Journeys Are My Diary

Life, Adventures, Entertainment and more - A little bit of everything blog!

Disney Countdown – Days 79 to 73

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Monday (79) – Jan 12th – Draw or Make Disney
Tuesday (78) – Jan 13th – Play a Disney Game
Wednesday (77) – Jan 14th – Dress up Disney
Thursday (76) – Jan 15th – Read a Disney book
Friday (75) – Jan 16th – Watch “The Little Mermaid”
Saturday (74) – Jan 17th – Make Disney themed food
Sunday (73) – Jan 18th– Paint “Ariel” peg doll

I seriously can’t believe how fast the days are flying by. In terms of weeks, we have a little over 10 weeks to go! Anyway, this is what we got up to this week. Monday was draw or make disney again and since we were so into our hair bows, the girls and I made a Baymax bow. On Tuesday it was play a disney game and since none of us could really be bothered, it was to iPads and iPhones, to play on Tsum Tsum! Wednesday was dress up disney and Megan was back to being Elsa again while Lily was Cinderella this time. Thursday the girls were at mum’s, so we had to be prepared. I dropped off a Disney book at Mum’s in the morning and left strict instructions as the selfie rule! Megan sent me the pictures later and I combined them into one for our Instagram countdown picture. On Friday it was watch a Disney movie and this time it was specifically The Little Mermaid. I will admit its been ages since I watched this, so it was really nice to watch again. I also spent the evening sewing Amy’s “Kiss the Girl” dress so it was very atmospheric!

On Saturday we had to make Disney themed food and honestly we’re running out of ideas a little. We want to avoid always making cupcakes or biscuits that just look or are shaped like Disney characters. We resorted to the Disney Cakes and Sweets magazines that I once had on subscription but sadly majority of those recipes are very tenuously linked to the disney characters. We decided on Winnie the Pooh – Honey and Vanilla biscuits, since Pooh Bear does at least like honey! Sadly no one was particularly fussed about the biscuits and after forcing Chris to eat the majority, the rest went in the bin! That leads us right up to Sunday where the task was to paint a peg doll – specifically Ariel. She decided on doing the “Kiss the Girl” look, probably partly because I’d been making the dress and really it was a very mermaid themed weekend. On Sunday, though it was nothing to do with our tasks, we also played Disney DVD Trivial Pursuit as a family, which was a lot of fun!

Week 42 – Monday Round-up

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Again, another repeat of my Sunday Round up, with a little more info – my weekly round up, for Monday!

This week has seen the end of week 42. I seriously can’t believe there are only 10 weeks of the year left. That said, I’m so so pleased to see the end of this week – its been both good and bad but mostly the end of my work week has been the landmark for this whole week. I now have two weeks off and while I have more planned for it than what is physically possible, I’m really looking forward to getting stuff done, as well as some down time.

Monday to Friday were work or school for everyone in the house. The girls were supposed to have Singing Stars on Monday after school, but at the very last minute it was cancelled. In a way I was pleased because it meant we got home earlier than expected. Chris was home not long after us too, so it was nice to spend the whole evening together. While I did do some online stuff and blogging, Chris and I also spent the evening watching the new first episode of Walking Dead and the first episode of Gotham too.

Tuesday the girls were with their dad so I was able to head straight home. Chris was off so it was nice to get some time with him, but I also had stuff I wanted to get on with. I did more blog stuff and then actually took a bath. When the girls were home, they unfortunately had to go straight to bed. Chris and I spent the evening together though I was on my computer and he did a mixture of Xbox and watching TV.

Wednesday I got an email about Disney on Ice for next year, I even mentioned it to the kids in the car on the way home. Then when I checked Facebook I saw that Amy was disappointed to not have one nearby to her, so I offered for her to come over for the weekend and we could go together. When I looked at the tickets, they were selling fast so I ended up pinching Chris’ credit card and booking our tickets! After that though I just spent the evening relaxing. My head was hurting quire a lot so I ended up sitting on the sofa and reading “Insurgent”.

Thursday I woke up feeling incredibly emotional for no real reason. I burst into tears several times before I even got to work. However overall it wasn’t a terrible day and I actually picked up a job application form for a new job I want to apply for. On top of that I had another relaxing evening where I actually finished off Insurgent – expect a book review soon!

Friday was finally the end of my work and I was so pleased. I called briefly at my mum’s after school and she came up to see the girls at school with me, as she was leaving for holiday that day. When the girls and I got home we went to pick up parcels – I received 2 “My Little Box”s, of which I will be reviewing later in the week. Megan and I also started to make a cake for Chris’ Gran, as it was her 90th birthday and we planned to go around the next day. In the evening I had hoped to sew but got distracted by online shopping. I won’t even tell you what I bought…

Saturday I got up and decorated the cake for Chris’ Gran, then did a little work on my computer before finally settling down to do some sewing. In the end though we headed out to Chris’ Gran’s fairly early, staying there for about an hour before coming home and having lunch. After lunch Chris had to head to work and I went back to sewing. When I ran out of material though, the girls and I headed into town for some more. We ended up having a little bit of a wander and then I bought them a notebook each and McDonalds for dinner. Then when we got home I went back to sewing and before long I was joined by both of them to sit at the table and write stories. Eventually Lily went to bed and not long after Nat arrived. I finally got around to making myself dinner and then Megan went to bed leaving Nat and I to chat. The whole evening flew by and it didn’t feel like we covered anywhere near enough topics, but it was midnight by the time she left! When Chris got home I made him open his “My Geek Box” which had arrived during the day – I’ll be blogging about that later in the week too.

Sunday I was really hoping for a lie in but it was not to be. I got up and went straight to sew, but as the girls both came to join me, to write more, it didn’t really end up being that constructive. In the end Megan and I went to watch Saturday night’s X Factor and when that was done we all agreed we’d got out and get the weekly shopping done. We headed first to Aldi and then to Morrisons, before coming home and actually getting lunch. After that I decided to knock sewing on the head for a while and instead settled down to watch TV and get loads of blogging sorted for the week. I ended up watching Casualty, followed by The Apprentice, followed by three episodes of Doctor Who. We had pizza for dinner and the girls had a bath and after they went to bed I finally went back to my sewing. Chris was home earlier than normal as its a Sunday and we spent the evening together before heading to bed.

Week 41 – Monday Round-up

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Sadly this is still feeling a bit repetitive, what with doing a Sunday round-up of my Stoptober, however I’ll give it a bash anyway. Monday to Friday were work and school as normal, except for Chris who had a week off. It was actually really nice to know he’d be home when we were every day, though I’ll admit to feeling jealous that I wasn’t having a week off!

Monday after school the girls had Singing Stars and so I headed into Lincoln and swung by Boyes to get some material. After that I headed to PC World to do a mystery shopper report and then on to my mum’s for a cup of tea – before heading to get the girls. When we got home I made everyone dinner and then did a little sewing. My brother came around at about 7pm and after a quick catch up chat, we settled down to watch the first two epsidoes of OUAT’s new season. He stayed for a little while afterwards but then headed home and Chris and I sat watching TV for a little while before heading to bed.

On Tuesday it was nice to come straight home after school and work, as it always seems to be after the night before being a later one. In the mail I received some new pre-release books to review, along with my Rosegal order, finally! I spent the evening on my computer, catching up with online stuff and writing blog posts so that I could have several nights away from my laptop. Chris and I then watched a bit of TV together before heading to bed.

After work on Wednesday we came home and not long after it started to go dark, we had a problem with our lounge light. In the end, all four of us, ended up down at B&Q buying a new light fitting and a lampshade. Luckily I’m not at all fussy when it comes to things like that and knowing we were leaving eventually we just got a cheap ceiling cord fitting and a cream lampshade to last until we go.

Amy had also booked our first of four Disney dining experiences that day, this one being Cinderella’s Royal Table and unfortunately we both had each others accounts connected wrong. I ended up ringing Disney to get it sorted out but it was easy enough and didn’t take too long. After that I spent the evening sewing, trying to get on top of the first dress I’d started. When “The Great British Bake Off” came on though, I spent the rest of the evening watching that with Chris as it was the finale and even after that we just watched more TV together before heading to bed.

On Thursday, the kids were with their dad after school which is nice because it meant I could head straight home at 2.30pm instead of waiting around for them till 3.30pm. Sadly I wasn’t feeling very well though so when I got home I snuggled up with Chris for a while before heading for a bath. Afterwards I felt much better but I didn’t have the energy to do anything other than snuggle up with Chris and watch loads of TV. We then headed to bed early and honestly it was much needed!

Friday the kids were with my mum as its been a while since she’s had them – and she’s going away next week. Again it was nice because it meant I could come straight home but I was a little lost without them. Chris offered takeaway for dinner but I’m very proud to say I refused and so when he offered me a bacon butty I gratefully accepted. After sitting with Chris for a while and working on my blog, I moved to the dining room to get on with some sewing. I finally completed the first dress I was making, which was Aurora for Olivia, ready for Florida. Since there was still a fair bit of the evening left, I moved on to the Cinderella dress that I’d part started too. While I didn’t get it completed, it was almost finished by the time I went to bed.

On Saturday morning, Chris and I were woken really early by the people next door. We were gutted as we were both hoping for a lie-in, especially with my kids not being home. Luckily we did both manage to get to sleep again though and it was about 9.30am when we actually woke the second time. After a lazy start (Chris actually brought me a cup of tea in bed!) we eventually got up and I went straight back to my sewing (after quickly booking a Disney dining reservation). However as we were heading over to Lincoln (to pick up the kids from Mum but also to go into town) we left the house at about 12pm. When we got to Lincoln, we headed to BK and got a burger plus some cheesy chilli bites. We then went to Chris’ work to pick up some keys, ready for him opening up on Monday, then into Primark briefly, before finally heading to Boyes for material. I picked up a very random assortment of colours but figured I’d at least be able to start on something!

From town we headed to my mum’s and we stayed there a while, having a drink and catching up. After we left, we drove back to Gainsborough and while I dropped off the girls and Chris at home, I popped into town there as I wanted to go to Boyes again and then to Next to pick up a parcel. Finally I headed home and it was straight back to the crafting table to sew. Sadly we’d run out of milk and forgotten to pick some up, so Chris headed around the corner to the shop to get some, taking the girls with him. The afternoon was filled with lots of tea (Megan made her first official cup) and lots of sewing. It took me majority of the day, on and off, but I finished dress number two – Cinderella for Olivia.

At dinner time, Lily decided she wanted broccoli and stilton soup so Megan, Lily and I walked down to Aldi for a few bits. As we started to pick up several bits, I realised we’d need to go shopping again for the whole week so it would be a good idea to plan out what we wanted first. While everyone was eating dinner and we were all together, I got a meal plan organised for the week. It was decided we go back to Aldi the following day and get the weekly shop. After dinner and when Lily was in bed, Megan and I settled down to watch the X Factor. It was something I’d been keen to involve Megan in this year, as she’s old enough to stay up and watch it and while she wasn’t really interested during the original auditions, she’s definitely got more interested over time. We both downloaded the app and watched/voted as we went along. However as the show went on till 10pm I told Megan she’d have to go at 9pm and we’d finish watching it in the morning. I wouldn’t have normally minded but Sunday night’s didn’t finish till 9.15pm and I didn’t want her having two late nights in a row.

Once Megan was in bed, I went back to sewing. Since both of Olivia’s dresses were finished, it was time to pick something else to do so I decided to work on one of Amy’s dresses, cutting out the pattern and tracing out the correct size. Chris came downstairs and watched some Andromeda so I went into the lounge to trace my patterns, in order to keep him company. Chris and I headed to bed around 11pm, even though we’d had a lie in, but it felt like a very constructive day.

On Sunday we were woken early by next door again but sadly this time I couldn’t get back to sleep. Chris did manage to and so as not to wake him, I laid in bed and read until he woke. I think it was probably about 9am when Chris did wake and at that point we got up – I was itching to get sewing again. After spending a bit of time with the girls, I started sewing again. I was pleased with the progress I was making though it got frustrating at times. For lunch we all sat down to lasagne and garlic bread, then afterwards we went shopping. As Chris wanted to give his bike a run, he headed out to Morrisons and I gave him a small list of things I didn’t think I’d be able to get from Aldi. The girls and I headed out in the car to go shopping at Aldi and after we got everything we needed, headed home. Chris had just beaten us but he helped unpack the bags and then the shopping. We then hung out washing, did the dishwasher and made a cup of tea – all before I went back to sewing.

I then spent the rest of the evening, up to dinner time, doing… yep, you guessed it, more sewing! I made the girls some food and myself some soup, before sitting down to relax for the first time all day. However I did end up going back to sewing, as I was so close to being finished that I just wanted to get it completed. As Lily went to bed, Chris, Megan and I sat down to watch Cake Boss, Next Great Baker and I took the sewing with me to do some bits by hand. After it finished, I headed back to the table to do a little more, Chris went upstairs and Megan and I made another cup of tea so we could settle in and watch the X Factor results. We watched the results and were both happy and surprised. Afterwards Megan went to bed and Chris came down to watch TV. I turned on my computer for the first time in days, catching up on blog stuff while Chris watched more Andromeda.

It’s been a pretty great week and while I’ve wavered a little on my “stop” list, I’ve also felt more productive than… well probably ever. I’ve learnt a few new things from sewing this week and that’s felt great – rather than just sort of botching it or doing it a way I know rather than by the instructions. While work has still had its up and down moments, I’ve definitely felt less emotional this week. Finally, aside from not feeling well on Wednesday night, all of Thursday and most of Friday, I’ve really enjoyed this week and can’t wait to get into this one – especially since the end of this coming week signals the beginning of two weeks off for me!

Making my Vanessa (Ursula) Costume

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This week I have focused on all my time at London Film and Comic Con last weekend. I did a day by day breakdown, along with the costumes and cosplays by both my group and several other people who attended. However the one thing I haven’t focused on yet is how I made my own costume.
Once I’d finally decided on a person to be (the clothes being part of that decision), I decided immediately that instead of wanting to make a dress, I would make a corset and skirt. Recently I have been wearing a lot of corsets, largely because I’m unhappy with my size and shape. With that in mind, I ordered these two patterns from Ebay.
Once the two patterns arrived, I proceeded to order all the bits I would need for making the two items. There was boning, zips, eyelets etc.
After much consideration I picked Iris and Purple as my material colours, along with a black lining material. It was then time to begin!
As the skirt seemed the easiest to take, I did that one first. It was a really simple pattern, just 6 main panels to make the skirt and another two for the waistband. I managed majority of the sewing myself, though I have to admit I called in to see my mum when it came to adding the zip. Not because I couldn’t… just because I figured she’d do it better.
Next I moved onto the corset. I’ll admit I was sort of dreading it a little but the beginning seemed fairly straight forward at least so I cracked on with that. There were lots of pieces to cut out, not just from the purple but also from the black lining and also from interface. It took quite some time just to get it all cut out.

Next it was a case of ironing on the interfacing and sewing all the purple pieces together. Then doing the same for the black lining. After that the boning had to be attached to the lining pieces. Finally it was starting to take on a corset type shape.

Before officially sewing it all together, my mum pinned it all together. The part at the front was actually my mum’s idea too – a fake opening instead of an actual lace-up front. Once I was sure it all looked okay and was going to fit (we actually took it in about an inch on each side), we sewed it all up properly. I then had to edge it all, which I chose to do by hand to make it look neater.

When it was all finished, I was really pleased with the result. I added eyelets and ribbon, the corset was made and the outfit was complete. Well almost anyway… I’d ordered a necklace from Etsy, the perfect thing.

Finally, all that was left to do, was get rid of my blonde tips in my hair. I bought a cheap brown hair dye and within 30 or so minutes, my hair was all brown again. Not just that, but it was in great shiny condition!

And that was that. My outfit was complete and I wrote it to LFCC last weekend. I was really pleased with how it turned out and while I expect I won’t wear it again, I was really happy with the choice to be Vanessa.

My costume for Comic Con – the final cut!

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So I’ve posted several times about my costume ideas for Comic Con and I then even picked a definite costume. However life was not to be that simple and I had to start all over again! This time though, I’m really hoping to have made an actual final decision. I’ve started to order bits and pieces here and there – I plan to make my own costume.

It will come as no surprise to you, that I wanted my costume to be Disney themed. When my original choice of Rapunzel was a bust, I went straight for my favourite princess (Belle) and my favourite villain (Ursula). I’ve always had a huge spot for Ursula from The Little Mermaid and as Amy is going to Comic Con as Ariel, Ursula seemed a great pick. However, despite the fact I’m overweight, I didn’t especially fancy going as a full blown octopus version of my favourite villain. Instead it occurred to me that I could go as Vanessa – her human version.

Now I’ve kept all this planning pretty secret, especially because my last idea was a disaster (and no I still don’t want to talk about it!). However at some point I had to make a final decision and now that I have, and the purchases are being made, I feel like I can share it all with you.

A few weeks back, I purchased a corset pattern and a skirt pattern. Both of which I hope to use (and adapt) in order to make my costume).

As soon as it arrived, I looked to see what I would need – purchasing little things like interfacing, a zip etc. I even scoured Etsy to find myself the perfect necklace. However it wasn’t until today that I actually purchased my material, taking plenty of time to make sure I was happy with the colours.

So this is it! The final decision has been made. When the material arrives I’ll have about 3 weeks to make my costume. I’m excited but also nervous – I’m really hoping to get help from my mum and maybe even Nat. I’m sure I’ll get it done but at the same time I just hope it looks good! Please keep your fingers crossed for me!

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Sew Sew

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A few weeks ago I posted about making a dress, for a Hamlet Murder Mystery party. You can read both my dress post and my murder mystery post, at those links! However until the actual Murder Mystery took place (last Saturday), I couldn’t post about my completed dress. This was for two reasons. One – I didn’t want to spoil anything in advance of the Murder Mystery. I like to post about everyone altogether. Two – The dress wasn’t finished until two hours before the event itself!

On 9th September I bought my pattern from Ebay. It cost me £8.75. It arrived within a couple of days and so on the Friday night, my best friend Nat (who was also making her dress) came around so we could try and decipher the instructions. The pattern I picked looked like this:

That night we drank wine, chatted, measured and tried to figure out what dress size we should make. At first we were flabbergasted by the thought of making size 20 dresses (we’re both about size 16) but we realised that its a dress pattern size you make, not exactly a dress size. Eventually we decided we had it figured out and planned the shopping trip for the very next day.

Though I had originally planned to get different coloured material from that in the pattern picture, in the end I did actually buy red and gold. Both were crushed velvet, though I imagine for the price I paid it was probably only velveteen.

We started work on the dresses about a week later. However it took us so long to cut out Nat’s dress (and we knew we would only have one or two days together each week to work on it) so I ended up cutting out my own by myself the following night. We met again a few days later to actually start sewing, but it was a long process and we were glad to have two sewing machines to work with.

In the end we decided it might be best to work on them alone, to make sure we had more time. Nat took my mum’s sewing machine home with her and obviously I kept my own. I spent one evening working on the dress by myself and was pretty pleased to have most of the components completed separately, even if they weren’t actually all attached together.

I posted the above picture to Instagram on September 25th. My dress pieces were all attached and my sleeves were all attached too, though I still had to attach the sleeves to the dress itself. Nat came around again that night and we worked together to motivate each other. By this point there was only three days left until the Murder Mystery and it was beginning to feel a bit of a rush.

That night I learned how to do eyelets – or at least how to cheat whilst doing eyelets. I didn’t feel like I got on very far with my dress and as I was working the following day and again that evening, I was beginning to think I might actually run out of time altogether. However by the 27th my dress was actually complete enough to wear, pretty much finished except for the trim. I sent this picture to my best friend, Amy:

My biggest struggle was definitely pinning the dress in at the sides, adding the sleeves and hemming the dress. This is largely because I only had hopeless guys in the house and unfortunately Nat and I didn’t have to meet up again to help each other do this. Lucky for Nat she had someone else nearby to help… but I just sort of made it up and hoped for the best!

Saturday arrived and I had a lot to do. Food to prepare, decorations to put up, a house to clean and tidy – yet still I had my dress to complete. I started with the trim for the waist, deciding it was the most important. Next I did the sleeves, so that I would have time to actually get both finished. By 5pm, just as Amy was arriving on her train, I was just completing the second arm. Finally I moved onto the neckline and although I was a little disappointed with how it came out, the dress was at least finished.

After some mad dashing around to get the place ready, I eventually headed upstairs to get changed around 8pm. This was actually my first proper fitting of the dress, in its complete state. Luckily it all fit and didn’t look too bad – though I unfortunately felt quite fat in it!

So here is the completed dress…

It’s not a great picture against the red background, but its really the only decent one I have. As you can see it didn’t turn out too bad in the end but I can honestly say I won’t be putting myself through that stress again any time soon – not with everything else I already end up doing for these parties.

And one more pic to show you the sleeves and the back! That is pretty much everything I can show you. It was definitely a sort of fun experience and perhaps if I had less of a time limit and also a less complicated pattern, I would consider making something again. However for the next murder mystery we do the most I’m going to be making is food…

For all the Murder Mystery pictures, feel free to browse here. There are literally hundreds though so you have been warned!

To Sew or Not to Sew, that is the Question!

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As I’ve mentioned before, I have a ton of posts I want to get written, yet somehow the most interesting are always the ones you haven’t planned and just come to you – like something you have to share.

Anyone who reads my blog regularly will know that I am an avid doer of Murder Mystery parties. They are something I have been participating in (and hosting) since I was about 16. As of last year, a fairly set group of us, started doing Murder Mysteries regularly. The first was a Gangster one, the next set in Space, one after that was Pirate and so on and so on. We have bought proper (and the original) board game style boxed sets, we have downloaded some for free and we have paid between £3-£20 for downloaded ones too. Some have been a lot of ad-libbing, others have been mostly scripted – there have been good and there have been bad.

Recently I was given the wonderful opportunity to choose a Murder Mystery from a site, free of charge, in order to blog about it. After checking with the usual suspects as to who was interested, we settled on a group of 8. This gave us only one option from this particular site (its fairly new, up and coming) – a Hamlet Murder Mystery.

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The Murder Mystery is so far unlike any we have done before. However once we’ve done it, I’ll blog all about it. This post however is actually about the costumes we’ll wear, or more specifically – the one I will be wearing.

My part is Queen Gertrude, Hamlet’s mother and Queen of Denmark. I’ve done some research and while Hamlet is pretty much a time period free play, many costumes have medieval undertones. We’ve settled on a Medieval/Renaissance feel of clothing and of course that means I have spent literally hours trawling through Ebay to see what type of thing I might buy/wear.

The problem with any costume you buy, is the consideration as to how much wear you’ll get from it again. Realistically you hardly ever get wear from a costume again (let’s face it, we all like a new outfit every time there is an event to go to) but even still, you have to take this into consideration when deciding how much to spend. On top of that of course is quality, size, location etc.

Since the Murder Mystery is a little under 3 weeks away, I have limited myself to UK Ebay only and location of UK items only. This is limiting in itself. After that I have to consider my dress size – somewhere between a 14 and 16 – which according to many fancy dress companies is XL or even XXL(!!) The most stunning and beautiful dresses – the ones you fall in love with at first sight – are definitely in the region of £40 and upwards. The bottom end (and definitely lower quality) are more like £20. Therefore do you pick quality over price, or be sensible and go for the cheaper but less likeable options.

All these dresses can be found on Ebay. I searched “medieval dress” along with size XL (as majority of other dresses only seem to come in smaller sizes). These pictured above, range from £16-£20 and as you can see, aren’t the greatest selection. The only one I actually liked (which is the second from left) only came in 20-22, nothing smaller (at that price at least).

Next up are the mid-range options. These are from around £20 to £30 and actually aren’t much better. In fact, depending on which seller you’re buying from, even the lower range dresses can be found in this mid-range, just charged a bit higher.

Though the shapes of these dresses are a little nicer, the actual materials aren’t much better than the cheap ones. For the extra money, they’re definitely not worth any more than the other lower range ones.

If money was no object, your choices of course are limitless. The top line of these dresses range from £30 to £40 and are actually quite nice. However the bottom line dresses are all around £70 and you can tell the difference between the two qualities and prices.

Finally, this dress above is one of the highest prices for listed medieval dresses. Though clearly beautiful and well made, this dress with set you back well over £500.

Anyway, the my point is really – you can spend an awful lot of money on a costume and still be left with something not all that great anyway. Where do you draw the line between what is affordable, how you’d like to look (and lets face it, feel) on the night and also what you can justify spending for a few hours of dressing up.

Having weighed up my options and spent several days doing so, I have decided that I am actually going to make my own dress. At first you might think that this is a cheaper option, but ultimately I don’t think it will be. At patterns ranging from £5-£10, you’re already half way to one of the cheaper dress options. However my decision is based on the fact I think I can make a nicer looking dress, for less in comparison. It might still come out around £20-£30 and for sure it will take me a hell of a lot more time (and probably stress) than ordering on Ebay, but at least I’ll know (fingers crossed) that it will a) fit, b) look nice and c) be exactly the colours and material I want it to be.

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The dress I have picked is the one above (its the same dress pattern in both pictures) and I aim to stick to similar colours – the red and gold. I only ordered it yesterday but hopefully it should be here in a few days time. My friend and I are then going to go shopping for material (she has chosen to make her dress too and we’re going to shop for them and sew them together) and make them within the next couple of weeks.

Hopefully I’ll be able to document the progress and show you how my completed costume looks. I’m actually pretty excited for this project, as its been a long time since I sewed anything.

What would your preference be? To sew or not to sew… that is the question!