She Wolf

Hello everyone!

I have not blogged in a really long time, as I'm sure you've noticed if you're a regular reader. And it's kind of unfair to you, because I've left you with tantalising threads of what was (apparently) a pretty good fantasy story and a teaser-trailer of another story.

I'm sure you have a lot of questions. If you liked Abracadabraholic, you might be wondering what's next in the world of alcoholic Ethan and what mysterious mission the police chief has for him. If you preferred A Fantasy Story, you might be simply dying to know what happens between Myrna and Darach now that they've been reunited; or maybe you'd prefer some backstory, how do they get past the Baron o' Mines to enter the dungeon and reach Darach in the first place?! Heck, you might even be a fan of my sewing blogs and be desperate to find out how my kirtles turned out (spoiler alert: pretty well, not perfect, and they're not 100% done yet so just be patient!).

A much as I'd love to answer these questions, my dissertation has been keeping me pretty preoccupied. I've got a lot of writing to do for it, as well as all my coursework. Also I'm sewing a patch for a quilt for a friend so that's taking priority over my more personal selfish sewing projects.

But today on the train I had a flash of inspiration and started writing! It's just a little snippet (self-contained, I promise; it’s not another “Part 1”) and I'm sure that this story, like most of my recent stories, will raise more questions than it can ever hope to answer. Regardless, I'm offering it up for enjoyment/critique.

I'd like to dedicate this story to my friend Aimee, because she's been having a rough couple of days and hopefully more wolves in her life will help with that.

Enjoy! (Also comment?)

♥Nancy♬

Running. A frantic dash through a thick forest of tall trees. It is dim in this forest, and getting darker as the sun slips closer and closer towards a hungry horizon. Before long it will be consumed in full and the sky will belch out a scatter of stars and a slim crescent moon.

Running. Heavy woollen skirts snatched up in haste, shoved into a plain leather belt to free strong legs from the trappings of feminine garb. The bodice of the dress: tight, but not too tight; nonetheless, her breasts heave and she pants. The green vines embroidered around the neckline rise and fall in time with every gasp for air.

Running. A predator follows close behind, heavy boots stomping hard into the ground: a stark contrast to nimble feet fleeing agilely through the grass and over protruding tree roots. His breath does not come as heavily: he is built for the chase.

Running. Red hair fallen loose from its braids flows free behind her like a cape. In her hand is a glass dagger with a hilt of shiny black obsidian; its wiggly edges make it look as if the glass blade is undulating out from its eery black base.

Running. Her goal is up ahead. The time is almost right and getting nearer every second as the horizon consumes the sun and regurgitates its celestial night-lights.

Light is in transition: it is dusk. Time is in transition: it is twilight. Up ahead, not so far now, the forest is in transition: the air seems to shimmer.

Running; faster now. She hits the invisible wall where the air seems to shimmer and slows suddenly, as if the crisp forest air has turned to water or translucent molasses.

Hanging; frozen in the air. Her clothes vanish and for a second she is naked: untouched skin exposed to falling night’s kiss.

Screaming; a second spent in agony. The transition is complete before her pursuer can catch up. Warm sunset turns to chill moonrise. Day gives way to night. Prey becomes predator.

Woman becomes wolf.

The wolf catches the glass dagger with graceful expertise, taking the obsidian hilt between her teeth. She turns to see her pursuer slowing; a look of confusion spreads across his face.

And then he grins. The woman would have been a pretty prize but it’s the dagger he wants and a wolf-pelt will keep a man warm long after he’s bored of a woman. He advances on the wolf.

Snarling; her lip curls. She leaps at him, knocking the measly human off his clumsy bipedal supports. Heavy paws force the wind from his lungs and leave him floundering in the dirt.

Running. A wolf escapes into the forest carrying her mysterious cargo far from the hunter. She is protected by the darkness. She is protected by the trees. She is protected by her lupine form.

And on she runs. In her mouth, the glass blade of wiggly-edged dagger seems to undulate out of its obsidian hilt.

Abracadabraholic Part One

Helloooooooo!

Well, I think this will be the last original writing you get for a while because the year is getting so busy. OMG. I’ll do my best to keep writing for the blog but my dissertation has to come first (did I mention I’m doing Honours this year? I’m doing Honours this year) so it might be a little light on for a while. At least I started the year well!

Anyway, seeing as how everyone seemed to enjoy A Fantasy Story, I was inspired to start work on another novel.

Clearly I’m much better at starting novels than I am at finishing them.

I promise to write this one in chronological order so that you don’t get confused about when things are happening.

The working title is “Abracadabraholic” and the first chapter is posted here for your entertainment.

Enjoy! (Feedback appreciated, as always; I’ll only get better with criticisms!!)

♥Nancy♬

Ethan Rackett accepted his certificate from the Chief of the station with a firm handshake and a polite, “thank you.”

 “I won’t speak long,” said the Chief into the microphone, “I know we promised you a party. But I wouldn’t be much of a Chief if I didn’t say that I was proud of y’all for expanding your knowledge like this. You’re a credit to the force.”

There was a pause, for applause. Ethan rolled his eyes.

 “Okay, look after those certificates because you’ll need them as proof of your training if we ever need to arrange a travel permit. Now enjoy the party!”

The Chief gestured to his second-in-command who had been designated DJ for the evening. The transition from formal speech to fun party was not a smooth one. Second-in-command fumbled with the microphone as the Chief handled it over and the sound system screeched a little as he pressed play on his computer. But, finally, music began to play over the speakers and the police station break room was transformed into a lame attempt at a celebration party.

Ethan’s buddy Juan came up to him and offered a friendly hand. Ethan shook it. He wasn’t feeling particularly celebratory but Juan’s grin was infectious; he found himself smiling back at his friend.

 “Hey good work, Ethan,” Juan enthused, “you gonna spread your wings now?”

 “To Wiz-land? Not a chance.”

 “Me neither,” Juan replied, “I wouldn’t go there if they paid me, man. But my Marguerite’s gonna be so proud of me, another fancy certificate like this under my belt.”

Juan’s girlfriend Marguerite had a fetish for self-improvement. As a result, Juan was one of the most highly qualified men at the Greenville Police Station.

 “She’s gonna cost me a fortune in framing,” he lamented, and wandered off to get some alcohol-free punch from the refreshment table.

Ethan stayed standing right where he was. He didn’t really feel up to partying. It had a lot to do with recent Life Events that had got him down but it was also because he didn’t think a two-week training course was really worth celebrating. It had been an intense course, with theoretical and practical components. It was meant to encourage tolerance and acceptance; Ethan was surprised that he’d passed that part. Especially after he’d threatened one of the guest lecturers. Still, it was a useful course. More and more cases were coming up that required this level of clearance.

He read his certificate. This is to certify that Ethan Rackett has completed the Wiznockee Information and Training Course and has achieved Level Two clearance and Firearms Allowance Three at the Wiznockee Border. It was authorised by the Chief of the Greenville Police Station. It was also authorised by the National Police Commissioner. That was a big deal and Ethan knew it. He was still finding it hard to get worked up about it, though, and he hardly thought that crazy Wiz-land deserved attention from the National Police Commissioner. There was so much crime nationally, surely they should have been solving internal problems before heading out to deal with the crazies.

Ethan felt a heavy arm fall across his shoulders and realised that he hadn’t been paying very much attention to the party around him. The Chief had snuck up on him again.
“Chief,” he said, politely acknowledging his superior officer while still secretly loathing him, and the job, and the world.

 “Rackett,” said the Chief, in a booming voice, “how would you like a chance to use that new qualification you’ve just earned, eh?”

What Ethan really wanted to say to the Chief was something along the lines of, “actually, Chief, I hate those crazy Wizzers and what I’d like to do is drink myself blind in my brand-spanking new apartment.”

But of course, Ethan didn’t speak his mind. Instead, he said, “new mission, Chief?”

 “New case, Ethan. We’re not superheroes, we’re police officers.”

Because that’s why he’d joined the force: to not be a superhero. Sure.

 “What’s the case?”

 “Sensitive stuff, Ethan. When’s your next shift? Monday? Come into my office first thing if you want the case. Or it’s business as usual.”

Ethan considered things. A case could be interesting. And if there was secrecy then there was also the potential for danger. Getting killed on the job was a better alternative than suicide, that was for sure. If you killed yourself you just looked like a coward. But if he had to go to damn crazy Wiznockee... well, that might change things.

 “I’ll think about it, Chief,” Ethan said.

 “See that you do,” the Chief said, and went off to the refreshment table to over-indulge on potato crisps and cheap lolly snakes.

Ethan left the party early. He turned his key the wrong way in the lock on his apartment door yet again. When he eventually got the door open he threw his keys lazily onto the kitchen bench, where they skittered over the edge onto the floor. He threw his certificate onto the bench too, where it joined the ever-growing pile of papers that was starting to take over the house from the kitchen outwards.

There was a glowing red 1 on his answering machine. He pressed the play button and got a beer out of the fridge.

 “Hi Ethan,” sniffled his mother’s voice, “I hope you’re doing okay. I’m having a lovely time on my recovery cruise.” She sniffled again and Ethan decided not to believe her. “I just wanted to check in with you, love. Edna sends her wishes.”

 “Hi Ethan!” called Edna from a distance, who didn’t sound half as sniffly as mum. She had fared quite well in her divorce. Mum had not fared so well when Dad’s second heart attack had killed him. Hence the sniffles.

 “I’m home in another week. I’ll see you then. Hope you’re holding up. Bye now.”

 “You have no more messages,” said the machine.

Ethan kicked his kitchen cabinet. It made him remember that he’d already taken his shoes off. He instantly regretted kicking the cabinet.

He went to sit down on his couch with his half-drunk beer and an unopened one to follow up with. He turned the tv on, flipped channels for a minute and let then let the remote sink down between the cushions. He settled in to watch Oprah. And then Ellen. Maybe The Doctors or the The View, afterwards. He moved onto whiskey after his fifth beer.

The next morning he woke up with a sore neck, a raging hangover and the tv still blaring its inane, mundane shows. It was a normal morning, really.

At midday, Ethan had mostly recovered from his headache and was enjoying the weekend by sitting alone in his dark apartment and pretending to sleep. And then the phone rang. He groped around on the couch, certain that he’d brought the handset down here at some point.

 “Hey,” he said, answering the phone without looking at caller ID.

When he heard the voice on the other end of the phone, he immediately regretted answering the phone in the first place.

 “Ethan?” said a pretty female voice. Once, that voice had been like a drug to Ethan. Now she sounded like poison. “Hi, it’s Amy.”

 “Hi Amy,” Ethan said, stopping at that because he had no idea what else he was supposed to say to her.

 “Hey, look, I’m just calling because I found some more of your stuff mixed in with my stuff. It’s all in a box, can I drop it round soon?”

 “Sure.”

 “I wasn’t certain if you’d be home.”

 “I’m home.”

 “I’ll bring the stuff round Sunday night, okay?”

 “Thanks.”

 “Bye Ethan.”

 “Bye Amy.”

There was a gentle clicking noise as Amy hung up the phone on her end.

Ethan sighed. Then he threw the phone towards the kitchen. It bounced on the tiled floor and broke open. He sighed again and got up, intending to put the phone back together. He changed his mind halfway through the process and got a beer out of the fridge instead. His supplies were running low. He made a mental note to sober up enough to get to the shops soon.

At 8pm, Ethan went to reassemble the phone. When it woke up again, he pressed speed dial three.

 “Lucky Moon Asia Restaurant,” said the man who answered.

 “Hey, it’s Ethan,” said Ethan, “can I just get the usual?”

 “Number 3, number 16, prawn crackers,” confirmed the guy on the phone.

 “Yeah.”

 “Fifteen minutes, Mr Ethan.”

 “Thanks,” said Ethan, and hung up the phone.

Ethan opened the fridge and pulled out his last beer. He kicked the fridge door shut. It severely rocked the unit and he watched for a moment, not even sure whether he wanted it to stay standing or to fall. It didn’t fall, in the end, and he cracked his beer open to fill in the time until he could go get his food.

Almost fifteen minutes later, he added that empty beer bottle to the ever-growing pile of empties next to the front door. He made a mental note to take them all out to the recycling. He was kidding himself and he knew it; they wouldn’t be taken out for weeks. It took a minute of scrounging around the messy kitchen bench before Ethan found his wallet. When he did, he shoved it in his back pocket and stormed out of the apartment. He didn’t bother to lock the door. What would people steal? The empty bottles and a crap old television?

As Ethan walked down the five flights of stairs to street level, he felt his head began to spin a little. He’d reached the stage that his mother would call “Dinner-Party Tipsy.” Usually he preferred to be at his father’s old “Pub-Night Stumble.” But he’d run out of beer so he probably wouldn’t get there tonight. He tried to remember whether he had any whiskey left.

On street level, he stormed through the door to his apartment building and turned left. Two buildings along the street was Lucky Moon Asia Restaurant. Bells rang above his head as he went in through the plastic curtains that hung over the door.

 “Hi Ethan,” said a young girl’s voice.

Ethan blinked to refocus and saw that Meili was at the cash register today. She was the owner’s sixteen year-old daughter. Ethan tried not to look quite so drunk.

 “Hi,” he said, “my order ready?”

 “Yes,” said Meili. She was adorable. Ethan used to imagine having a cute little girl of his own, one day. He no longer imagined that sort of thing.

 “Hi Ethan,” said Liu, the owner of Lucky Moon Asia Restaurant. “How are you?”

 “Same as ever,” Ethan said, with a nod of greeting. “How’s Sandra?”

 “Big as a house!” announced Liu, proudly. “But still, so sexy, eh?”

 “Dad,” said Meili, and escaped into the back of the restaurant.

Liu spent five minutes raving about how well Sandra was doing, how well the baby was growing and how he’d need to hire someone to take over the books for the restaurant while Sandra was on maternity leave.

 “It’s a problem, with family owned business, you know Ethan? Meili doesn’t want to work but her mum is pregnant, so she works. I don’t want a new bookkeeper, but my wife is pregnant, so I interview.”

 “Yeah,” said Ethan.

Liu handed over the food and Ethan paid by credit card, as always.

 “Bye Ethan,” said Meili, as she came to stand by the cash register again.

Ethan raised one hand in a wave and then trekked back up to his apartment. No one had been in to steal his junk. He ate his Chinese takeaway in front of more tv shows and followed it up with what remained of his whiskey. He really needed to go shopping. He slept on the couch again and woke up the same way he always did: with a sore neck, a raging hangover and the tv still blaring its inane, mundane shows.

Things were looking bad. He’d run out of beer and spirits. There were bottles, papers and empty Chinese food containers all over the apartment. His usual channel was running a Friends marathon and they were all way too cheery for his tastes. And Amy was coming round this evening, to return some stuff.

That last thought was particularly sobering. Ethan jumped up from the couch and rushed to the bathroom. For the first time since Friday morning he looked into the mirror. Jesus, he needed to do something about himself before Amy came round. And he should probably clean up the apartment a bit. He didn’t want to look pathetic. Even though he was.

He showered and shaved and put on clean clothes. When he realised that he’d just put on his last clean shirt, he kicked his chest of drawers and then hopped around clutching his sore foot.

Ethan cleaned up his apartment for the first time since he’d moved in. He took all his empty bottles out to the recycling. He took his dirty clothes downstairs to the laundromat next door to the Lucky Moon Asia Restaurant. He took a good, long look at the papers all over the kitchen bench and settled for pushing them all into one pile and wiping down the bench around them. He vacuumed the floor and poured some disinfectant into the toilet. Surely the place was clean enough, now?

There was a knock on his door. He ruffled up his hair, as if that would make it look better, and went to open the door.

 “Hi Ethan!” Amy said.

She looked as beautiful as ever. And she was as cheery as ever, too, which made Ethan’s heart hurt, which in turn made him think of his dad and how everything had gone to shit in his life lately.

 “Hi Amy,” he said, politely, and moved out of the doorway so that she could come into his apartment.

Behind Amy stood a tall, well-built man who was carrying a large cardboard box. He had the same brown hair and grey eyes as Amy and the same beautiful features. He was an Adonis.

 “Hey,” he said, following Amy into the apartment. He put the large cardboard box down on the space that Ethan had cleared on the kitchen bench. Then he turned to Ethan.

 “Hey Tim,” said Ethan.

 “Sup bro?” said Tim, and reached out a hand.

Knowing what was coming, Ethan tried to look enthusiastic as he took Tim’s hand to shake it and was, instead, pulled into a manly bro-hug. He chose not to point out to Tim that he was not, in fact, his bro. And never would be, because Amy had given back the engagement ring.

 “You’ve got a nice place here,” Amy said, looking around. “It’s very clean.”

 “Thanks,” said Ethan, then lied, “I’m trying to take good care of it.”

 “Any good hang-outs here?” Tim asked.

 “Nothing like the Brew Ha Ha back near Amy’s” - back near my old place, he didn’t say - “the Chinese place down the street is good though.”

 “You busy tonight? We’re going to a party. Amy’s gonna be my wingman,” Tim said, proudly.

Amy, who had been looking around the apartment, turned to face them. “I’m sure Ethan’s busy, Timbo. Let’s leave him to it yeah?”

 “Yeah, I got plans,” Ethan lied smoothly. “Give ‘em hell tonight, Tim.”

 “Thanks bro.”

 “See you later Ethan,” Amy said.

 “Thanks for my stuff. Bye Amy.”

Amy ushered her brother out of the apartment and let Ethan close the door behind them. He returned to his couch and watched tv until he fell asleep.

Lingerie

Hi everyone,

This is a short piece of fiction that I wrote and then I forgot what it was meant to lead into. So... there’s no actual story here, unfortunately. It’s just a snapshot of this character’s life.

I like the idea here, of someone alone in her bedroom slowly getting dressed. I really like the idea of being that relaxed and not having anywhere to be that means she’s rushing to throw clothes on and get out of the house.

However, I’m not particularly happy with the piece because I’m pretty sure I’ve fallen into the old trap of telling-not-showing.

That being the case, I would really appreciate some feedback. What does the piece make you feel? Bored? Intrigued? Like I’ve over-used the adjectives? Let me know!

Warning: wall of text. Sorry.

♥Nancy♬

Taking hold of both of the drawer knobs with perfectly manicured hands, she pulled the heavy drawer halfway open. To the untrained eye the contents of that top drawer might look like a jumbled mess. This was her drawer, though, and there was no one whose eye was better trained to survey its contents. She ran her hands over silky smooth satin, skimmed her fingertips across soft cotton and paused as she felt the netted texture of lace. She fondled red lace, her fingers light against the delicate fabric. She hooked one finger under an elastic waistband and then under a bra strap, pulling the matching set free of the other garments in the drawer. With a casual flick of her hand, the underwear landed gently on the nearby four-post bed. Outside the window, the leaves of a tall tree provided a filter for the morning sun. Despite the chill outside, the sunrise poured through the window and warmed the room in patches. She stretched, languid in the comfortable warmth. Before she brought her arms down out of the stretch she used one hand to squeeze open the clip on the top of her head, slowly extracting it from the mess of silken red hairs. She wandered across the room, her bare feet sinking into luxurious carpet, to place the polished wood hair clip neatly on a glass platter on her dressing table; her hair fell around her shoulders, big, loose curls tumbling with each step. As the morning sun rose higher in the sky, light fell over the dressing table. It refracted through a crystal bottle, scattering rainbows across the room. She looked down to see a splash of rainbow light on her hip. She touched the rainbow and felt her own alabaster skin under her fingertips.

16th Century Cream Linen Kirtle

Hello!

A short time ago I blogged about my Blue Linen Kirtle and I finished that post with a lament about how I am lacking in awls. I haven’t got an awl yet so I haven’t continued work on the Blue Kirtle. However, I’ve still been sewing a lot and I’ve made good progress with my next kirtle.

UPDATE: Since writing this post I have, in fact, received my awl, but I've been sewing much slower so this post is basically still up-to-date.

Kirtle #2 is made using the same pattern that Rosie helped me with. However, it has a very different structure from the Blue Kirtle because it is front-lacing instead of side-lacing. It’s also cream-coloured. The top fabric is from Fabrics-store.com and it’s IL019 5.3 oz/yd² in a colour called Krista. For the lining I used the same white linen that I used in my Blue Kirtle. The Cream Kirtle is also entirely hand-sewn using linen thread, except for the basting stitch where I used the same cheap cotton.

My process for the Cream Kirtle started in the same way that the process for the Blue Kirtle started. I cut out the pieces in interlining fabric. This time I used two layers of linen and one layer of the grey horsehair stuff. I didn’t really want it to be any thicker but because the cream linen is so light you can see the grey horsehair stuff through it. I didn’t have that problem with the Blue Kirtle because you can’t see the grey through the deep blue. Using two layers of the heavy white linen means that you can’t see the grey stuff through the cream stuff. Here’s a picture of those three layers:

As with the Blue Kirtle, my next step was to stitch the layers of interlining together. I used running stitch. Next step: cutting out the top fabric. I cut out the lining fabric at the same time to make sure it was the same size and shape as the top fabric pieces. I was pretty careful at this step because I think that wrong cutting-out of my lining fabric contributed to the shoulder-lumping on the Blue Kirtle. I also used a slightly smaller seam allowance this time and I didn’t have to trim any off. After all the cutting-out I used a big running stitch to baste the top fabric to the interlining.

Picture for proof:

And then, herringbone stitch! I remembered to take pictures of my herringbone stitch this time so you can have a look at how I did.

Along a straight edge:

Around a curve:

The next step after the herringbone stitching (which took forever, it’s such a slow part of the process) was to sew the seams. There were many more seams on the Cream Kirtle than there were on the Blue Kirtle. I sewed the side seams first and then the shoulder seams. I don’t really think that the order would have made a difference, I just did it in that order because I thought it would be better to sew the longer seams first. I used back-stitch because it’s good for seams. After I sewed the four seams (two side-seams, two shoulder-seams) on the top fabric, I sewed those same seams on the lining fabric.

Next, I pinned the lining fabric into the bodice. I started by matching the seams and then I tucked the seam allowance all under and pinned that down. For around the armholes I did the same thing, using little snips to be able to fold it in neatly. Interestingly, I was watching the “Jersey Shore” episode of Bones whilst doing this. I don’t know why I remember that. Anyway, I then sewed down the lining using slip-stitch. Here are a couple of pictures of the lining all sewed down:

I’m pretty happy with how the bodice has turned out so far. It doesn’t have any weird lumping that I’ve noticed yet and I think my sewing was mostly quite neat. The only part of the bodice that I’m not as happy with is the back panel, which is a V-shape. I’m not happy with it because it turned out not-very-pointy. I tried to make it pointy but it didn’t turn out very pointy and I don’t know how to increase the pointedness. Here’s a picture of how it turned out:

*sigh* Oh well, it will do.

I’ve done a bit more work on this dress but I haven’t taken pictures yet, so I’m going to keep this blog post short and sweet and leave it here.

The rest of what I’ve done is: cut out the skirt pieces, do the pleating, attach the skirt, sew the side-seams.

What I have left to do is: a bunch of finishing, remove basting stitches, a bunch of lacing-holes.

UPDATE: I may have done this stuff already (but not on the blue dress yet).

Hopefully by the next time I blog I’ll have completely finished both dresses! I should be able to sum them up in one post (with pictures)!

Thanks for reading :)

♥Nancy♬

Hysterical Pregnancy

Hi everyone!

I promised that there would be some more creative writing to come and here it is, yay!

No, it’s not A Fantasy Story. I still fully intend to write more of that but I haven’t been inspired and so I’m just experimenting with short pieces at the moment.

I don’t really have any background information to offer on this one; I pretty much just sat down to write and this was what came out.

I hope you enjoy it and, as always, I appreciate any comments you’d like to provide. I’ll only get better if I get some constructive criticism!

♥Nancy♬

She sits in a deep, velvet arm chair with her hands resting gently on her swollen belly. There is a tiny fire struggling to maintain vigour in the grate but she does not take any actions to help it survive. There’s not much left in the room. The floor is wooden but the thick layer of dust makes it difficult to tell. There is a coffee table with a now-cold mug of green tea leaving a wet ring on the glass surface. There is a photograph of a married couple on the mantlepiece; they look happy together. She pointedly avoids eye contact with the man and woman in the photograph. She caresses her distended abdomen. Empty. That’s what the doctor told her. He told her that her belly was empty and barren. He called her hysterical. A hysterical pregnancy. She didn’t believe it was kosher to call a pregnant woman hysterical; surely it was just the hormones making her a little crazy? She’d tried to explain that to Dan, but he’d believed the doctor and screamed at her for making her empty belly out to be full of growing life. Which it is, there is no doubt in her mind. She feels a flicker of movement.

 “Don’t kick,” she scolds, gently, affectionately, to the baby that she knows is wriggling in her womb.

She supposes it was wrong to blame Dan for walking out. They’d tried so long and so hard to have a baby. They’d both wanted the baby. At first, anyway.

 “Okay,” Dan had said, “we’ll go to a specialist.”

He had been so good to her, way back at that point. It seems so far away now. They had gone to the specialist. She remembers back to poking and prodding, appointments and injections, and test after test after test coming back... negative. She tries to forget.

And instead she remembers Dan saying, “we need to stop trying. It’s not going to happen.”

She’d gotten so mad and they’d fought. She regrets it now and wishes for Dan to come home to her. She glances up at her dusty wedding photo. For a split second she misses that woman, the one laughing and smiling with Dan on their wedding day. But she wasn’t pregnant. She stops missing that barren bitch and caresses her stomach again.

Dan will come home, she is sure of it. Once he realises that she’s actually pregnant this time, that’s when he’ll turn right around and come home. How could he not? They have always dreamed of raising a child together. Dan might have said otherwise during their fight on the night he left, but she was sure that he didn’t mean it. He can’t mean it now, anyway, she thinks. Not now that he’s had time to calm down; he has definitely realised that she’s truly pregnant this time.

A doubt niggles in the depths of her mind.

 “I don’t care anymore, I don’t want a baby!” Dan had yelled, on the night before he’d left.

 “Yes you do, you do,” she had yelled back, “we’ve always dreamed of raising a child together!”

 “That was your dream! And it’s not going to happen.”

 “It’ll just take a little longer.”

 “I don’t want to try anymore. I can’t live like this. I’m leaving tonight.”

 “You can’t leave! It’s dark and it’s raining. It won’t be safe on the roads.”

She had turned to logic in her time of need. A pregnant pause had followed. There was a kind of poetic irony to that.

 “Fine,” Dan had said. “I’m sleeping in the guest room. I’ll leave in the morning.”

She shakes her head gently to break herself out of the painful memory. Thoughts are whizzing around in her mind and she can’t do anything to stop them. Dan will come back. They will have this baby together. She’s not hysterical, she’s just hormonal. And her belly isn’t empty, it is full of growing life. It can’t be empty, not after what she did...

She remembers:

It was dark and lightning struck outside the window, lighting up the living room with its wooden floors, polished mantelpiece and deep, velvet armchair. This was a night where the weather was cutting the world off from heaven. How convenient. She lit a candle. She’d wanted a black one but they only had plain white candles at home. Did people really stock black candles in their homes? What would you ever need one for? Well... this. She sat on the floor in front of the coffee table with its glass top and watched as the candle began to drip-drip-drip its wax. She began to speak.

 “Isis, Astarte, Diana, Hecate, Demeter, Kali, Innana.”

She’d read the names on the internet. They were names of goddesses, of female gods that, let’s face it, no one really worshipped. But it was nice to think that on this dark night of rain and storms and husbands leaving there was someone listening, even if it wasn’t God. And this was a woman’s problem.

She read the names again, “Isis, Astarte, Diana, Hecate, Demeter, Kali, Innana.”

She spoke faster the second time, liking the sound of them, the rhythm and the unfamiliar sounds as they fell off her tongue. She said them again. She said them again. She was chanting.

She is not the chanting sort. And now, as she breaks out of that memory and back to reality for just a brief second, she feels bad for turning her face away from God. She turns to him now and makes a different wish, a wish for her husband to come home. It doesn’t feel as powerful as the wish she made on that dark and stormy night. She falls back into the memory.

 “Isis, Astarte, Diana, Hecate, Demeter, Kali, Innana, Isis, Astarte...” she had fallen into a rhythm, a proper chant. But she could feel something building too. It wasn’t God, he didn’t seem to be watching. But it was a familiar force, something that could have been from her own religion and not from one of the crazy religions where the names she was chanting actually meant anything.

Again, she chanted, “Hecate, Demeter,” and she felt that same feeling that something was building, like a wave or bread rising, or an orgasm. “Kali, Innana...”

A pause. And then: “Lilith,” she hissed, and felt the presence of something very powerful all around her. Lightning cracked again. She had chanted women’s names but the last name, that was not a made-up goddess from a pretender’s religion. Lilith may have been demonic but at least she was Judeo-Christian and that had to count for something. And really, she was only turning aside from God, not away to Satan, just... aside. To a female power who could help with a female problem.

Thunder clapped and she made her wish in front of the dripping candle and in the presence of that female power.

 “Give me a baby.”

She snaps out of her reverie and feels sweat running down her brow even though it is a cold day. Her actions had worked. The night had been dark and God had not been watching, but she knows now that he must have heard her plea and understood what she had done in desperation. She smiles and caresses her beautiful, pregnant belly. Empty? Pah! She knows her body better than any doctor. She isn’t hysterical. This is not a hysterical pregnancy. She spoke directly to God and now she is pregnant.

Dan will be home any day now.

She begins to laugh. She is alone in a cold and empty house. Alone, with her cold and empty belly. Her soul feels cold, too.

She laughs. And laughs. And laughs, until the fire goes out.

16th Century Blue Linen Kirtle

Hi everyone! It’s been a long time since I did a garb diary. Usually that wouldn’t be a big deal but this time I’ve actually been sewing. A lot.

Armed with the AMAZING pattern that Rosie helped me with (read all about that process here) I began work on my first kirtle. I decided to start on the side-lacing one because I’m making that one in my blue fabric, and blue is awesome and should come first every time!

I started by cutting out my pieces in my interlining fabric. For the interlining for these kirtles I’m using a combination of heavy linen (I’m pretty sure it’s the 8 oz/yd² IL090 from Fabrics-store.com in Bleached, or maybe Optic White, I can’t remember exactly) and some sort of horsehair fabric that I found at Spotlight. I wanted horsehair canvas for its stiffness and I don’t think that’s exactly what I found, but it feels like natural fabric of some kind and it has no stretch to it at all, which in the end is the point. The heavy linen is stretchy (because it’s linen) so I added the horsehair whatsit stuff to stop it stretching (interlining needs to hold its shape). Anyways, after I cut out the pieces in exactly the same size as my pattern I then sewed them together. For the first dress, the blue one, I just used 1 layer of linen and 1 layer of the horsehair stuff.

Here’s a picture which kinda shows that. The grey-ish fabric is the horsehair stuff.

I sewed the layers together using running stitch around the edge, and then I put the pieces onto my blue fabric so that I could cut out the top layer, with appropriate seam allowance. The linen I used was the 5.3 oz/yd² IL019 from Fabrics-store.com and I think the colour was Pacific Blue but I can’t remember or find where I put that information... Anyway, the following picture demonstrates how I went overboard with the aforementioned seam allowance; you can also see my running stitches on the interlining.

Once I had cut out both top pieces in my beautiful blue linen I basted the interlining to the corresponding top piece using a big running stitch. This was the only part of the process that I used definitely incorrect materials (I’m still not sure if my horsehair stuff counts as a period-accurate material but at this point I’m giving myself the benefit of the doubt). I used crappy cotton thread to do the basting. I used this because a) it was really low-quality random thread that we had laying around, as opposed to my fancy linen thread and b) because the basting stitches get pulled out at the end anyway so it didn’t really matter that much.

See the above picture: basting. Also, too much seam allowance.

My next step was to use herringbone stitch to attach the top-fabric to the interlining. I didn’t take any photos of my herringbone stitch, unfortunately. But basically I started about two finger-widths in (to leave room for finishing edges after I attach the skirt) and herringbone-stitched the whole way around, leaving the top of the shoulders open so that I could sew the seam later. I was pretty happy with my herringbone stitch, I think I did lots of nice small stitches and I made sure I never went through to the top fabric so it’s basically invisible now.

Cutting too big of a seam allowance caused some issues when I was doing herringbone stitch up around the shoulders and then when I was sewing the shoulder seam, but I fixed that problem by trimming down the seam allowance.

My next step was to sew the shoulder seams. I used back-stitch because that’s a nice strong stitch and the shoulder seams have to be particularly strong. On a side-lacing kirtle the only seam is the shoulder seam, because where side-seams would be otherwise there will be lacing on this dress. One of the shoulder seams went just fine but the other one turned out kinda lumpy. I don’t know what I did to make it go like that, but you can’t tell on the finished thing so I guess it sorted itself out.

I then cut out the lining fabric. My lining fabric is white linen, again from Fabrics-store.com, but I can’t for the life of me remember whether it’s the 5.3 oz/yd² or the 3.5 oz/yd². I cut out the lining fabric with too much seam allowance too and had to trim it down also. Once I’d cut it out/trimmed it down, my first step was to sew the shoulder seams. After that I pinned it into the rest of the bodice and then I tucked all the seam allowance in and sewed it down using slip stitch. I left a little gap at the bottoms (about two finger-widths) for finishing and sewing on the skirt.

I had a similar lumpy problem when I was sewing the lining down around the shoulder seams. In the following picture you can see some lumping:

The lumping isn’t too bad really, it just looks a bit messy. I couldn’t work out how to fix it up though so I’ve just left it that way. It’s on the inside so I don’t think it really matters that much. The other side turned out just fine. Here’s a picture of what the shoulders look like along the edges:

Here are a couple of pictures of the lining sewn down on the bodice, so this is what it looks like on the inside. I especially took pictures of corners and stuff because they are fiddly bits.

So that was the bodice pretty much finished, except for lacing holes and finishing off the edges at the very bottom. My next step was to do the skirt and that is where things went kinda wrong. I decided to do a bit of shaping at the top of the skirt.

This was my process: I measured the edge of my bodice, I folded and cut my fabric in half, I cut the diagonals at the top for the shaping.

The problem? I’d measured the shorter part of the bodice. I hadn’t even thought about the fact that the two pieces of the bodice have different length edges. Noooooo it was a disaster! One of the pieces was the right size but the other one was not. If I hadn’t already cut my diagonals I could have just rotated it (not ideal, but it would have worked) and cut different diagonals and it would have fit perfectly. But I had cut my diagonals so I freaked out and cried everywhere until mum came home to help.

We remeasured my edges, recalculated the lengths of fabric I needed and tossed around ideas of how to make it work. In the end I rotated to the too-small piece, which made it approximately the right size, and cut new diagonals even though they were smaller than the diagonals on the other piece. In the end I still have an unfortunate diagonal at the top and bottom on one side, but at the top it should be lost in the waist seam and hopefully at the bottom it will be lost in the hem, so no harm done in the end.

Now that my skirt-cutting drama was over, I was able to pin the skirt onto my dress. I lined up the seam allowances at the edges and pinned it in place and then went around pinning my pleats. I decided to do a box pleat in the middle and knife pleats fanning outwards because I think that looks nice. I had measured my skirt so that I would have three times the length of the bodice and I did tiny perfect pleats of 1cm width. I say perfect, I am seriously exaggerating when I say that. I ended up with the same number of pleats on both side (of the middle, not on both sides of the dress) but it took some wiggling. It’s very hard to get accurate pleats.

Once I’d pinned my pleats I used backstitch to sew the skirt on. I tried to sew it in such a way that I got some of the stitches into the interlining as well, so that when I removed the basting stitch it wouldn’t flap around at all at the bottom of the bodice.

Here is the skirt all sewn on and back-stitched and pleated. I’m pretty happy with it.

And here it is on the outside. The pleats don’t look entirely even here, even though I think they are pretty close to even. When you hold the dress up they look more even so it should look pretty okay when I wear it.

After the skirt was sewn onto both sides of the dress my next step was to sew the side-seam down the whole length of the skirt. I did it with back-stitch and it was a pretty uneventful step in the process.

Then I had to deal with this mess:

This is what it looked like at the bottom of the bodice. It’s excess seam allowance and that sort of thing and it needed to be neatly tucked down and finished off. I was quite unsure how to get that all working. It took looks of folding and poking and prodding and pinning and, eventually, stitching. Here’s how it turned out:

It think it looks pretty okay in its finished form. The folded bit down the edge is the edge of the skirt-opening. I folded it in and sewed it down using slip-stitch and it continues into the seam of the skirt where it then turns into a flat-fold finished seam.

Pictures for proof, the edge:

Pictures for proof,  the seam and finishing on the inside:

That all went quite smoothly, except at the top where the seam-opening starts. I had to find some way to make that all be finished edges so that it didn’t fray to pieces and, well... just look:

So... it turned out kinda messy. That’s the inside, of course, so it’s not really a huge deal. In order to make it look neat and tidy on the outside I think I will try to sew a little buttonhole-bar, just to give it strength and neatness at the bottom. For now, though, it looks okay so I’ll probably do that as the last thing before I wear it.

I finished off the bottom of the bodice, over the skirt seam:

And then, goodbye basting stitch!

Yay! It’s looking quite good.

So what’s left to do on this dress? Well, it’s not wearable until I sew some lacing holes. The reason I haven’t done that yet is because I don’t have an awl. However, an awl is a belated part of my Christmas presents from mum and dad so when it arrives I will be sewing about a billion lacing-holes.

I asked a garb expert (Rosie, again) what colour my lacing holes should be. She told me that lacing holes in English garb are the same colour as the fabric. If I were sewing Flemish garb I might have just used my same natural-coloured linen thread to do the lacing holes. But I’m definitely English rather than anywhere else so I will be doing the lacing holes in matching blue thread. Linen thread is hard to find and even harder to colour-match, so I pulled a bunch of long threads out of my excess blue fabric. The lacing holes should end up pretty much invisible, as long as I sew them well!

I also have the bottom hem to go, but I’m planning to leave that until my lacing holes are done so that I can be properly wearing the dress when it comes time to measure the hem. I think that will make it the most accurate length-wise.

Without an awl I am currently stuck so I have left this dress alone for now. I’ll work on it more when I have an awl. In order to keep myself busy while waiting for that important tool, I started work on my next dress, yay!

But this post is pretty long already so I’ll blog about my next dress another time (maybe once I’ve made some more progress on it).

Hope this was an interesting read!

♥Nancy♬