Magic dough.

Fresh from the oven. The holes collapsed a little while baking...

I randomly came across an old friend while looking for something entirely different: taikataikina, magic dough. This stuff is what a large part of my childhood was made of. It's easy to make, the ingredients are cheap, definitely non-toxic, fun to work and the dough dries/bakes completely hard. It can then be painted, glued, filed etc. whatever you feel like doing with it - or you can mix some food dye into the dough before working it.

Recipe:

0,5 dl salt
1 dl wheat flour
0,5 dl water
1 tsp oil

Mix salt and flour together well. Add water, mix, add oil, mix. If you want to use food dye, add it now. The dough is ready for working! If it still feels sticky add a bit of flour, if it starts to crack add a little water. It's quite soft when ready, a bit like gingerbread dough.

Nipnops in the making? :D

Tips: it's good to rub a bit of cooking oil into your hands before working to avoid extra stickiness. The best tools I found were made of metal or wood, such as knitting needles and sewing needles. The dough dries if you don't keep it covered but it won't do it too fast, you'll notice when it's time to put the lid on. If you're making imitation food you can coat the pieces with egg just as if you were baking normally, it'll create a yellowish, warm glaze.

Once done let the items dry in 125°C oven for about an hour. If your items are on the larger side keep them in for a bit longer. Ready for paint/whatevers!

DIY apron skirt.

An apron skirt is a really easy and fast to make project, and as such ideal for a beginner seamstress. I hope the above pic gives an idea of what exactly is an apron skirt - it's open at the back, tied around the waist like an apron and meant to go over another skirt.

This particular one is as simple as they come. Every piece of it is just a rectangle so no patterns are needed to make it. The above photo should give some idea of how much fabric it takes to make one, which is not very much at all (the yellow thing is just a regular measuring tape).

Cutting done. From bottom to the top the pieces are 2x ruffle piece (= at least twice as long as the skirt part to create a proper ruffle), 1x skirt piece, 1x waist band cut to the length of the wearer's waist circumference annnnd... the last one's in actually two pieces but was I smart enough to show that in a photo? No. Imagine, however, that the top rectangle is cut in two equally long pieces that will become the apron's apron strings. You can make longer ones too if you like. :)

The heap of fabric right at the top is the extra material left over. Nevermind the heap.

Length: there's no good rule to how long the pieces have to be, but here's some ideas. The ruffle and skirt parts added together should come to 45-55cm length, which imo is ideal for lolita. The waist band has to be minimum 10cm wide because it will be folded in half when attached, same with the waist ties. If at all possible add 2cm to all measurements for seam allowance.

Zigzag around all edges, or serge if you own a serger.

Sew the middle seam/s of the ruffle.

Fold waist ties in half and sew as shown above. Cut the corner as shown, turn around. You may use a knitting needle or some other tool to poke out the corners tidily.

You'll probably notice I didn't zigzag these pieces... it's cause I'm lazy and these particular seams will end up securely pocketed once the waist ties are turned around so it doesn't actually matter.

Ironing time! Iron all seams open (and always do this with seams because it makes everything so much neater-looking and easier to sew).

Fold the side and bottom edges of the ruffle as shown above, same with the side edges of the skirt part, iron in place. This will make stitching it tidily so much easier, especially if you plan on adding lace to the ruffle.

Fold waistband in half lengthwise and iron tidily.

Waist ties need flattening too. The one on the right has not yet been ironed, the one on the left is ready to be stitched.

Stitch around the waist ties a few millimetres from the edge. Also stitch the sides of the ruffle pieces and the skirt, if not adding lace to the ruffle you can also just go ahead and stitch the bottom.

If adding lace, pin it to the ruffle securely.

I would then go on and stitch around the bottom edge of the ruffle from the right side, careful to pull out the pins and not sew over them because that may break or bend your needle.

Ruffling time! Baste along the top of the skirt piece and the top of the ruffle as shown, ideally use a thread that's very different colour than your fabric. There are other ways of making ruffle, most notably this one*, but when dealing with thick material like the one used for this tutorial hand basting actually is far more reliable a way of creating the ruffle. When done, pull the thread gently and gather the whole thing up in a ruffle.

* The tutorial uses ruffle that's folded lengthwise in half but that part's not necessary. In fact a lighter, airier ruffle suits lolita style better.

Spread the ruffles evenly and pin the ruffle to the bottom of the hem part. Sew to attach. Do the same with top of skirt and waist band.

NOTE: attaching the waist band goes like this.

Iron the seams open again, press nicely flat on the front side. Stitch over ruffle top and skirt+waistband joint as shown above.

As a final step attach the waist ties. I simply folded the to-be-attached end over, pinned it in place and sewed over it twice.

Finished item with a matching gigantic head bow.

Hem detail.

Bow detail. A great bow tutorial here.

Detail shot of the back and the waist bands.

And here's how an apron skirt looks when worn:

Front - the skirt underneath can peek from below although it's not necessary - with this type of overskirt both ways look correct.

Back. This is the reason why you always need an underskirt that's not just a petticoat - apron skirt flares out a lot and opens in the back. They're meant to. It's part of what makes them so cute.

Aaaand a quick shot of the gigantic headbow. :3

A new boystyle/lolita set.

What have I been up to recently? Well, this. If it looks familiar it's entirely possible that I was somewhat influenced by Dear Celine but hey, summer's on its way, a girl needs something new. :Þ

Backside. I know what I'm wearing for the next meet-up!

I haven't, however, decided whether I'd wear it as a boy- or a girlstyle, because one of the main points behind making this set was that it could be used for multiple styles.

Whenever I need to take photos it always gets windy immediately... if you thought I'm holding my hats for pose-related reasons you're, alas, wrong. I wonder how the Icelandic ladies of yore managed to wear hats outdoors back when etiquette still demanded it, are you supposed to pin them into the hairdo or what? 

Anyway, to the details to better explain the whole thing. This is a three-piece set consisting of trousers, short vest and a middle piece that probably has a better name but lacking the vocabulary to properly describe it its name shall now be butt ruffle.

Vest. I found that pink leopard lining by accident and could not stop myself. :D

The buttoning takes some influence from the Icelandic national dress.

Breast pockets are real. Just in case I need to carry something smaller than a field mouse.

Butt ruffle, the simplest part of the whole thing! It really is just a button-on half skirt.

Detail of butt ruffle.

Waist detail of the same. Yup, I hand-sew button holes, I like doing that.

The trou. Lost of bagginess = love, these are seriously comfy to wear!

Waist and belt details, belt only has one hole so I better not fatten too much. :Þ

Leg... cuff? What are these things called?

And a belt loop detail, just because. :3

LBC: Your First Lolita Item.

Lolita Blog Carnival can be found here!

I love these themes, they're not written too exactly or explained in any way so it's up to the writer to interpret them any way they see fit to. For example this time I thought long and hard about the definition of "first lolita item". What would count as one? The first item I owned that was meant for lolita? The first item that actually was acceptably lolita? The first brand piece? Well, let's see. Prepare your frilly butts though, the ita is strong in this one!

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The first item I ever owned that I meant for lolita

...was of course a shoddily handmade headdress. I started dressing up in the mid-2000's, what were you expecting? I can't remember how often I wore this thing but since even once would be too many it may be for the best.

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The first item that actually counts as lolita

Lul, you can has a mini photoshoot. This is the first actual lolita outfit that I ever owned and true to form it was selfmade. Btw gimme some cred that stone ramp was icy and I almost broke my ankleneck 50000000 times.

Yup, it's an obvious lolita outfit! Shame that it doesn't show but the fabric was pinstripe and it was no small pride of mine that I managed to make the stripes match all around the skirt. :D

In fact it's not too bad if you ignore the lack of hairdo, weird ribbon dangly, maxipad headdress and them strap-things (personally I still kind of like the strap-things though)!

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My first brand item

It was Moi-Meme-Moitie! It's a bath towel! I still have it! :D

Aaaanyway the story goes that a group of friends saw those towels and made a group order, to which I jumped mostly out of the hilarity of the whole thing. Lolita bath towel, well why the hell not I'm totes in on this! I still have it here, it's quite a good towel.

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My first serious brand item

Nope, not the dress. Dress is still selfmade. It's the shirt, Jane Marple, and unusual in its time in that it had both a huge Peter Pan -collar and no lace or ruffle what so ever. In short it was a dream shirt for me that matched everything in my closet and never looked out of place.

Idk if it's easier to see in this photo but maybe I'll get extra points for matching my ice creams to my outfit. Anygays I wore this shirt almost literally to shreds. I still have it but in the end I dyed it chocolate brown, years of use always shows on the armpits of a white shirt no matter how well and often you wash it. :(

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My first dream item

I'm sure this one's unnecessary but I wanted to end this post with something else than a mental image of yellowed armpits. Puppet Circus was my dream print for ages, even after realizing I'd never be small enough or rich enough to get the OP. But seriously, there's just something about gold etched velvet, and not only that but the print on PC does own my heart.

I became the happy owner of this skirt via a friend who knew I loved the skirt a little more than my kidneys and, since she was planning to sell it, offered it first to me. I've let out some serious happy sounds around that time of my life!

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Other blogs partaking in this theme:

☂ Spoon & Fork ☂ Sparkling Girl ☂ ABC Lolita ☂ Wonderland Gone Mad  ☂ Vanillas Traumfabric  ☂ Whimsical Adventures of Me ☂ The Life of a Lolita ☂ Beautiful and Damned ☂ Alice in Lolitaland ☂  Alpine Heidi ☂ The Bloody Tea Party ☂ The Electric Carousel ☂ ImaPrincess ☂

I try my hand at smocking.

A new dress - again, ahem. I swear I do other things during the days than sew, but recently I've been feeling really inspired to try new techniques. This one began when I thought it'd be awesome to learn smocking. Not entirely lolita in style (although it can probably be used for that, too) but a girl needs summer dresses. Er, I need them at least. Need. NEED.

Kind of open at the backside...

Then for some WIP photos of the smocking, which is only around the top of the front side of the dress. Call me lazy but that's all my patience could handle. -.-; I have massive amounts of respect for people who use this technique on larger projects. Personally, I'm just going to say it was entirely the opposite to what I actually like doing so it could be this is it for this technique and I'll be returning to my work-avoiding ways. :Þ

Closer look at the folds.

Finished, the front looks like this. The photo's taken from the left side which plays some funny tricks with the perspective, the tying ribbons are in reality same width. :D

Backside, or the lack of it. This dress will always demand either a shirt underneath or really warm weather and as we all know the latter does not happen in Iceland, ever. Shirts it is.

Button detail. It used to have a black middle part that fell off, so now I'm planning on some modifications (because an empty slot like this is screaming for me to put something on it).

I'd add an outfit rundown but it's all selfmade or off-brand, so...