My Colonial outfitt

 Now that I finally have access to all my pictures since they have been transfered to my new laptop I thought I would do a proper post about my colonial(1771-1776) outfit. I have worn it many times for french and indian and american revolutionary war reenactments as well as volunteering at a historical 1771 farm. Last time I wore it was in August volunteering at the local farm which has reenactors live like a family would have in 1771. I made this outfit I guess in august and september of 2010, but never got around to doing a proper photo shoot of the garments. So here you go! :)

I used white linen for the gown which I dyed lavendar for the gown using the J. P. Ryan Pattern.  I could not find any linen online that was the color I wanted, so I dyed it myself. They would have done this anyway, so I did. But yes its not a period dye, its rit dye, but hey it works. :)

I sewed the whole dress by hand except for the indside seems, so all those pleats in the skirt are by hand. The neck kerchief is cotton, but I plan to make a linen one soon when I volunteer again or have another event to attend. The grey petticoat is also linen and I did not use a pattern for it, I just pleated the skirt into the waist band. A good book about this can be found here, it has diagrams and drawings of all kinds of garments form the period. When my sister and I and are friends and family went to Williamsburg for our graduation in 2010 we were also able to study many garments. We found the book on that trip as well.

My cap was made by the lovely Sarah Jane over at Romantic History. She was having a sale of many of her own garments she had made for living history and I jumped on the cap because I was running out of time before an even to make one actually. In the future I will probably make a second one to have one hand if I volunteer more at the farm.

The apron is also linen and I just made it up. :) I saw pictures and drawings and just cut out a rectangle and sewed it into a waist band. Its pretty easy. I am not wearing shoes as I do not have period shoes yet. I have been using my civil war boots to tell you the truth. I don't do much colonial reenacting so I was not willing to invest the money in a nice pair yet. I got a thrift store pair for the farm since we do a lot of messy work.

I will be posting photos of my new regency gown as well soon once I can do a photo shoot. I finished it in September in time for us to do the Defenders day reenactment at Fort McHenry. So pictures coming soon! You will see lots of stripes and lots of blue! Blue is my favorite color. :)

In Christ,

Rebecca