My body double

She’s a bit on the stick-straight side. She’s ditzy because her brain, well, it’s just not there. She’s not much of a dancer. She’s not much into anything really. In fact, she’s a horrible conversationalist. But what she lacks in brains or talent…or a head, she makes up for in style.

It’s my body double. V². Thank you(!) to my mother who always wanted twins.

Oh how cute. We already match. I swear I didn’t plan that. That’s how doppelgänger she is. I better quit there, seeing as I called her a ditz and pretty much lifeless earlier. Look at her trying to be just a little bit taller than me. Jealous.

I had to dress her down and cut her down to size. Har har.

Sigh. Enough already. I’m so excited to finally have a dress form. I mean, ever since I’ve been watching Project Runway it just hasn’t felt right to not have a form. All legitimate designers and seamstresses have one. Follow my logic trail.

The thing is, I’m not quite sure where to go from here. I see professional sewers (that would be people who sew, not sewage drains), using them to create garments like these:

This is a beautiful frock the lovely and cute Carol Hannah created for her Bryant Park collection. Let me just be honest. If I could create this you better believe I’d be wearing it everywhere. Even to the grocery store. And to the girls’ dance classes. And to dentist appointments. And play dates. I’d be the one they talk about…even more.

But I’ve never seen someone like me learn how to use a dress form. And we all know how cheap frugal I am. I don’t want to spend good money on fabric, even cheap fabric, and not have it turn out to be prêt-à-porter and runway ready. Add to that my tendency to want my craft projects to be perfect and I’m kind of paralyzed right now. I cannot put needle to fabric for fear that it won’t turn out right and I’ll have wasted money, time and energy.

Isn’t that what learning is about though? I mean, it took me months to get up the courage to just go ahead and make a diaper bag for myself for crying out loud. I had to literally talk out loud and convince myself that if I messed up, then that was a step in the right direction because I would be learning.

I hate using patterns. I created this diaper bag without one. I am almost always forced to use a pattern when sewing clothes though. Two skirts I have made without patterns.

Both I learned to sew by reading the Xtreme-knitting blog (she is pretty inspiring). This was in March of 2005.

I’m hoping that V² will allow me the ability to drape and fold and pleat and pin and tuck without a pattern. And more than a skirt. That would entail actually buying some fabric though. And getting over my fear of failure. And actually enjoying the learning process.

So, what should my first challenge be, if I can be so bold as to put it in Project Runway terms? And no, Kelly, I will not be making an outfit for Ashlyn using Cheerios and fruit leather. V² would get all sticky. And she’s all about me anyway.