January HSM Challenge – Dressed to the Nines

January: Dressed to the Nines: make something fancy so you’ll be ‘dressed to the nines’ – whether its the full outfit, or a little accessory. Or look at the challenge in a different way, and make something from a year ending in 9 (find a portrait or fashion plate or mention to support the date), or even an item with 9 major design elements (9 buttons down the front, 9 tucks in a petticoat etc)

This is an exciting challenge!  I have sooooo many ideas running around in my brain, none of them practical.  Especially since I am still trying to finish with late Christmas gifts.

My first thought was, “if I can’t dress myself to the nines, why not dress dolly-dear to the nines”? Some time ago Franklin Habit ‘translated’ the knitting patterns from the 26th series of Weldon’s Practical Knitting for an extensive dolly outfit (part I & Part II).

If you are unfamiliar with Franklin Habit, you should look him up.  He is wonderful!  I have had the honor and pleasure of attending one of his historical knitting classes in February 2018.

Now, because I am still frantically trying to finish Christmas knitting, I don’t know if I will actually get the time to even start working on this ensemble. My backup plan is to make a Beatrix Potter skirt using a pattern attributing it to the date of 1909.

I don’t have a skirt from this time, I want a skirt from this time and the date has TWO 9’s in it.  (aren’t I clever?)  I ordered the pattern from Amazon Dry goods.com, we will just have to see how long it takes to arrive…

Just got an email update.  It has been shipped!  Aaaaaaand… I see that the local fabric store has a coupon for 50% off one cut of fabric.  Perhaps I should go fabric shopping at lunchtime.  😀