I'M BACK!!!!!

hello,

I am so sorry that I haven't posted in so long (OMGosh, has it really been 3 months?). I have about a million excuses, but most of them seem stupid and/or invalid, so I'm just going to say one; my Pop (Grandfather) died back in October, so since then my family has been back and forth from my Nan's which is about two hours from our house, travelling has settled down since christmas. But I wont bother you with any more :) 

Hopefully my life is calming down now so I'll get to posting more. I really want to get back in to my Lucy's clothes series. I also want to start a Quote of the Week but I'm not sure what day to do that on, I'll have to look at my schedule and see how that goes. 

have a lovely day,

Queen Nellie

Jane Austen Festival tickets now on sale!!!

Early bird tickets for JAFA (Jane Austen Festival Australia) are now on sale!!!!!

My Mum, Bell and I went last time with our friends Beany and Weasel (was it really only earlier this year?) and we had a ball (literally), it was SO much fun to be able to basically play dress-ups all weekend. It was FUN.

The basic program is roughly as follows (now remember this is a really rough sketch of the top off my head based on last year);

   Thursday

I didn't go last time so I can't say

   Friday

 A bunch of activities in the morning (these include dancing, sewing workshops, and other random stuff related to the era)

 Lunch (provided)

 Another bunch of activities (see above)

 Go home an hour or two (I think it was two but I'm not sure) to get dressed for dinner

 Formal dinner (again, it's provided) and entertainment including some dancing

   Saturday

 A bunch of more activities (again, see above)

 Lunch (again, provided)

 More activities (continue seeing above)

 Go home earlier to have dinner and get dressed for the ... BALL (no, that isn't a soccer ball, or even a football, but a dancing ball - think Cinderella)

 Go to Ball :D

   Sunday

 Go to  Commonwealth Park for a promenade and picnic (not provided, sorry but you have to bring your own :P)

 (I think there was something in here, but I can't seem to remember what it was, so I'll just leave this bit blank)

 Back to the hall for some more informal dancing then finish up about mid afternoon

The link to the JAFA website is here and the link to the blog should be on my profile.

Have a great day and may God bless you,

Queen Nellie

The Magicians Nephew the next Narnia movie?

Dawn of Narnia

That's right, MN (the Magicians Nephew) will be the next Narnia movie, or at least according to narniafans.com. However be aware that it isn't official yet, I heard it from/read it on narniafans, who heard it from some guy on twitter who supposedly asked Waldon and Fox about it himself, so whether you want to believe it or not yourself is completely up to you, I haven't decided whether I believe it or not yet. Anyway, what this guy on twitter (Larry411) says is that MN is in development, and SC (the Silver Chair) is getting it's script written. What that means I don't really know (as you might have picked up, I don't know much about the process of making a movie, any one who would like to explain it to me would be most welcome). So the dates that Larry411 says are 2014 for MN and 2015 for SC, (sooo long to wait) but for some strange reason SC is actually further along in production than MN *confused face*.

I'm not quite shure what I think of this, of course I'm super exited that they are (hopefully) making another (2) Narnia movie(s), and I hadn't been able to make up my mind witch movie I wanted them to make next, so this solution is perfect for me. I think my biggest qualm is that I don't want to get my hopes up in case it isn't true *sighs*

Oh well, I guess all I can do is hope and pray that it is true *more sighs*

Queen Nellie

P.S. The link to the actual page were I found this is here http://www.narniafans.com/archives/12209

Lucy clothes part 3: lamp post dress

 This was the first of Lu's dresses that I made, but when I decided to post her dresses on here as a series I decided to do it in chronological order, hence my only posting it now.

full length photo

 When I made this dress a couple of weeks ago, ether I hadn't found the wardrobe door yet, or I didn't have access to the Internet  for some reason or another (I'm hopeless at remembering such things), so I just had the pictures on my DVD cover to copy the dress off (not good pictures for that sort of thing in them-self's, plus they are tiny) so this is (hopefully) going to be the least accurate of all the dresses/outfits in this series.

close up of the bodice 

The 'flowers' on the cardigan are slightly very wrong, they are made of round sequins for the petals and for the center I used some shiny-star-thingies that I found in my sequins box. For the 'smocking' on the bodice I just used thin strips of green and red paper because they looked those colors on my DVD cover. 
 Sorry this post is so short, but there isn't anything else I feel I need to comment on. If you have any questions please, by all means leave a comment, I'd be more then happy to answer any questions I can :)
 Queen Nellie

Lucy clothes part 2: train outfit





This is the 2nd part of Lucy's clothes. This outfit is the one Lu wears while the Pevinsie kids are on the train to the country/out of London. I've always liked this outfit, Georgie looks/looked so cute in it. I love the coat. I love the hat. I love how the suitcases set it all off so perfectly <3.

The paper I used is actually a photo of the fabric that they used for her coat in the movie that I blew-up and printed out, hence although technically it's the same fabric/paper, the Patton is a lot bigger, which does make it look somewhat different and which is a shame but couldn't really be helped as far as I know. In the movie the coat has double piping of chocolate brown and hunter green which looks amazing, but unfortunately I couldn't get that to look alright with my method (the pipping is a piece/pieces of paper slightly bigger than the one in front of it) so I just used the green instead.

  

the "label", buttons and pocket (yes, the photo is sideways)

The detail on the coat was so much fun, even if it was rather tricky. Getting the buttons the right size and in the right places, getting all the "pipping" the right size, and all-round doing the label. In case you're wondering what the label says it says; "Lucy Pevensie, 6th Dorset Ave, Finchley N3" and yes that is what it said in the movie (does anyone else think that it is therefore strange, that, while the children are at the train station before the Macready picks them  up, Ed looks at his label and says "perhaps we've been incorrectly labeled"?). One of the things I had the most trouble with was the safety pin that was holding the label on  the coat in the movie, I didn't have any safety pins small enough, so I decided to research the history of safety pins to see if I could pass off not using one as something to make it still historically correct, I discovered... that although safety pins were invented in 1849 they didn't become common until the 1930's, and with rations from WWII (starting in 1939) Mrs Pevensie wouldn't have wanted to send 4 safety pins off with her kids never to see them (the safety pins that is) again, so instead I 'tied' the string onto the button (aka;  glued it under the button)

the hat and collar (sorry about the glare)

The hat I had some trouble with, and I'm still not happy with it to be honest. In the movie Lu's hat comes right down to her ears and hence flattens her hair against her head, unfortunately my model/doll is made of cardboard and therefor her hair won't lie flat so I had to just perch the hat on the side of her head making it look way too modern.

cuff

For some reason or another I did the 'pipping'on the cuff in the brown, I don't really know why, I just had an urge to do it and I don't think it looks too bad if-I-do-say-so-myself ;)

next time I'll be doing Lu's 'lamp post dress'

 Queen Nellie

Lucy clothes part 1: bomb shelter nightie

the original

I have always loved the costumes from the Narnia movies. While the characters are in our world their clothes are based on  the 40's, a period I have always loved, and their  Narnian dresses look so pretty and Feminine, just like I always Imagined them when reading the books. So I have decided to make them out of paper on this  cute paper doll I found when i was going through my stuff (the doll is 32cm or 12 1/2" tall). enjoy :).
The paper I used is just a white paper that I painted an off-white color because i didn't already have anything that would work. the buttons are little jewels that I found in my sequins box, all the rest of the detail I just drew/cut in by hand.

Lucy's nightie

 I had some trouble finding what length the nightie needed to be, 'cause I could only find the one photo of the nightie (above)... so I had to watch the movie ( what a shame ;) ). the buttons also are incorectly placed, it turns out that the closure is too short but I had already glued it all down and everything before I had any idea that it wasn't going to work so i had to leave it, that'll teach me not to check stuff before I stick/sew it down :( 

the top half

I had some trouble with the collar, if you look in the original photo you can see that the collar has little protruding bits on the edge, but my hand isn't nearly steady enough to cut  that, so instead I opted for cutting a tiny fringe which gives the effect of detail at least. 

Hope you enjoyed it, next i'll be doing Lucy's train outfit

See you next time Queen Nellie

Bell's regency dress and stays part 2

NOTE: Bell's regency dress and stays part 1 and 2 are one post that I had to break in half, due to the amount of photos, it would have taken far to long to load. the stays are now part 1 and the dress is now part 2

Dress

front of dress

Mum and i made this dress on Friday for Bells party on Saturday. I'm rather proud of this dress, we did all the sewing in one day, plus cut out the lining (the outside fabric we had cut out the day before), I didn't get to bed till about midnight that night and Mum staid up for about two hours after that so Bell could wear it Saturday.It's not quite done yet, things like buttons and button holes aren't sewn on yet, and we haven't done the hem yet ether.

back of dress

you can see here what i meant earlier ('back of stays' pic) about cutting the 15cm off the back of the stays caused problems later, the stays are popping out the top of the dress due to cutting that bit off and making the back heaps narrower (you'll be able to see this a lot better in the 'bodice back' photo)

side of dress

I don't know if you can see it in this photo, but there's a bit of a train which is one of Bells favourite parts, 'long enough to be pretty with out being so long as to be a nuesense'. one of the things with  this dress is the length of the skirt, it's not quite long enough for the rest  of the dress, if you notice in the 'front of dress' photo, the skirt is almost up to Bells ankles, although this would be correct for later years, the rest of this dress is set too early and should be floor length.

bodice back 

we didn't get the buttons on so Mum had to sew Bell into the the dress on Saturday, I took these photos yesterday so i just pinned her in. this is a better/worse view of the stays popping out.

our cat Catherine

this is our cat Catherine, she kept hanging around while Bell and I were taking the photos, and when I knelt down to take a photo of the hem, she wouldn't move out of the way,  so I took a photo of her and she was happy and moved out of the way. :D

hem (or lack thereof)

As you Can see we didn't get to hem the bottom. Mum overlocked it, which isn't terribly authentic, but then, we did the hole dress by machine and that wasn't even invented till 1830, this dress is approximately 1810 (the waist line reached it's height - literally - in 1811).

All up the patterns weren't to hard to follow(I'm still a beginner, so any pattern's a tad difficulty's to get my head around at times) and they turned out alright if-I-do-say-so-myself, :) , and I'd use it again without a thought.

have a lovely day and God bless,

Queen Nellie