Over the last year I’ve been trying to lose some weight, so far I’ve lost 57lbs and I have about another 38 to go. Well over the halfway mark I’m confident I can do it, but it’ll be tricky especially with my love for sweets and the stress I’ve been feeling. Of course the lost weight does make me feel good, down two sizes in clothing, and a noticeable difference to my face and shoulders, but I was hoping for a little more energy to do the creative things I want to do. That said these things don’t happen “magically” they happen with time and patience.

Part of my inspiration for losing the weight has been to feel good, and to be able to stick around for my kids as long as possible. I had them when I was older (much older than I wanted to be) so I worry sometimes I’ll miss everything if I don’t get a handle on my health. The other part was a desire to do one thing before I’m just too “old” to do it and that’s cosplay Princess Serenity. I have wanted to do it since I was a teenager (and while I would have looked much better as her as a teen) I never had the money or the patience to really do it so I would constantly say “next year”. Last halloween when things didn’t go right I ended up sewing my own Star Wars costume, and honestly I’m super proud of it. It’s not perfect and I see places I could have done better, but it’s mine and I did it.

So what have I been afraid of? I have the money (adult money is scary) and while I still worry about my patience to do a project where I don’t have a very specific formula or outline. I’m kind of excited.

All this to say I’ll be sewing Princess Serenity’s dress, and making her crescent moon staff (hopefully) and I thought I would take you along for the journey. I have a lot of design ideas in mind but one of my favourite inspirations for her dress was the sketch this person had done. I love the layering of the skirt, I love the look of the bow, and the beading for the top of the dress. (https://pin.it/Hkq8S10GA)

Of course I want to have the circles be in the gold instead of silver or white, and I’d like to do the back bow in a pale pink. I’m hoping to get the bow to be stiff, one of the things I like about pictures of Serenity are the bows being very large and not flopped down more stiff.

I’ll also not be doing the sleeves, as much as the sleeves are part of Princess Serenity’s dress, I’m not really interested in having them, I’ve never been a fan of the sleeves and this is meant to be my version of the dress and not a perfect copy of the actual dress.

To get the skirt layering right I’ll be doing many layers, one main layer, two over layers of the same length, and then two more where they are shorter in the front, like the picture beside. All aimed to keep the dress looking very flowy.

As part of the design I’m hoping to work on the crescent moon wand. Similar to the new(ish) Sailor moon crystal, I want the staff instead of the wand, but unlike Crystal, I still want the 90s style wand, yellow crescent, pink wand, pretty little crystal.

The item I have to decide on is if I use Clay to make the wand, or if I go the 3D printed route. Both options have their own challenges, but hopefully the end result will be worth it.

So, as I venture into the project, I’ll keep track of my progress and post here along the way, now don’t mind me, I’m going to go recklessly spend my adult money on shiny objects.

Until next time…