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Saturday, October 17, 2015

It's a cape! It's another GoT inspired costume!

Look at me, posting a post again. Only a week and a half after my last post! By the way, I updated my last post because I forgot something. Here is or my second week of costumes based loosely on the best show ever, Game of Thrones.
By the way, I am extremely aware that it was a series of books first. No, I did not read them. It would not have appealed to me, as I rarely read fiction and have never been into medieval-dungeons-and-dragons type stuff. But, when I heard there was a show with naughty scenes that also stars Peter Dinklage as a sex symbol, I was like "count me in!"
While the first week's costume was dark and sexy, this outfit is more of a nod to my past as a "mother figure" of WAW. This is my Lady Catelyn Stark inspired (very loosely inspired) costume.
 That's Lady Catelyn Stark, not me. Wife of Lord Eddard Stark, who was killed attempting to get retribution for her slain husband. She's wearing a cape and some fur around her neck. That's about the only thing in common with my "creation."
That is a teal sweater, size 1X. It will be a cape. I think Lady Stark wore a color similar to this in a scene where she and her husband Ned were talking near their tree.
It's hard to tell. Anyway, I also wanted the chance to wear this incredible black, velvet dress:
Available for purchase ;)
Let's just cut to the chase. First, I turned the sweater inside out and pinned up the armholes.

See? I pinned, marked, and then sewed the arm up, right across the armpit. I cut off the sleeves after I decided it looked ok.
LOL, bad lighting for both pics, sorry not sorry. It doesn't look perfect, but that's the shoulder area with the sleeves sewn/cut off.
Next, the fur collar part which is kind of a cheat.
What you're looking at is a faux fur collar that I removed from another sweater. The collar has those button loop things as it once attached to the buttons on a thick gray sweater.
The black chain holding it together is from the same long chain that I used to make my necklace last week. The chain didn't hold it in place as much as I needed, so...
See those little clasps on each side? They're the clips from one of those mitten clip dealies like the one used to hold Chris's cape on in the last post. These things:
 I removed the elastic part and attached the clips to the jump rings on each side of the chain. These clips then clipped to the straps on my dress, as well as the cape. Let's see!
There's a close-up. Here's the whole thing:
I should mention that the picture quality isn't great because in an effort to get a shit-ton of things done, I stubbornly took these pictures after sundown. I didn't waste time lacing up my boots, but I didn't wear open-toed heels when I performed in this. I added a belt because that's just how I do. Accentuate waist always. How about that necklace?
I found that in the jewelry section of a craft store and thought it would be perfect. Moody Starr was known as the Queen Bee back in her day and as the Stark's had the direwolf and Lannisters used a lion, the House of Starr's symbol should be a bee.
Here's some light on the details:
Stay tuned for next week's Daenerys Targaryen! In a half-assed way!


Tuesday, October 6, 2015

I know what you did last April...

...and I'll show you in this Halloween themed post! My plan is to show four Game of Thrones inspired costumes to whomever happens to view my blog this month. That's four posts by the end of the month. Let's see if I meet my goal--or take until Christmas!
I don't mean to bury the lede here, but here's the short version: back in April, Chris and I did a month long stint back in WAW. As mentioned previously, we returned with a Game of Thrones gimmick. Medieval style costumes! I waited so long to post about it for several reasons, all of which are probably valid excuses.
For the first week, I chose a look I call "Moody Starr-k." If anyone needs help with that, "Moody Starr" is my long time performance alias, and "Stark" is one of the main family names on GoT. (Get it? Starr-k?) My inspiration is the dark look of Sansa Stark at the end of Season 4.
I call this "heel Sansa." ('heel" being the bad guy in wrestling.) In this final episode of the season, Sansa accepts her fate as out of her control and attempts to play along. The once red haired maiden enters the room in a goth-y style dress, badass necklace, and darkened hair.
Keep in mind, my attire isn't cosplay. My aim was not to make an exact replica of Sansa's attire, but to make my own that is clearly inspired by that one. Here's where I would be showing you the "before" pic of the dress I used. But I can't. Most of the pictures where taken on my phone and then not uploaded. They were lost during the sad phone death back in May.
Here's what I looked like!
The dress is a black velvet one that I got at Hot Topic when I was in my late teens. (And that is why you don't throw anything out!) I updated it by making it sexier. I lowered the neckline and made a slit up the side. I also created bell sleeves by slitting them a few inches.
 I added a waist cinching belt because that's just how I do. That furry piece is an old collar that I snagged out of a bin at Goodwill. It came from an old coat and it's a piece I made long ago for another GoT inspired look! Fur collar from 2013.  That's a nod to the direwolf fur worn by those in The North
That necklace.
Pretty damn easy to replicate. See that round thing? Doesn't it look like one of those plastic belt rings?
Materials:
2 medium jump rings
one black plastic belt buckle
one long black chain
some kind of long, black, weighted pendant

By the way, people make much nicer versions of these and they're available for purchase in the handmade section of Etsy. So, there's the cheapy belt buckle that I took off a belt that I never wore. As you see, I attached one jump ring to the top of the plastic piece, then another to that.
Attach the chain to the second jump ring. Then you put it around your neck and loop the other end through the plastic ring.
Ideally, there should be something on the end of that dangling chain to weight it down. I didn't have anything that I thought would work.
I put this costume on just to get pics for this post. After the photo shoot, I  realized I was missing my
gray rope belt: 

There it is. It's a spool of something from Joann's. I forgot to put my fur detail on for this one. More pics?

Chris wore his wrestling attire, because one needs proper attire to wrestle well. For his entrance, we bought a yard or two of fake furry fabric from Joann's. I have here, a picture from Instagram taken on that very night.
Furry cape is attached with one of those mitten clips with a brooch on it. Crowd reacted with much applause for the wolf pelt cape, chanting "King of the north!" and such.
Come back soon and see my Lady Catelyn Stark cape!

Update: I meant to include something else in this post. See that gentleman in the picture with me up there? He happens to collect these toys known as Funko Pops (I guess that's what they're called. I've been calling them rubber dolls.) They're large-headed, vinyl figures of various characters. He sometimes "refashions" them into one of a kind pieces! For instance, here is the Sansa Stark figure:
Here is the figure that I received for my birthday this past August:
That's me in my outfit! He added fur, painted the hair magenta, and even gave me rosy cheeks! He then placed it on a platform of clay snow with a picture of Sansa's home Winterfell as a background. Awesome!