rounded tabs, but to me, rounded is a bit more aesthetically pleasing. I was terrified to cut them because I'd already put so much work into these stays, but I lined up the two halves and pinned them together so even if I made little mistakes here and there, they'd at least be identical little mistakes! I just have to keep reminding myself that binding hides a world of sins.
Now I just need to get the binding sewn down around all of those tabs, which will involve lots of futzing and squiggling around corners, but I think I can manage it. Oh, and speaking of the binding, I was originally thinking of using binding and lacing ribbon in a coordinating but contrasting color like purple, but I couldn't find both binding and ribbon in the same matching shade (why don't these companies use the same dye lots???), so I ended up going with a perfectly matched green for the binding, and then I found this sweet sort of homespun ribbon in a kind of light linen color with - would you believe it - tiny little green accent stitches running down each side! I couldn't resist. I actually like that the binding is such a good match, because it's just one nice uniform background color, so I could switch out the lacing ribbon for something a little more flashy if I want to.
After the binding is complete, there will still be eyelets to sew by hand. Probably about 60 of them. Yeah, I bit off a lot with this whole project. I'm going to be borrowing a lot of underpinnings and accessories, and I've hired someone to make a dress for Ziva as "Nabby." The fabric for my gown hasn't arrived from India yet! I just got word that it made it to New York, though, so it's at least in the country!
But now let's focus on the good stuff...pictures of my progress!!
Here's the package of cable ties - they're 36" long and 1/4" wide. They were a little wider than I had expected, so I stitched the boning channels just a tad outside the edge of the lines I had traced.
Here's a cable tie cut down to the right length, and the top sort of shaved down and rounded off (I scraped it against very rough sandpaper, which you can see in the picture above) so it doesn't poke through the fabric. I cut them with tinsnips, which made the job much easier!
BONED! In the best possible sense, of course. Eamon has been saying all along that it's no fun because the jokes are too easy to make.
Here's the boning shown from the coutil side. You can see that it really gives the stays their structure.
And here's a closeup on the brocade side. The channels are slightly raised.
This is after stitching the binding down on the brocade side. You can see how nicely the binding (which is cut on the bias, or the diagonal of fabric) curves around the shape of the top of the stays. If it was cut on the straight grain it wouldn't stretch and be this flexible.
Here's the same thing from the coutil side, before folding the binding over and stitching it down. This is all done by hand because it's too fiddly for the machine. Not all of the stitches came all the way through, which is fine, it's all hidden anyway once the binding is folded down. The bias is pre-folded and basically comes down right where it's supposed to on this side, so it's not like you need the hand stitches as a guide. But dang it, I sewed by hand and I almost never do that, so please admire my hand stitching!!
The bias stitched down, shown from the brocade side.
And here's how it looks all stitched down from the coutil side. It's a little wrinkly but pressing it should help.
This is a really minor detail, but if you look carefully at the bottom of the stays, this is after I rounded off the tabs rather than leaving them squared at the bottom.
Isn't this terrific for the lacing ribbon?? I just love that little hint of green. I'm sure it won't show (anyone who gets close enough to see it had better know me REALLY well), but I'll know it's there!
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