Challenge #3 – Pink – almost done

Tags

18th century bedgown, Challenge #3 pink, illness

I really thought I could make the Feb 15th deadline. I kept telling myself, “I got this. It’s only a bedgown in the shape of a T. I already made one and it was super easy…so yeah! I got his!” And then, not exactly disaster, but close to it struck. We missed some days of school because of the cold so my kids needed more practice time. Being the self-sacrificing person that I am, I figure that it is perfectly reasonable/doable/acceptable to stay at school three nights in a row until 7 p.m. coaching. Awesome idea = not. I did not realize how tired I was when I finally got home at 7:45 p.m. after having been at school since 6:30 a.m. After three days of super late nights, I woke up Friday morning hot, achy, chilled, dizzy, aching deep down in my throat, and a super awesome cough to boot. Swell. I forced myself to go to school Friday and I sat most of the day because I was on the verge of fainting in my 80 degree classroom even thought I was freezing. Given my schedule and my body’s betrayal, zero sewing was actually accomplished this week. Saturday was another forensics tournament that had me up at 4:50 a.m. and out the door by 6 so I could be on a freezing cold bus by 6:30 a.m. The tournament went well and I felt better as the day progressed, but zero work is done at these tournaments besides working the tournament. Therefore, the pink bedgown still hangs on the dress form, un-hemmed, the sides (at the hip level) still need to be pleated and sewn down, the edge of the sleeve needs to be hemmed, and the collar portion at the back of the neck needs to be redone because I thought I could sew it a different way than I had the first time (even though the first time totally worked amazingly well). *sigh*. 

*Note sudden transformation into sewing hulk monster* 

I will finish this garment!!!!!!!!! 

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Sharing my love of 18th century clothing with my students

Tags

18th century teaching, teaching

We read two letters from John and Abigail Adams as a way to discuss rhetorical strategies and gender differences/stereotypes. Naturally, it seemed a perfect fit to bring in my 18th century wardrobe components and explain to students why women had ramrod straight posture, covered their elbows, and wore frilly white caps. I’ve found that high schoolers generally know what a corset is, but have never actually seen one up close (except a girl who wears a strapless prom dress with boning in the bodice). So I thought it necessary to bring in my two 19th century corsets and one 18th cent pair of stays and demonstrate why it was so difficult for a woman to dress herself and then to pass the corsets/stays around so students could feel the steel boning and thickness of fabric. Some boys even attempted to wear my corsets. It was pretty darn adorable. Almost boys. Almost. They had really awesome questions and were impressed/surprised that I had hand sewn the majority of my wardrobe. Earlier in the week we had discussed why it was not considered impressive for a woman to have a well run household and how knowledge related to running a house hold can be considered a form of intelligence that has been often overlooked. So today they were actually able to see how garment construction and sewing knowledge was a huge asset and very necessary skill for most women. Yes, their primary job was making, remaking, and mending garments for their family, but they knew how to accomplish it while managing all the other aspects of their family and home. That’s impressive! Overall, it was a good show and tell for myself and the students. 🙂 Hopefully I’ve convinced some of them that living history is not weird and that they should try it some day soon!