So many pepper and courgette flowers!

Walking Dress, 1881

A lovely fashion plate from Peterson's Magazine

Chicken Scratch Embroidery Introduction

A short video explaining Chicken Scratch

The Facebook Diet

Heh don't worry I'm not talking about some kind of dieting fad.

No instead I'm just going to mention how much more productive I've been now that I don't permanently have Facebook open in a tab on my web browser.

I used to always have it there in case someone sent me a message, but now I only check a few times a day and I get so much more done, which I guess is pretty obvious for a eureka moment, but that's how it is.

Kitten has Claws Previews

Two previews from my most recent shoot 

I'm gearing up to start selling online (hopefully in September if I can get the paperwork and web hosting sorted in time) and so I have begun to get shoots together in clothes I have made and intend to sell online. For this shoot I wore the Medusa skirt, with a corset and accessories by Forever in Black, but on the page itself I plan on having a few different photos of how it can be styled with or without a corset.

I also got to do a few portrait shots of Forever in Black accessories and the knife that Kev bought for me at Comic Con :)

Photos in this post by Peter Lennox (who doesn't have a website)

Skirt by me

Corset and accessories by Forever in Black

Hobble Skirts

A fantastic outfit video that turned up in my youtube suggestions

I really love this outfit, it says in the description that her corset and collar are by Jeroen van der Klis (who seems to be all over the place all of a sudden!) and her skirt from Honour (site is NSFW), 

I admire the way she managed to walk so well in the skirt and heels, I have a jersey hobble skirt that I made myself that has a lot more give for movement than the latex one in this video and the first time I wore it with heels I fell flat on my face in a room full of people!

My Drawing Skills Have Improved Somewhat Since 1996

The Corset Di Medci

A fascinating article from the April 1855 edition of Peterson's Magazine

Depression Lace

It's taking a very long time to embroider this skirt, so I don't think I will be making a lot of these.

But still I feel like it will look extra special in my wardrobe when it's finished :)

Black Forest Gateau

Some of my earliest memories involve eating Black Forest Gateau with my Granda when I was a child

I know it's probably not much like traditional Black Forest Gateau, for some reason here in the UK we call this kind of cake Black Forest Gateau, but I have been told that Black Forest Gateau from the actual Black Forest is very different.

I have always been afraid of trying to make it in case it didn't turn out right and I spoiled my memories a bit, but this version looks like it would be pretty much exactly like the ones I remember from childhood so I feel like giving this one a try.

Selfie Time

Super happy with how my hair is looking, totally worth the year long weird growing out of the front bit

A Typical Day in Skyhold

I'm almost finished the main storyline of Dragon Age Inquisition and while it's been a blast I'm a little bit sad as it's almost a year now since I started the journey with Dragon Age Origins.

Still amusing fan works will keep me happy until the rumoured Deep Roads expansion!

The Missing Stay

Delving back into Yours magazine's 50 Years of Fashion I learned something about the transition from corsets to girdles.

In the article "The Hidden Support" it claims that corsets were banned during World War 2, except by medical prescription. I haven't heard that before, and I have a reproduction of Make Do And Mend (which might also be in a box in my parent's shed) that mentions cleaning corsets, so it's possible that it wasn't that all corsets were banned, just that new ones weren't allowed, which does make sense as the steel used for the bones would be needed for the war effort.

After the war, in came roll ons, zip girdles and plastic boned corselettes instead, and both the article and my grandma mentioned that these were pretty uncomfortable to wear, so I figure that this must be where the idea that actual corsets are uncomfortable comes from.

The small inset article underneath mentions a few discrete things women would say to each other if they spotted that someone's petticoat was showing such as "It's snowing down south!"

I feel like it would be fun to revive that saying for Lolita wearers!

Sharon Van Etten - Every Time the Sun Comes Up (Official Video)

I'm doing a course on song writing with Futurelearn

This song is on one of the playlists to listen to and I really liked it and love the video.

Looks like it'll be beans for tea soon :)

Boo Y'all

My Chicken Scratch Embroidered dress is coming along quite nicely.

I'm sewing a border of bats adapted from this design by Cottage Nest

Gone With The Wind

I don't care how famous this film is, please don't lace a corset like this, it's one of the easiest ways to damage the back of the wearer and damage the corset too.

Stand up straight!

Latex

Another advert pulled from Scarlet magazine that made it onto my inspiration board

I've been intending to buy something from Atsuko Latex (who later went on to make the latex gown that Lady Gaga met the Queen in!), but I've never really had enough cash to be able to justify it yet.

I have been doing some major oggling at their latex leggings and heart shaped eye patches  recently though, so who knows, maybe once the wedding is paid for!

Fashion on the Ration Part 2

In my box of books and magazines in my parent's shed I found a copy of Yours magazine's 50 Years of Everyday Fashion.

Women having their legs browned during the nylon shortage

So as a follow up to the previous Fashion on the Ration post I thought I would post a couple of things from the pages about the war years.

There is another small mention of parachute silk underwear in a small section on recycled fashion. During World War 2 almost everything was rationed in the UK, and according to the magazine

"At the beginning of rationing you got 66 points a year, by the end that number had reduced to 48. A woollen dress took 11 coupons, a blouse 5, and a petticoat or cami knickers four."

66 points obviously didn't go very far, and so everything that could be mended or re-made was, and so this was why parachutes and silk maps were scavenged to make luxury underwear.

Queen Elizabeth II on her wedding day

Rationing effected almost everybody, even our Royal Family (although our Prime Minister, Winston Churchill opted out of being rationed and enjoyed copious amounts of brandy, champagne and cigars in the Cabinet War Rooms underneath London), and when Queen Elizabeth (still a Princess at the time) was married in 1947, a lot of people tried to send her extra ration book coupons for her dress, although coupon sharing was illegal so all of the coupons were sent back to their senders and the Queen made do with the 200 extra coupons that every other bride in the country was allocated for their wedding clothes.

Another thing that caught my eye mentioned the nylon shortage.

"Not wearing stockings was a sign that you were common! The tell tale line up the back of your calves was a clear sign that your legs were decently covered. Getting a regular supply of stockings during the war was difficult so, famously we used gravy browning and eyebrow pencils to fake seamed stockings when none were available."

It's funny how attitudes change over time, I feel like if that happened now the red tops would have a field day and start banging on about vain celebrity trends, although back then it was normal.

Stitch sample

Trying out Chicken Scratch Embroidery for the first time

Pretty happy with it, I need to take a bit more care with the fabric tension though.

Be Gorgeous - Be Glamorous - Be a Goddess

Continuing the theme of "stuff from 2008 I found in a box in my parent's shed".

I used to have this on my note board in my room in first year, it was the back page of a magazine I used to buy called Scarlet (which was unfortunately cancelled when I was in second year :( ).

In amongst the articles I bought it for that introduced me to the concepts of Female Domination as more than just a comedy trope, puppy play and boot worship (I was 19 and living on my own for the first time, I was kind of a curious kitten about sexuality), there were often full page adverts for The Plus Size Lingerie Lounge and they were one of the first times I encountered plus size women presented as anything other than the comic relief or someone who must deep down hate themself.

As a fashion student who was plus sized herself this had a huge impact on me, and for a while I actually considered going into underwear design.

I Am A Fan Of This Look

And terrible at puns

A look from a 2008 issue of Asiana magazine, a fashion magazine aimed at Asian Brits that I used to buy when I was at uni because I was often inspired by the colour palettes and use of accessories in their editorials.

Bad Romance Parody

<3

Forgotten Playlists

I went through a box of books and magazines in my parent's shed that had been there since I left university and found a playlist stashed inside a copy of Vogue

I didn't write it, I hate Metallica, my friend gave me these song recommendations after I spent a night wandering around the ruins if an Anglo Saxon church with her in the middle of the night, because that's the kind of thing I did when I was 18.

I miss her, but we lost touch after she attempted suicide and sent me an MSN message telling me that she had taken pills and wanted to say goodbye. I didn't know what to do so I told someone who I knew lived near by and they went around and rang an ambulance.  

She sent me an angry message and never spoke to me again.

A few years back she turned up at a gig where I was working the door, I said hello and she blanked me, shoved the ticket at me to tear off the side and held her hand out for me to stamp it, she wouldn't look me in the eye.

I don't know if she's still alive, I still feel guilty for hurting her and selfish for not wanting to lose her, I ended up losing her anyway and this is all I have left, and it was tucked away and forgotten about.

I still wonder if she knew I'd get her an ambulance that time anyway. 

I hope she is alive and that things are better for her now.

Nine Strand Braid

It ended up slightly lopsidd, but this is the first time I've managed a passable attempt at a nine strand braid.

So I Still Haven't Finalised My Wedding Hair!

Follow Alexandria's board Wedding Hair on Pinterest.

Watch my struggles to decide on Pinterest!

Cider and Combine Harvesters

Body Acceptance

I ran across a meme a few days back that said body acceptance should be about burns victims and paraplegics rather than "people who can't stop eating."
I find two major problems with this.

The first is that I am pretty sure people with a lot of burning or who are missing limbs still eat, eating is a fairly essential part of life.

The second is that body acceptance already includes those people, body acceptance is for everybody that has a body and accepts that it is the way it is, however burns victims and paraplegics tend to get less media attention since people are generally too busy pearl clutching over the notion of fat people who don't hate themselves to even notice anybody else.

Gone Batty

Starting my chicken scratch embroidery JSK today, wheeeeeee!

Wedding Dress Inspiration Board

Follow Alexandria's board Wedding Dress Inspiration on Pinterest.

Cranking up the wedding planning at the moment :)

Long cat is long

18th Century Layers (1740-1770)

AKA all of the stuff I will have under my wedding dress because it's very similar to the outfit in this video!

And y'all wonder why I've been strength training lately.

Magic Beans

So thrilled with how my broad beans are doing!

And some more on one of my other plants!

The Silly Pages

A rather silly photoshoot with my bit fluff <3

About a year and a half ago I did a photoshoot with Kev

Unfortunatly the photographer had a lot of trouble with his PC so we didn't think we'd see the photos

But a few days back I got an email with them all attached

I'm really happy with how they came out, it's so nice to do a silly photo shoot now and then.

Photos by Peter Lennox

With kev36663

My Blouse: Surface Spell

Corset, Overblouse and hair accessories: Forever in Black

Skirt: Hand Made by Me

Full set on my like page.

Corset Shopping For Trans Women (link)

I'm of the opinion that everybody who wants to wear a corset should give it a try, there are corsets for every body, although some people have to search harder for a corset that will look and feel good on them, so The Lingerie Addict has put together this handy guide to corset shopping for trans women.

Chicken Scratch Embroidery

Found on Pinterest

My next sewing project is going to involve Chicken Scratch embroidery. I found chicken scratch a while back on pinterest and was pretty fascinated by it.

It's a type of cross stitch based embroidery done onto gingham fabric, using the squares as both a size guide and a design feature, and I think it's really pretty.

I found a few nifty Halloween chicken scratch patterns on Etsy and I thought it would be super cool to get one and try it out around the bottom of a skirt!

Future Project?

I found this map of Middle Earth fabric on Spoonflower this morning and I am very tempted to get a couple of metres of it at some point and make Middle Earth map underwear inspired by the map lingerie in yesterday's post!

Fashion on the Ration

A primary school memory kicked back to the forefront of my brain by What Katie Did

Countess Mountbatten's map underwear as featured in What Katie Did Magazine issue 3

After buying my birthday underwear from What Katie Did it turns out Kev is now subscribed to their magazine, which was of course handed straight to me, as he is well past the age of flipping through lingerie magazines!

It turns out it's quite an interesting little read, as well as detailing their new collections (I actually really like the hybrid power mesh corslet) there are also a couple of small articles in there, and one of them is entitled "Fashion on the Ration."

Fashion on the Ration is about a temporary exhibit at The Imperial War Museum in London, that I would very much like to see but probably won't be able to due to lack of funds, it's about wartime street fashions during World War 2, and one of the photos is of Countess Mountbatten's lingerie made from a silk map that was given to her by her boyfriend in the RAF and it reminded me of when I was in year 2 at Primary School (for those unfamiliar with the English - it's different in Scotland, not sure about Wales and Northern Ireland-  schooling system, year 2 is not the second year of primary school, it's actually the third, and we go there between the ages of 6 and 7), and TV time happened once a week.

During this term we were watching Look and Read's Spywatch

The whole series is up on youtube, and bar a mild bit of cheesiness it's still worth a watch.

Every so often before TV time we'd be shown something that related to what we were about to watch and learn about it, and in one episode of Spywatch someone in a parachute (assumed to be a Nazi spy) lands near by.

This TV time one of the teachers from another class brought in a real World War 2 parachute, or what was left of it anyway, it had lots of little holes in it where it had been used as fabric to make underwear!

She explained that her mother and grandmother had collected it when a plane had crashed near by during a dogfight and the pilot had escaped in a parachute, which later got tangled in a tree. I don't recall weather the pilot was British or German or even survived (this was TV time twenty years ago after all!), but I do remember her saying that even clothing was rationed during the war and almost everything was recycled, so if a couple of metres of silk landed in your back garden you'd use them!

The Silly Pages Preview

So Kev and I did a photoshoot... It got quite silly :)

Tights to Stockings

a pair of tights I am converting into stockings because I managed to rip the crotch, the legs remain un-laddered though.

Cougette, mint and feta salad

Made with this recpie http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/aug/26/18-recipes-for-leftover-mint

Novelty Bustles

What do you hide in yours?

Join the conversation over at Cogpunk Steamscribe

An incredibly sweet video of Cathy and Bob Jung

For those of you who perpetuate the rumour that tightlacers flop in half when they take off their corsets

Aren't they just freakin' adorable?

Though I see TLC's terribad editing strikes again, it sounds a lot like Bob was still talking when they cut off his "it's the most attractive" I suspect the end of the sentence would have been "to me".

Alexandria, Alexandria, how does your garden grow?

Now for some garden updates!

My tallest broad bean plant has ten pods!

Five of them are visible in that photo but they're all still pretty small at the moment

The next tallest is covered in flowers

As is this one

Buds on this one, so flowers in a few days.

They all smell really nice which is something I've not noticed growing broad beans in my grandma's garden in previous years.

My mint plant I bought a few weeks ago seems to have decided to take over the world since I moved it to a bigger pot!

Rosemary steadily getting bigger

lettuce doing pretty well

And this is my basil I bought in Lidl yesterday, apparently it should be ok outdoors during the summer but will have to come in for the winter.

30. Smething You Cooked

Delicious veggie pasta nomnomnom

Maternity Corsets

Lilly Langtry in the family way

One of the things I have seen come up a lot in anti-corset arguments is maternity corsetry.

I've seen it bandied around that maternity corsets caused birth defects and miscarriage, this seems in most cases to come from a complete misunderstanding of the purpose of a maternity corset.

 The misunderstanding is that corsets were worn to appear thinner (which in the majority of cases wasn't true even for someone who wasn't pregnant), and as thus a maternity corset would be tightly laced, squash the abdomen and the fetus inside.

The truth however is that maternity corsets were, much like maternity bras and those super elastic-y maternity pants were support garments and not supposed to be tightly laced.

Maternity Corset Advertising

I've seen a couple of different kinds, , one kind looks just like a regular corset, but there are two extra lacing panels that you can lace looser as the pregnancy goes on, I do think that kind looks somewhat awkward and uncomfortable, but I have never been pregnant or worn it.

Another is the type like above with boned sides and and elasticated front.

29. An Old Object You Love

My well loved vegan cookery book

A Viennese Prostitute In 1865

via Goodreads