My shire held it's first event of the year yesterday, and in classic fashion, I was up until 1am the night before trying to finish off my garb. As in happens, it wasn't finished, but it was wearable, so I got away with it for the day.

 

The handy thing about the unfinished items is that they were mostly invisible. But in the interest of disclosure, here's what has to be done: 

• Straps: These need to be shortened. I was pulling them up constantly during the day, and it was doing my head in. I may need to make them tighter than a "just right" fit, as clothing tends to slide off my shoulders constantly anyway. 
• Hem: The hem of the dress was cut to the correct length and I tried not to point out it's unfinishedness to too many people. Funnily though, the centre crease line from the wool (it also didn't get ironed) made a nice feature. 
• Skirt split: Hidden by the pleating of the skirt is a short split so I can fit into the dress. I cut this with a pinking shears to save it, but it'll need to be finished off properly. The linen lining won't be so forgiving. 
• Lacing: On an aesthetic point on view, I had to use a ribbon on the day, but I'd much prefer a hand made cord. I have a cord on the lucet at the moment, but I'm far from having it long enough yet. 

The fixings aside, this is a very warm and comfy dress. I look forward to wearing it again.


Marbles update! A week has passed and I think the marbles are finally fully dried. I transferred them to a larger sheet and over the course of the week rolled them about a few times to be sure any wet sides were turned up to the air. Not it's time for the next step.

To make a shellac polish,  it's as simple as dissolving shellac flakes in alcohol.

My ingredient for this are shown to the right. A clean jar with a good seal in the lid, shellac flakes (I used blond shellac as it's what I had available) and methylated spirits.

The solution needs to be made up in a 1:4 ratio of shellac to spirits, so I used 10g of shellac and 40g of spirits. Seal the jar well, shake occasionally, and leave to dissolve. This should take about 24 hours. The resulting solution can be thinned out a little with more alcohol if necessary.