A Little House Weekend: Day Two

We started out on the Saturday of our Little House themed costume weekend with ice skating at the Landmark Center rink in downtown St. Paul. Sabrina, Rebecca, and I were joined by my local friend Erin. My daughter joined us as well. She loves to dress up and to skate!

I didn't bring my camera to the rink, so many thanks to Sabrina and Rebecca for these (and many other) photos!

I wore my old brown and blue wool again, plus my faux-fur trimmed muff and capelet and some new yellow gloves. 

I cannot tell if the yellow gloves are fun and bright or just look like I bought them at the Fleet Farm for doing my yard work. 

I like this one because it looks like we are going very fast!

Lots and lots of people took our picture.

After skating, we had lunch at the St. Paul Grill, part of the historic Saint Paul Hotel. Then I frantically drove home, then went to the grocery store, and started cooking. 

Our Main Event of the weekend was the Saturday night house party. Many other friends joined us! I hosted in my home, a 1918 bungalow, which I tried to make look less modern. Mostly this means hiding the toys.

I had never hosted a costumed event at home before, though I have always wanted to! I really enjoyed the experience and I think I learned a lot for next time.

My vision for the evening was lifted directly from the Dance at Grandpa's chapter of Little House in the Big Woods: a small house bursting with people, full of voices and laughter, the glow of oil lamps, simple wholesome food, and everyone dressed in their rustic country best. 

I re-oriented my dining table to make it go the long way, added an extra table from the basement, and covered them both with one long cloth (which Sabrina helpfully ironed for me!)

I felt the need to put doilies everywhere. The lamps came from Ace Hardware.

I brought up my homemade hard cider and we all had a toast to friends!

In advance (a few days before) I cooked boiled potatoes, cabbage with onions, vegetable pasties, and whole wheat bread. On the day, I roasted a chicken, baked two pounds of Lake Superior trout, and steamed some butternut squash. There was also apple butter, cheese, and butter, which I did a somewhat crappy job of molding in a measuring cup, so it wouldn't be stick-shaped.

Dinner was served at the table, very informally! My husband Marc carved our roast chicken for us.

Part of where I cheated: I do realize that the Ingalls did not have Pyrex. In the planning phase, I had hoped to get some prettier/more historic dishes and more decor, but in the end, the pans I already owned plus my plain white IKEA plates did the job. I had a few thrift store pieces for serving that helped round out the table. 

I had never tried to light my house with just candle and lamplight before. I had 12 candles and two oil lamps total, and it worked surprisingly well. The atmosphere was magical.

I loved the oil lamps and I can see why the were so popular. Compared to candles, they were so neat and clean - no spilled wax! - and gave a very bright light.

I did have some concern with all the open flames, especially with kids! That is why the bright red fire extinguisher makes a cameo in nearly every single photo here. I also had two windows fully open so I didn't give us all carbon monoxide poisoning, and of course I had the detector plugged in. The weather was unseasonably warm, probably about 40 F, so even with the windows open it didn't feel chilly.

At the end of the table you can just barely see my daughter and her best friend enjoying dinner with us!

I spent a lot of the evening running around getting things ready, but here I am sitting down and eating! I wore my 1883 green print dress, because it's Little House-y, comfy, and easy to wear for work and dancing!

After dinner, we moved the tables and got to dancing. I don't have any pictures of the actual dancing, because I was doing all of them! We had 8 dancers at the most (counting the 2 kids) so we couldn't do too many. I didn't have a program and made it up as I went along. My awesome dancer friend Amy was there to help guide people. 

Our amazing musician friends, Tom and Kathleen, brought the entire evening alive. I cannot thank them enough for being there!

My dance background is Irish ceili, which isn't exactly what Laura Ingalls would have done, but it's what I know and it's close enough! We started with an open waltz just warm up, then did a Haymaker's Jig and a Siege of Ennis. I can't remember the exact order, but we danced a Rustic Reel and a Bonfire Reel also.

Halfway through there was a dessert break. In advance I baked two pies, apple and pumpkin, and a big jar of sugar cookies with nutmeg and cinnamon. More drinks and treats!

Amy and I pieced together a modified polka set from a couple of our usual dances. It was amazing! I love a polka. We finished the evening with another waltz. Well, actually two, because as our musicians were playing the first one, we were all just talking. Oops. So we asked for one more!

Altogether I think we had 12 for dinner. In my over-a-year-ago plan I had expected a much bigger crowd, but many people were unable to make the trip and some local folks couldn't make it. However, I almost ran out of chairs for the group we did have, and I am not sure I could have fit more! We might not have been able to make it a sit-down dinner. My little house was full to bursting.

I hated to see the evening end. Nothing is ever perfect, but this was pretty damn close.

There was one more day of costumed adventures coming up, though!

Also see: A Little House Weekend: Day One and A Little House Weekend: Day Three

A Little House Weekend: Day One

Last weekend I hosted a costumed weekend-long event with a Little House In The Big Woods theme. I had been planning this event for about 18 months. That is quite a while, I know! But we wanted to get a date settled for anyone who wanted to travel in from out of town to participate.

Since I knew some folks would be traveling, I planned an entire 3-day weekend of fun to make it worth their while!

On Friday, Sabrina and Rebecca flew in from Winnipeg and Seattle, respectively, and we all dressed up for a luncheon at W. A. Frost on Selby Ave. in St. Paul.

Here I am looking goofy as usual. I was just so excited! I am wearing my new plum wool gown, which I hope to give its own post later.

Patti joined us for lunch.

And so did Sarah and baby.

They still had christmas stuff up, including this beautiful tree. I LOVE CHRISTMAS.

After a delicious lunch, three of us headed a few blocks down to the James J. Hill House, our local schmancy-pants mansion. 

I purposely ran ahead of Sabrina and Rebecca just so I could snap this picture from the front door carriage step, with the St. Paul Cathedral in the background.

We spent a little while running around taking photos of each other, inside the house and out, before our tour.

The house is wonderfully restored throughout the majority of the rooms. We had an extensive tour. Our guide was very knowledgeable and tons of fun! We didn't all take pictures of every room, or even most of them, there were just too many! But here are some highlights.

This giant organ is definitely an attractive feature.

Here is the main hall. The main entrance is to the right. That double staircase to the left leads up to. . .

This awesome landing!

From where we are standing you can see the beautiful stained glass windows. This is just a few of them.

A photo of Mrs. Hill.

Some knitted lace. I wish I had asked if this was an original item and if we knew who knitted it! It looks like one of the many lace edgings seen here at this website of vintage patterns.

This glass area above the art gallery let in lots of lovely natural light.

The formal dining room was covered with intricately carved woodwork and had an actual gold ceiling and tooled leather on the walls.

This ended up getting so long I am going to split my weekend posts into a few parts. Saturday is up next!

See also: A Little House Weekend: Day Two and A Little House Weekend: Day Three

A Cage Crinoline for the early 1860s

Back in February my sister and I made a plan to attend the annual LHS Winter Ball. I was able to outfit her in an 1860s ballgown, but that left me with nothing to wear! I needed not only a gown, but a set of undies as well.

I was never perfectly happy with my pink toile hoopskirt from back in 2008. I made it from Simplicty 7216, and the shape always seemed a little weird to me. Before I made another hoopskirt, I looked at some period images to get a better idea of what kind of shape I was looking for.

Costumers often refer to hoops in two basic categories: round and elliptical. Round hoopskirts have the fullness all around, with a round bottom hoop. Elliptical ones have more fullness thrown toward the back, with a slightly oval bottom hoop. However, historic examples show more variation. You can follow a basic timeline of hoop changes, but keep in mind that photographs show a more complex story. There were many different hoop manufacturers making many different shapes, so while you can create a sweeping arc of general trends, there will always be room for odd differences.

Note: In the period, the terms hoopskirt, hoop petticoat, crinoline, and cage crinoline all described support undergarments with hoops of steel or other stiffener. For this blog post, I am just going to refer to any of these garments as a "hoopskirt."

Hoops in the 1850s evolved from the dome shape of the 1840s. This shape was very full and round over the hips, with a line that hung straight down to the floor as it reached the hem.

dress 1858

While the shape is a dome, examples also exist with more fullness toward the back.

Balmoral hoop skirt 1858

By the 1860s, the shape had become slightly more triangular, with less fullness over the hips, a larger hem circumference, and more angled sides. The dome shape is starting to dwindle.

Hoopskirt 1864

Hoopskirt 1860

After 1864, the "elliptical" shape emerges: even flatter over the hips, almost straight in front with lots of fullness in back, and a strong triangular line. The dome effect is almost gone, and the bottom circumference is very large.

Elliptical silhouette

In 1867-8, there was a brief fad for a very small, triangular hoopskirt paired with a slightly raised waist. The look was very narrow, with a straight, angular line and very little fullness over the hips.

Narrow triangular hoop silhouette 1867-8

After I spent some time looking at examples, I felt that the most flattering shape for me was more domed than triangular, but since my event was set in the 1860s, I tried to compromise with something rounded, but still flatter than that super-full 1850s dome. I was aiming for a moderate hem circumference of about a 112.

I started out with my old hoopskirt and a measuring tape. I measured the bottom hoop and the length from my waist to the floor while wearing it. Then I set the old hoop aside and started playing with numbers. I used the tape measure around my body for some rough estimates and did a little math to make things even.

I cut 16 lengths of twill tape, doubled them so I had 8 pairs, and marked them for sewing the hoop channels. I sewed the channels on the machine about every 6 inches to make space for 7 hoops.

I cut the hoops roughly to size and inserted them in the twill tape casings. I knew I would have to trim some off later, but I wasn't worried about wasting hoop wire (much) because 6 out of the 7 hoops came from old projects I took apart and salvaged.

Then came the fun part! I put it on the dress form and started playing with it! At first it looked pretty crazy:

Then it started looking a little better, sort of:

And eventually started shaping up into a hoopskirt! I added a waistband somewhere in there and trimmed off some of the excess twill tape.

I took it off the form to attach the ends of the hoops together.

First I tipped the bone ends with rubber tips, then overlapped and sewed them together with strong craft thread.

The finished hoopskirt!

I made a new petticoat with a large flounce to go over this hoop. It's amazing to see the difference in the shape with a petticoat over it! I love the side silhouette. There's none of that weird bump my old hoop had, and the size is just right for me: not too big, not too small.

I am very pleased with it. It was light and easy to dance in. I was a little worried about putting a foot through it but that didn't happen. I might still go back and add a fabric hem to prevent this in the future.

To be completely ready for the ball, I also needed a dress, of course! That will be a separate post. Until next time!