suffragette dress diary

Hi everybody!  I'm having a blast working on my new dress for the suffragette picnic, so I decided to make a dress diary so that I could blog about my progress.

Check out my Festive Attyre blog if you'd like to follow along!

Shakespeare in the Park: OCT 16, 2010

Shakespeare in the Park of Dallas presents: The Two Gentlemen of Verona

Here Ye! Here Ye! Join us October 16^th, 2010 as we have the pleasure to attend Dallas’ Shakespeare in the Park in Addison Circle at 7:00PM.  The players will be showing The Two Gentlemen of Verona.  Those in attendance are able to bring food and drink for a lovely picnic during the show.  Are you a CURRENT member of the DFWCG?  As a paid DFWCG member you may purchase a discounted ticket in advance for $8.  Non members can also purchase tickets in advance for $10.  Check out www.dfwcg.org for more ticket info in the next few weeks. In the Shakespearean spirit costumes are encouraged to be around the Elizabethan/Tudor/Renaissance Era.  The play itself has a very Italian theme so think Italian renaissance to really get in the mood.  Need some ideas? Craft Store patterns are below:
http://www.simplicity.com/p-1576-costumes.aspx
 http://www.simplicity.com/p-2009-costumes.aspx
http://www.simplicity.com/p-1547-costumes.aspx
http://www.simplicity.com/p-2022-costumes.aspx  

http://www.simplicity.com/p-2089-costumes.aspx

http://mccallpattern.mccall.com/m5155-products-6518.php?page_id=493

http://mccallpattern.mccall.com/m5444-products-7840.php?page_id=915

http://mccallpattern.mccall.com/m5647-products-8938.php?page_id=915

Suffragette Picnic

Good new! Although we hit a snag with the Liberty Fest thing, the suffragette event is back on! We have moved the venue to Chestnut Square, which is a beautiful little historical site close to downtown McKinney. We are planning to set up a suffragette booth at their farmers market, and then we'll have a private picnic at noon when the market ends. I am SO excited about this event, and I am thrilled that we found such a welcoming host at Chestnut Square.  

I had the idea of bringing paint and extra ribbon so that people could paint their own "votes for women" ribbons to wear. It would be a fun way to occupy our time, and I think even some of the random market folks might want to get in on the fun. I figured that I would just buy some cheap floral ribbon and make a stencil that people could use for painting.  

When I was looking for examples of banners, I stumbled across a FABULOUS suffragette site that I hadn't seen before. It has an overview of the suffrage movement in America and an image gallery of various suffragette stuff that was really helpful. Some of us were wondering what colors were used for the banners back then, and the answer seems to be mainly yellow or gold, but purple and white were used extensively as well, and purple/white/green was also used occasionally (those were from the British movement). I also think I'm going to paint a copy of one of those posters and it would be cool to have a banner with a slogan on it too. And I was going to print up some fliers with one of the propaganda illustrations from this site and a quote from one of the speeches. Can you tell that I'm excited about this? ;)  

After the market is over, we can relax and have fun doing other various Edwardian activities. I thought about bringing cards or dominoes so we could play some games. If anybody else has any ideas, I'd love to hear them!