Me vs the English language

The pattern I used, Simplicity 3782, is on the far left. I paid $17.95 for it.

As I've already told you, I'm from Finland and my native language is Finnish. I've studied English at school since I was nine. I know the basics and I can make myself understood in everyday situations. I can read books in English without much (or any!) help from the dictionary. And I thought that I would manage with English sewing instructions. How foolish of me. Sewing this dress has been a constant struggle with the English language. The English sewing words confused me. It was challenging, but fun and I learned loads. 

I started by making an underskirt. That was quite easy, and I hadn't nearly any difficulties following the instructions. Simplicity recommends that a hoopskirt should be used with this dress. I don't own one, and I wasn't willing to purchase one, so I used an extra underskirt made out of very thin foam. It once belonged to my aunt. In these photos I have it under the underskirt. 

That orange looks hideous, but I did save some money by not buying red fabric for the entire underskirt :D

I made a bumroll following the instructions, but ended up not using it. It made the dress look bigger than in the movie.

 

Bumroll

Here's the dress with the bumroll...

...and here it is without it.

The picture above was taken on the mornig of our schools annual "costume party". You can see the entire costume in it. I think the golden fabric looks really great. I didn't waste all those hours I used textile printing the pattern on it after all!

 Sewing the underskirt was just a warm-up for sewing the bodice and the sleeves. For one thing, I had picked the wrong size, and I had to scale down everything. There was also the question of how I was going to get into my costume. If I'd follow the pattern, the dress would have buttons on the front. But if I that was the case, what would happen to the golden front panel? Another option was to put a keychain to the back of the dress. That would possibly make it difficult to get my hands trough the sleeves. After some thinking (this happened late at night, mind you) my mum and I came up with a "creative" idea. I'm not going to the details (they're nothing important because I don't recommend this option to you), but lets just say it included safety pins and velcro.

The sleeves had to be scaled down as well. I used golden and black fabrics and ribbons made out of the same red fabric I used for the underskirt. I glued some red rhinestones to the red ribbons (this happened at 1:30 AM!). I made the puffs a lot bigger than they were in Simplicitys pattern. I made the pattern to the black and white cuffs myself, using - once again - textile printing.

Next some details: the white collar and the golden front panel. The front panel was quite simple to make. I cut two triangles of golden fabric and one of buckram and sewed them together, making one triangle that was golden on both sides. Then I created some red lines by sewing very thickset stitches with red thread. I added rhinestones and plastic pearls for decoration.

The collar was something of a challenge, because it needed to stay up almost horizontally. I used thin foam sewed inside fabric to give the collar some structure and stiffnes. The collar had to be made a lot bigger than in the original pattern. 

Here you can see the collar and the front panel

Finally I attached the golden skirt part to the bodice. When all this was done, I was pretty tired of sewing and the ridiculously mysterious sewing instructions. 

One of our cats (we have six of them) fell in love with my pincushion. I just had to take a picture :)

Hejsan från Sverige!

 

I had the time of my life in Sweden! Our field trip there was amazing! It really brought our class together. We had a great time together and shared some unforgettable moments. On top of it all, Sweden was breathtakingly beautiful! Everything was green and the trees were full of flowers. The houses we saw there were small and cute, and everyone seemed to take excellent care of their gardens.  I took nearly 600 photos, some of which you're about to see in this post.

The Swedish language sounded lovely, we just didn't always understand what people were saying to us. Every time we would tell them that we didn't speak Swedish, they would give us this knowing look and say: "Finland". I guess they see a lot of Finnish tourist that don't speak Swedish there. Swedish is one of  Finlands two official languages, and it is taught in every school in Finland. However, this doesn't guarantee that everyone in Finland would speak fluent Swedish. Many students have a bad attitude towards studying the language - and even some adults have something against Swedish being a core subject at school. I've studied Swedish for nearly three years, and personally I think that no harm can come from studying a language. After all, everyone doesn't speak English, so it's good to be able communicate with some other languages as well.

I loved every moment of our journey, and I hope that it could have lasted longer. In years to come, I will alway remember this as one of the best experiences of my life. So, without further ado, here's a day-by-day account of my week in Sweden.

Day 1

We left from our school at 9.45 and drove about 570 kilometres by bus. You could think that sitting in a bus for hours would be boring and annoying, but not this time. We talked, joked and laughed. And took a lot of photos and videos. Our destination was a on the west coast of Finland. Our ship left from there at 20.00. We didn't really have time to do anything else there but eat in the buffet, have a quick look around the tax-free shop and then go get some sleep. The ship would arrive in Stockholm very early the next morning. Each of us was given a Svenska språkpass to be filled during the field trip.

Day 2

We travelled from Stockholm to Gotland via Nynäshamn. This ment more travelling by ship. It suited me fine. I love the sea. I could spend hours watching sun light play on the water surface. I got an idea for my next costume project while admiring the reflecting light. I'm not going to tell  what it is. You'll find out soon.

We ate lunch in a cosy small restaurant in Visby. After that we saw our hotel for the first time. It wasn't really a hotel, it was more like a hostel. It was previously a living place for the workers of some kind of factory. It was a quite nice place to stay, but the other customers (both of them) were, well, interesting. It seemed that they had stayed there for a longer time.

In the afternoon we had some free time in Visby, the only city on the island. I bought some clothes and a book: Harry Potter och Hemligheternas kammare (Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets). The weather was great, so instead of spending the whole time in shops, I walked along the streets and visited a park with my friend.

Day 3

My camera's battery died halfway through our third day, so I couldn't take photos of the beautiful viewes we saw after we left the caves. :(

On day 3 we left our hotel in the morning and headed towards Lummelundagrottan. Our visit there included a short feature about caves, information on the ice age, and a tour in the cave. It was very beautiful in there. There were small areas filled with dark, running water, like a creek. Stalactites hang from the cave roof. We were strictly forbidden to touch anything. It would have been imbossiple to see there if the route hadn't been illuminated with electric lights. The guide spoke both Swedish and English, which was great, because otherwise we would have missed a big part of what she was saying. She told us about the cave being found by three boys some 50 or 60 years ago  While we were there, it was hard to understand that we really were underground. It felt as thought we were just indoors. It was a bit chilly there. 

For the afternoon we went to a little island outside Gotland. There we walked along (or more likely climbed on) reefs. I've never felt more in peace with the world than on that day. I sat on a reef and looked at the wide sea infront of me and the reef extending to as far as I could see to my left and right. Surrounded by all that, I felt very small and insignificant. My worries were just particles of dust in the vast universe.

Day 4

We spent a day in Visby. First we walked along the side of Visby city wall. We climbed far too many stairs up to a tower. We were able to see all of Visby from there, but standing too near the barriers aroun the top of the tower made me feel a bit nervous. 

We also visited a botanical garden. It wasn't at its best, since it was May, but it was still a very beautiful place. The very first picture of me in this post was taken there. 

The old part of Visby was amazing, with all these small houses with doors and windows much lower than they normally are and flowers planted on the sides of the streets. We visited an old church. We couldn't see all of it, beacause it was being repaired. After that, we had some free time to wonder around in Visby. My friend and I accidentally walked to the wrong direction at one point and got momentarily lost, but then we found our way back. It was a nice little adventure anyway. Oh, and if you are wondering about the bird, it's a new friend of mine.

Day 5

We left Gotland far too early in the morning, and headed to Stockholm. We ate at a restaurant which was on the top storey of one of the highest buildings in Sweden. The food there was great! Then we had some free-time in Stockholm. I went shopping with my friends (obviously), but I bought only a bag. It was insanely cheap: 99 crowns, which is about 11 euros. We visited a candy shop that was like from a movie or a book (like Honydukes in Harry Potter). I didn't buy anything there, just took some photos. Stockholm was just the kind of place I want to live in: it had old and beautiful buildings, the best shops, and the best of all, lots of different people. This may need an explanation: I live in the countryside, 4 kilometers away from the nearest village and 24 kilometres away from the nearest town. And this place just doesn't have the versatility of big cities. I want to live somewhere where the word "mainstream" doesn't exist, because everyone is truly who they are. Now don't take this as if I don't like where I live. There are just places I'd rather live in, you know?

In the evening we had another magnificent dinner in the ships buffet. I had a little language-misunderstanding-confuse-thing with one waiter. First I tried to speak Swedish to him, but then I realised that I didn't know how to ask for a piece of  roast beef in Swedish, so I changed into English. Then I thought, that since it's a ship going to Finland, perhaps the waiter would speak Finnish. And so he did.  When I left with my roast beef, he looked at me like I was crazy.

Day 6

Me and the Panda mascot :3

Back to home! Nothing really interesting happened, just sitting in the bus. Most of us were really tired after many nights of too little sleep.  We visited a factory outlet of a Finnish sweetsmaker, Panda. I had a ballet lesson in the afternoon, and you can imagine that my concentration wasn't at it's best. When I was finally home I was tired, but also happy.

So, thats all about my memorable field trip. Since then I've complited secondary school with pretty good grades, been accepted to high school (the one that speciliazes in drama education!) and relaxed on summer holidays. Have a nice summer everyone! <3 :)