three-quarter sleeves

Masquerade Gown with Sparkly Pink Bodice, Red Velvet Trim and Blue Flowered Skirt with Cream Ribbon

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A masquerade gown with a sparkly, light pink bodice The neckline is off the shoulders and slightly V-shaped, and is trimmed with a line of light blue ribbon ribbon. The sleeves are three-quarter, and their edges are trimmed with more blue ribbon. There are long ruffles attached to the edges of the sleeves, and they are dark red and decorated with large, lighter red swirls. The bodice extends over the top of the skirt and is gathered at one hip, decorated with a cream-colored bow. From the bow, four rows of ruffles fall towards the base of the skirt like a waterfall. Each one is dark red and decorated with large, lighter red swirls. The skirt is light blue with an apple blossom pattern. The flowers are cream, pink and dark red, and are interspersed with white butterflies. The skirt is long, and falls to the floor.Click for larger version (PNG); click for PDF version. Click here for the list of dolls.

Sparkle Week continues! I must admit that everything I know about making fabric sparkle in Photoshop I learned from the Disney princesses. Yesterday was sparkles over dark color, today is sparkles over light color. I made this brush myself, too, with help from this tutorial. The pattern on the red fabric is from Pixels & Ice Cream, and the pattern on the skirt is from flashtuchka’s Vintage Floral Patterns.

I’m very annoyed by how Photoshop handles brushes and patterns. I always find myself saving and losing brushes, and if I download a pattern set I have to remember how to credit it. It’s all very kludgy, it seems to me. Am I doing things wrong? Is it improved in future versions? (After all, I’m using CS2, which was released in 2005…)

Aqua 1950s V-Neck Dress from A Dress A Day

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Click for larger version; click for the list of dolls.

I e-mailed Erin from A Dress A Day last week and submitted my blog for her Linktastic Fridays, and today, when she posted it, my traffic went waaaay up. Since I started I’ve gotten maybe a hundred, two hundred hits a day, and on Friday, over a thousand! My stats graph looks like a cute little worm sticking its head up and looking around curiously.

A Dress A Day always makes me wish I could sew. I can’t sew well, and I’ve thought recently of taking a class, but it is a little hard to be all that enthusiastic about it when two hours with the Prismacolors will get me a dress, done exactly as I wish it, with divine colors and as much lace, frills, jewels and amazing fabric as I care to lavish on for rather less than I’d pay for the real thing. And if I can’t wear it, Sylvia can, and that way it never gets dirty or torn. If I had carte blanche and a personal dressmaker, I would wear things like this all day, but as it is I have colored pencils, and that works for me. Anyways, this dress is based off of one on Erin’s page, although it’s more aqua and the collar isn’t quite right.

On a sadder note, I think we are entering the last days of my scanner. (You can kind of see the banding on the skirt, and that’s because I messed around with the placement; when I scanned it as I always do, the banding was VERY apparent…) Hopefully we’ll pick up a new one soon enough that I won’t have to miss any days. (I do a lot of the days in advance and post them later thanks to WordPress, but right now, I’m not any days ahead…)