Fashion Plate: Perky in Polka Dots

 

I've had lingerie on the brain lately.  Making underwear is a thing on my bucket list.  It needs to happen.  I'm sure once I get the first pair under my belt (lol), it won't be a THING anymore.  I love and secretly covet all of ohhhlulu's patterns, which is why I chose the Grace hipster pattern for this week's fashion plate.  It's all about details, so you can tape the side pieces together and redraw the side seams.  You'll need one of the extra seam allowances from the side piece to give you enough fabric for the tucks. I went with this jewel jersey knit in red from fabric.com.  The lace detail on the leg bands is an afterthought detail.  You can see that it was sewn directly on top of the fabric before the crotch gusset was added.  Lingerie is amazing because you need basically no fabric.  You could probably make 2 pairs of underwear with 1/2 yard of fabric depending on your size.  An hour or so and a tiny bit of fabric and you can have your own version of ModCloth's Perky in Polka Dots undies!

Souvenir Fabric: Las Vegas

 I HAD to go to Heddy's fabric in Las Vegas.  Given that this shop is the big supplier for all the fabric for shows on the strip, it seemed like Heddy's was the go to place for lingerie and swimwear fabrics.  It was.  I only left with 3 lengths of fabric.  Believe me, it was hard to leave with just that much.  They had some gorgeous Italian cotton I wanted, loads of stretch lace yardage, plenty of knits, about 300 different kinds of 4-way stretch fabric in solids and prints, bridal fabrics, a wall of silks, a shelf of tweeds, and on and on and on.  If you like fabric--especially unique fabric--definitely check Heddy's out.

 

My first selection is this raspberry 4-way stretch lycra.  I bought a yard of this to make a bombshell swimsuit.  I'm half expecting to have enough fabric left over to make a bikini too.  I think this is 108" selvedge to selvedge.  

 

This fabric was hella expensive.  I paid $27.49 for one yard.  I'm planning to make a bikini similar to ohhhlulu's zooey pattern. I prefer bandeau tops, so I'll have to modify or draft a top of my own.  I almost bought a remnant of white lycra fabric for the contrast, but I really didn't need almost a yard of white lycra too.  I can quite possibly use the raspberry leftovers for the contrast if I want.   We'll see.

 

Look at the detail of this fabric!  I love it.  The glitter is weird.  I didn't see it coming off in the store when I was browsing, which is why I bought it.  I'm noticing some glitter on my hands after taking these photos though and this is disappointing.  I'm hoping it's just transfer from the cutting counter.  There was a guy buying glittery pink fabric for a custom dress next to me.  That guy was really cool.  He actually designs and makes costumes for some of the shows on the strip.

 

Another of my favorite rayon/spandex knits. This length cost me about $15 total.  The color was different than anything I've seen locally, so I grabbed it up.

 

I'd also had a hard time finding stretch lace locally.  I'm planning to make Butterick 6031 soon.  Heddy's had a huge selection of lingerie elastic, both foldover and picot among others.  They had many different colors available and I heard from another customer than notions at Heddy's are cheaper than those at JoAnn's.

Do you buy souvenir fabric or yarn?  Leave me a link to your FOs in the comments. 

Extraterrestrial Full Moon Midnight (half) Marathon

I can't brain right now, so I'll recap my latest half marathon.

The ET run was held on the Extraterrestrial Highway near Rachel, Nevada (about 2.5 hours from Las Vegas).  This run is held on the weekend closest to the full moon in August every year and is a midnight run.  The half marathon start time was actually 12:30am on Sunday, August 10th.  Let me back up----

I arrived in Las Vegas on Wednesday, August 6th and got in a rental car to head to the Grand Canyon (will post about that another time).  I woke up at 4:45am Saturday to catch the sunrise at the Grand Canyon, got in the rental car, drove back to Las Vegas, went fabric shopping, had ice cream at Luv-It, returned the rental car, walked to the bus stop with all my camping gear on my back, got to the hotel, checked in, got to the room to find it was occupied by other people already, waited a while to get someone to bring me a new card for a new room, finally made it to a room, took a shower, walked to the bus stop off Trop, walked to the Hard Rock for packet pickup, got on one of the buses for the ride to the start line.  Note I did not say "took a nap."  My naptime was eaten away by waiting for my room.  I was most displeased.

The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino was the host hotel for the ET run.  I got to packet pickup around 7:00.  The Hard Rock is off the Strip--waaay off the Strip.  I had to walk about 1/2 mile from the bus stop to get to the hotel.  I'm glad I got to packet pickup well before it ended.  I had plenty of time to do some much-needed stretching.  I lost a lot of flexibility during my time at the Grand Canyon and I needed that time to warm up my muscles and get some of it back.  Here's my swag bag: 

 

T-shirt, Hammer nutrition propaganda , emergen-C packet & coupon, Hammer gel, race bib

At 8:30, all the runners loaded up on the buses for an 8:45 departure.  The buses were designated either "chatty" or "quiet."  I was hoping for a nap, so I chose one of the quiet buses.  I actually slept almost the entire 2.5 hour ride to the marathon & 51K starting line at the Black Mailbox.  I didn't even get out of the bus to see the mailbox.  Sleep was more important.  We still had at least an hour to the half marathon start time and I desperately needed sleep.  The half marathon starting line was a point along the the ET highway.  Just a spot.  No timing mat at the beginning or anything--just a go point.  The bus drivers kicked us off the bus at midnight and we had to crack our glow sticks and get ready to go.

 

Here I am a few minutes from go time.  I look pretty awesome in this photo.  I was actually freezing! and still kinda sleepy.

The race itself was pleasant.  I found the first 4 miles or so to be easy running.  I felt like I was climbing a neverending hill between miles 4 and 6.  I hit an eerie cold pocket of air during those miles too.  My torso was cold but my legs were warm.  Aliens.  After I got to the top of the hill, it was literally all downhill to the finish.  Unlike all my previous runs, I didn't use runkeeper.  I find that runkeeper isn't reliable when it has a good GPS signal, let alone how it would be in the middle of nowhere with a barely there cell phone signal.  I stopped to take a photo of the Extraterrestrial Highway sign just outside Rachel and was surprised to find it was 3:21am.  That meant I had 9 minutes to run just under a mile and finish in under 3 hours!

 

Not my photo (got this one from Trip Advisor)

  

Here I am at the finish!  I ended up finishing the 13.1 miles in 2:58:4-.  I made it!  A typical half marathon course has a 3 hour time limit, so that was why I was so excited to finish in under 3 hours.  I shouldn't have any issues in coming in under the time limits of any race, especially since this was my 9th!  

I don't feel like I had any issues with the elevation or the air being thinner.  My biggest challenge going into this run was trying to keep myself from becoming dehydrated.  I didn't sweat at all during the run and I couldn't tell how much fluid I was using.  I didn't want to drink too much water and become grossly bloated, but I didn't want to not drink enough and become lightheaded and dizzy either.  It all worked out in the end.  I loved this run.  It was very well organized and the whole concept was very unique.  One could tell that the race organizer is a runner herself and she knows what is important to runners in order to make the event great.  There wasn't a single thing I could think of to make this race better.  That is never the case for me.

I can't say this run was the highlight of my time in the desert, but it was definitely a great way to spend a few hours.  The medal is really great too!

Fashion Plate: Beauty and the Botanist

 

This week's Fashion Plate is ModCloth's Beauty and the Botanist skirt.  I chose Simplicity 1369 for the pattern.  The ModCloth skirt is basically a half circle skirt with a waistband and a zipper though and totally doable without a pattern.  It was hard for me to find 80s bed sheet fabric!  I went with this organic cotton by Cloud 9.

Fashion Plate: Twinkling at Twilight

 

I'm on my way to Vegas tomorrow!  I put this fashion plate together based on what I think I would wear on a fancy date (or something) in Las Vegas.  I love ModCloth's Twinkling at Twilight dress.  Mostly, I love the back cutout.  I think low backs look funny on me right now given all my weird tan lines from running, but that doesn't mean I can't dream!  The bodice shaping is weird on the ModCloth dress.  It doesn't use darts or princess seams at all.  Instead, the middle of the bodice has slight ruching for shaping.  I chose the Belledone pattern for this fashion plate.  I know it isn't a perfect match, but I'm playing off my favorite feature.  I found this gold brocade on Mood and I would totally make this dress in this fabric if money were no object.  Besides, "It's Vegas, Baby!" 

I'm looking forward to visiting Heddy's fabric while I have the rental car on Saturday.  I'm specifically going to look for swimwear and lingerie fabric.  I figure Heddy's outfits Vegas, so she'll have whatever I need in the stretchy fabrics department.  I don't think I mentioned my actual itinerary on the blog before?  I'm camping at the Grand Canyon on Thursday & Friday nights, hence the need for a rental car.  I'll be staying in Vegas Saturday through Tuesday-ish.  I'm still trying to determine what to fill my Vegas days with cost-benefit wise.  Everything seems so expensive.  :-/

Happy Tuesday and enjoy your week!