Lots 'O Laundry and Tons of Fun!

Monday was spent washing/drying/putting away most of the Ragtime laundry.  Maggie was kind of sad when I took her little bed away load by load...

Funny side story... Maggie was sleeping there and Austin covered her up with some of the laundry.  Then he asked the kids where she was.  They didn't know, so they called her and SURPRISE! She popped out of the pile of laundry.  It was pretty funny. 

While loads were doing their thing in the machines, I had some helpers taking care of things on Monday!

Shandi changed our Papa's buttons, and Linda worked on the villagers knickers.  Ooh!  Exciting stuff, right!  Here's Papa's coat now that we changed the buttons.

We had a great time sewing like crazy!  In addition to the show stuff, I was able to finish a couple prom dress alterations. Now THAT's excitement.  Or not... I was also able to take care of some alterations for some kids renting costumes for their high school production of Cinderella.  See, my no is broken - so the work load is varied and nuts! But still fun.

Monday I was able to start Lumiere's coat.  I was pretty excited to get started on it.  Seriously excited!  I had the velvet cut out, and I self lined it with some stiffer black fabric so it would hold it's shape.  Then I put some of it together and started the embellishment.

Below is the fabric I cut the gold embellishment out of to make what I wanted for Lumiere. I cut out the scrolls from this mesh, and reshaped them onto the coat. 

 Below is the front of the coat.  It's the left side, you can see the collar and then the front of the coat.

I pinned the embellishment where I wanted it and then sewed it down. 

The cutting out and sewing down took FOREVER.  My hand was cramping from cutting and my back hurts from sewing.  Poor me, I know.  

Tuesday (today) I finished up washing/drying the laundry!  Yay! My living room is almost free of costumes - though the couch with the beauty and the beast stuff is still covered with the same stuff.  By tomorrow I'm hoping to have all of Ragtime put away (minus the dry cleaning I still have to pick up).  Robin came and helped finish up some knickers and put things away.  I was able to take care of a couple more prom alterations (ugh.) and built Pocahontas for Mrs. Potts Tea Party - a local princess party place.  Here's a picture of it:

I did not pick the fabrics - just built the costume. 

Back on track with B&B I started working on Lumiere's coat again.  More cutting out... lots more cutting out and now, as of tonight, I have most of the front and the sleeves done.  

I still have to embellish the back and the tails (not shown) and then attach the tails and sleeves (they're pinned on here) and trim around the edges like I did on the cuffs.  The pictures don't do it justice, it is really looking beautiful!  Right now, without the tails, It looks kinda like a bull fighter.  Haa ha. 

Well, I'm tired and need to rest up before another full day of sewing.  I know it doesn't look like much but geesh!  This took hours. :/