Making the Most of Icy Weather

NOTICE: I don't know why the body text is highlighted. Well, I have an idea why, but my attempt to fix it failed and I don't want to put any more work into it, so I guess we can all just be glad that this post is mostly photos of a dog in her funny outfit and focus on that.

When life hands you lemons in the form of an ice rink driveway, you make lemonade in the form of a figure skater outfit for your dog! And my "you" and I mean "me/I."

I dug through all my fabrics & trims bins looking for remnants and leftovers to cobble this majestic outfit together and came up with a variety of golden treasures!

Ruffles!

Sequins!

Please note the flutter sleeves.

The whole thing is lined with polar fleece remnants.

Dogter Pitter's Medicine Show COSPUP!

I sent E a few of the better shots, he tweeted one, his publisher retweeted it and that tweet showed up on the Angry Robot Books' website.
If you click on the photo, you should be able better read the text.

... and then I got the idea to use leftover materials from Eric's Dr Potter cosplay suit to make a Dogter Potter suit for Delia! I made a pattern from the red plaid jacket I bought that she wears regularly for below-freezing fetch sessions, then made a prototype from other remnants in my fabric stash.

The prototype turned out so well, I'm a bit disappointed that I didn't have enough of a cuter flannel in my stash to have made it with.

Once I figured it was close enough, I dug into the Dr Potter stash and got to work! And about 10 work-hours later I had a pretty good dog-version of The Suit!

Same suit! Same expression! Same beard!

HER FACE! She's knows when business is serious, you guys!

A fetch session reward for being such a good model gave an opportunity for a good show of the side and back of the "suit"!

Annnnd remember how I mentioned my slight obsession with documenting the details of my projects? Well, here are the photos of some of the details of this project, taken in various poor lighting conditions, minus the pesky model. YOU'RE WELCOME.

I'm not going to lie, my original plan was A LOT less complicated, but C'MON what kind of fool is going to make a less complicated dog outfit that will never be seen anywhere but on the internet? Oh.

The back with the button details to match the button details on Eric's jacket! ACK!

Buttons, buttons, buttons! They aren't functional, but there were entirely necessary. For real.

My favorite overboard detail might be the lapel and collar of the "jacket"! It slays me! And the lapel required a good bit of hand sewing which I think deserves extra credit and should be noted in my permanent file.

Delia was a real good sport about all this! Historically, she's not much for outfits and disguises, but I think having associated her red plaid coat with her favorite fetch sessions has helped her turn the corner on this one. If it's much below freezing a jacket extends her tolerance for outside exercise by up to 80%! If it's 20 degrees or lower we'll use Musher's Secret on her feet and she will usually be totally up for her usual 25 minutes of exercise (+ 10-12 minutes more later in the day). She can call it at any time by simply heading to the door. She ended up wearing her Dr Potter suit for a few hours in the house after the photo shoot and fetch reward and was totally un-bothered by it. I admit that I was hoping to get a belly shot of her sleeping with her paws in the air, but that didn't happen. Yet.

As satisfying and challenging as the other projects were, particularly Eric's Dr Alexander Potter suit, this might be my favorite project I have made in a quite a long time. It just gives me giggle fits every time I see or think about it! Thus, I have shared it all over the place. LOOK AT MY DOG IN HER OUTFIT! LOOK AT HER!

Dr Potter's Medicine Show COSPLAY

Obviously, I have shared and shared (and yeah, bragged a bit) of the fun things I've gotten to make as my little contribution to helping promote Eric's book. The biggest thing I made was A SUIT! Like a three-piece suit, you guys! I bought a McCall's pattern, lots of fabric, and spent a good 60-70 hours on this and I am pretty pleased with how it turned out. THANKFULLY, Eric was pretty much model size on this, because one thing I am not is a tailor and I have almost no alteration or fitting skills.

Hey look! Bare ground! This was taken when our moms were here for Thanksgiving... before the snow!

Eric has been a terribly good sport about modeling.

The unaltered, real deal!

Admittedly, I'm a bit obsessive about documenting the details of projects (as I am sure people who follow along have noticed) so here are some detail shot of the suit minus the pesky model. Ahem. I made the jacket, pants, and vest. We bought the shirt (H&M), braces (suspenderstore.com), hat (Goodwill at Halloween), shoes (TJ Maxx), and Eric had the socks and walking stick (a 40th birthday gift) already.

These shell buttons came from the 4 or 5 generation button box and might well be from the 1870s! I did have to find new clips for the back.

We got so lucky to find an inexpensive white shirt with the appropriate style collar! It would've been much more costly to make it and taken just that much more time. Suspenders are elastic and less "authentic" than most of the other pieces, but the cost difference easily justified the compromise. And I couldn't have made them for less, either.

Vent and button detail on the back of the jacket.

This jacket is made from about 50 pieces of fabric and interfacing. What with the pockets, lining, etc. it really added up. Oh, and it has 12 or 13 buttons, too!

Wooden buttons purchased online from MJTrim.com.

Special thanks to our neighbors and friends who turned out in the cold & snow to make this photo shoot even possible and all the work of making all the things come to a pretty great end! We certainly could not have pulled it off with out Neighbor Bob's fantastic Western town, knowledge, props, and photography skills! Not to mention everyone who showed up with costumes, props and with GREAT and generous-of-spirit attitudes! And for Coworker Randi's time and skills turning digital photos into daguerreotypes! Without all of them, the suit wouldn't have mattered one bit.

It's a Treat to Trick Out Betty!

We kept it pretty low-key for Halloween decorating this year. After all the hubbub of shed building, house guest hosting, adding a kitchen island (post coming, I promise), etc., it just felt like a few well-placed favorites would be enough to get in the spirit. Of course, there are more favorites around and not all the favorites were put out, but next year, boy howdy!

I found the extra small vintage marching band uniform (left) for $5 at a flea market in the valley in September and knew it would fit the skellies just right. I dug up some academic award medals from junior high and we named him The Commodore. Later I brought the sombreros in from storage and started making the mariachi jackets.

Just wrapping a length of fake barbed wire around the chandelier made it kind of creepy.

This just goes to show you that Mavis will not be chained down.

Last year I added this headstone to the Bitterhill Boneyard. It seems some squirrels or similar chewed a bit on the "carvings" while it was in storage, so it was very roughly "repaired" before installing in the 'yard. This one went to the office, as is appropriate based on the design.

I set up all the bleeding candles in the kitchen this year. Since last year I found a couple of killer sales on these flicker flame light bulbs, so they're extra spooky now!

House decorations aside, I did get to contribute to Eric's office celebration. His team did a Mexican theme with the lucha libre and Dia de los Muertos* accents. One of his co-workers was a calavera catrina mariachi musician which worked out perfectly, because I had made mariachi jackets for our 5' skeletons to go with the mariachi hats we just happen to have on hand. Eric and Betty were a luchador team! Photos from the office courtesy of their Photo Editor, who does not know I am using them here, but probably won't mind, right?

I made Betty's costume from the ground up, then Eric's shorts, belt, and gauntlets. I had made his boot covers several years ago for a Ziggy Stardust costume, the luchador mask was a special premium from Sol Neelman's first Weird Sports book.

You may recognize headstones from the Bitterroot Boneyard.

Betty was a champion (as indicated by her belt) throughout the whole costume making and wearing process! She loved the attention and spent lots of time wagging her tail. She loves Fritz, the calavera mariachi, but his mask was throwing her off a bit.

Here's the arty, moody, movie star shot of Betty in her lucha mask! Note the antlers.

And these shots of the costume were taken by a rank amateur at home with a phone camera, but dang it... Betty is just so cute in this costume and who doesn't want to see more photos of dogs in costumes? No one I want to know about, that's for sure.

This was the first full "dress rehearsal" for La Cazadora (The Huntress)! She's fierce.

A closer look at her pink, orange, and black spangly camo pants! Note the "boots" at her ankles and her IT champions belt. Obviously, La Cazadora is a winner!

A little side-eye action modeling her mask. 

A closer look at the new parts of Eric's Diablo Rojo costume...

A champions belt to match Betty's, vinyl cauntlets to coordinate with Diablo Rojo's uniform, and shorts to keep the costume safe-for-work. Note the subtle flame motifs on the red fabric. Fun Fact: the only material purchased specifically for Eric's costume was the red-flame fabric for the shorts. The rest was from stash or left over from Betty's. WOO!

Now, Delia was not left entirely out of Halloween shenanigans, you guys. It's just that she really hates outfits and costumes and she doesn't like going to the office, either. So she celebrated by a) not doing those things and b) wearing a gross eyeball Collar Cozy and c) not holding still for a photo unless she was asleep.

*Missoula has a big Festival of the Dead celebration with a parade and activities leading up to it. We can't quite figure out how or why a place with so little other Mexican culture goes big on this, but it all just happens anyway.

Greetings from the Easter Betty and Delia, too!

I found myself madly pinning amazing Easter (and Derby) hats on pinterest last week and then got the wise idea that Betty needed a fancy Easter "bonnet."  Three dollars and an hour or so of crafting later and ta-da!

As you can see, I couldn't stop at the fancy hat and had to make her a Peter Pan collar to match!  And then I couldn't stop with just Betty and had to make Delia a Peter Pan collar, too.  Delia is our tomboy and thinks fancy hats are dumb, so instead she just got a fancy bow on her collar.

Here are some better shots of the gear:

I had just enough of this material, which I could never find another use for, to make this. It's not really a print I find super appealing, but it's perfect with her hat.  The button came from the big button box.

Delia's collar is also made entirely from materials on-hand. WOO!

These are closer to what "real life" looks like.

This was taken about 1/10th of a second before Betty dashed off to chase a bird off of the deck.  And then about two minutes later she tried to get the hat off. If her attitude about her Halloween costume taught me anything, it was that she loves wearing outfits in front of friends or at Papa's office where people are cooing at her and fawning over her, but only tolerates them a little for her very own mama at home.

Delia insists that this is how the pups are wearing them these days, but I think she's just letting the weight of the buckle on her regular collar turn her pretty outfit backwards.

A Braaaand Newwwww Car!

YEY! We finally replaced Eric's Honda Civic with a car that can be driven all the way home all year long! No more parking at the IGA in town and shuttling back and forth in Bert (the pickup). Friends. Family. I present to you, Khan.

Our new all-wheel drive car!  It's a Subaru XV CrossTrek Limited and even though I'm typing this less than 16 hours after it became ours, so far we love it.  Eric says he made it right up our steep-ish, snowy road like it was dry pavement!  Even though this is not a luxury vehicle, Khan is superior mentally, physically.  Both the driver and passenger have both bacon and email!

Khan comes standard with dispersal for basic snakes AND laser snakes!  You have to opt out of snakes in Khan.

And in conclusion:

Turkey Season is Open!

This year Mavis has gotten into the spirit of the autumn season and decided to wear Delia's turkey costume.  Now that Delia is well past her second birthday, she does't fit it anymore anyway.

And Ramon is feeling his hunter instincts kick in!  He's a conscientious guy though and made sure to don his flash orange hat. "Safety first!"