Blingy sleeves are done

I know, I know, more crummy pictures.  I always finish things late at night.  I just have the loops to make on the dress to attach these and to fix the hem and then the 12th Night dress is done and I'll get good daylight pictures without my toes in them.  But hey, at least I am finishing it.  I was far too excited about this lace to not.  I still hope to figure out how to do a decent looking standing collar and rebato before Coronation in March in order to show it off at an event. 
The lace itself is just over 8 inches deep, so the cuffs are pretty epic, if I do say so myself,  Do you notice the heart with the fleur?  They're even heraldic.  How cool is that?  I was beside myself when I bought the lace (it's a vintage window valence but shhhhhh.) It looks pretty reticella-like to me.  The whole dress is on the theatrical side with the rhinestones and pearls and such so I just went for it.  I promise I'll do penance and handsew something in wool with no lace soon.  I did do handdone eyelets and the lace is stitched on by hand. I even did the outer construction by hand so only the inner skirt long seams and the boning channels are machine done. I did itty-bitty unpadded cartridge pleats for a change of pace and I like how they changed the look.

Accessories still to come, but I have to finish up a gift project first.  I'll show you the various bits of it tomorrow.

Praxilla-- but no pear tree

I'm working on my own 12 days of Christmas as I scramble to finish my dress and gifts for 12th Night.  Yesterday was focused on beading the billiments for the dress.

Yes, I know billiments and oodles of bling is more English than Italian, but it actually isn't unheard of.  I was just going to do a total fantasy as I used up some questionable things in the stash, but then I found this Tinteretto over at Starlight Masquerade (thanks Angela-- again.)

As you can see, there are ouches on the partlet and a heavily jeweled billiment type band across the top.  The dress is also a greenish brocade, which fell in with my plans perfectly.  My colors are a tiny bit less pastel, but a pretty good match.  How fortuitous!  I love it when my crazy ideas turn out to be documentable.

So yesterday was consumed with wiring 28 pearl ouches and stitching on the 15 red jewels (they're buttons) and 14 large black rhinestones. The gold trim underneath is lined in red linen to give a bit of contrast. It also happens to be the same trim I have on my chopines, so I'm considering wearing them to 12th Night.