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A wee bit of catch up to do here I’m afraid. First off, in my own defence, I’ve worked on average 75 hours per week since my last blog post. To put it in perspective, that’s more than twice what the average person works in a week. When I work an eight hour day, I feel like I’m getting off at lunch time. So, think about it… what does that leave time for? Well, I have to sit down and pay bills, make invoices, go to the bank, and get groceries. I have to make meals for my daughter and I, clean up after, feed my cat, do laundry, and vacuum. I have to shower, dress, sleep and do pilates. I have to fill Buggy Bag orders, tweet and post to the Buggy Bag fb page. Yeah… you get the idea…there’s not been a whole lot of time left to blog! I’ve been off now for 2 weeks. Some of that time was spent recuperating from the last 5 months. Some of it was spent blowing off steam with my friends. I went to the Cloverdale Rodeo, several parties and over to the island for a night.
I’ve sold out of Large size Black Lap Blankets! I’ve put in a new PO with the factory and should be receiving the new shipment by September, just in time for the cold weather. Toys ‘R’ Us (.ca) has increased their re-oder amount steadily since they took on the stroller and jogger blankets, so that’s good news for me, however, I still can’t for the life of me find the product through any search on their site!!! I wonder how they’re selling them.
I missed the Abilities Expo at the Roundhouse this year because I was working on a movie, which upset me, because I really enjoy that event. I did get to go to the Recreational Resource Fair at GF Strong
though, which was really fun. The pic above is of David from Vivify. It was nice to see his big smile from where I was sitting this year. I also, had a great chat with the author of a blog called Priority Seating. Check it out.
I have done more than that, obviously, but, it’s past my bedtime, so, that’ll be for another day.
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Really, it wasn’t one of those “wow.. that was quite the Gong Show” sort of events. It was a fundraiser for Interfit Integrated Fitness Society. It’s an event that I not only attended last year, but will likely become known as a ‘regular’ at in the future. This years’ event was themed as a ‘Gong Show’, with lots of entertainers attempting to upstage one another in front of a panel of judges, with mallet ready to strike the gong. There were the good, the bad and the ugly, and the utterly breathtaking, rocking and hypnotizing. It was sheer entertainment.
Silent Auction Table
My friend Rina from LiddleWorks came with me, and we bought a glass of wine and began making our way along the super long table sporting all of the donated items that were up for silent auction. There were a huge variety of items ranging from vacation get-a-ways, original art, jewelry, sports accessories, and of course there was my very own contribution, Cairns Technical Gear (aka. buggy bag, story to follow) Wheelchair Blanket,… oh, and not to forget the huge beanbag cushion. Lots of cool stuff. We bid on many items and then staked out a seat on the groovy low white leather ottomans in the centre of the room. All the couch seats were already gone, or we would have been there.
Rina and me
Looks like I’m making some wise-crack out of the corner of my mouth….
All the volunteers at the event were dressed in 70’s outfits, some of which were just stellar.
Gong Show MC
We were also entertained by a very handsome man who kept bringing little yummy bits over for us to sample.
Yummy.... um... hors d'œuvres...
One of the entertainers that really stick out in my mind was a very young guitar player that played so beautifully, in the realm of Steve Vai… wow… he’s going to be even more amazing when he gets older. And the best part of his act was the fact that he was sporting the long, free-flowing hair of the 80’s rocker… totally fit into the gong-show theme.
Here’s a picture I took of Interfit founder Brian Bell.
Brian Bell
Last year I promised myself that I would take my good camera with me, but, I forgot, so you get my iPhone pics instead. Maybe next year I’ll remember.
I look forward to this each year, and this, my third year was no different. (more details on the project in last years post) I got up early (for a Sunday), got showered and dressed in black with my jewels and headed downtown to the Rennaisance Hotel. It was a glorious, sunny Vancouver morning as I cruised along Hastings St. with a big smile on my face. A cup of coffee, good music, sunshine, the expectations of a fun-filled day, compiled with the fact that the big vehicle cruising along beside me, contained an unusually comfortable looking passenger.
Cute guy in the car next to me.
This year Deb told us that the parkade across the street was only $6 on Weekends, so I pulled up in front of the Hotel and unloaded my two sewing machines and my sewing kit, went to park and then skipped back across the street into the Hotel Lobby. One of the guys there gave me a hand up to the event, which was great, because I would have had to make 2 trips otherwise, since my coffee was taking priority.
Every year the alterations area is set up on the stage by Deb, the day ahead, then everyone who comes brings a machine or two. I was the last one to arrive and I think there were about 10 of us this year. It’s alway so much fun to see everyone, and it was particularly nice to be asked by several people how the Buggy Bag business is going. We had a chance to catch up with each other for the first half hour and then it was dress time!
The entire Ballroom is transformed for the day. There are racks and racks of dresses and suits, tables and tables of shoes, accessories, undergarments, there are hair stations and make-up stations, rows and rows of change rooms and food and drink stations. It is amazing.
Our job is to alter the dresses that the girls pick out. Our team is made up of volunteers who are professionals in film costume, or the garment industry. Deb does all the fittings and then hangs the dresses up where we then choose which one we want to work on.
Here’s a picture of Deb at work marking a dress for alterations.
Deb works her magic on the fitting platform.
Here’s a shot of Petra working on a silver lame dress.
Petra's cutting so fast her scissors are a blur.
I think it was while I was working on this dress that a very sweet ‘godmother’ came up to me and said, “I’m looking for the dress my ‘goddaughter’ picked out… it’s got a crinoline and glass beads”. I looked around the room and smiled back at her and asked… “can you give me any more detail?” Then she laughed, as she realized she had described all the dresses that were up there.
Here’s a shot of me working on the pretty lace dress with six layers of tulle to be hemmed.
Here’s Ruth, enveloped by frothy tulle….
Often we had to get down on the floor to get the hem straight through all the layers. Here’s Rosalie doing just that.
Rosalie
Here’s a picture of Sarah and Jayne working together on a piece.
Deb shortens a hem.
One of the team, I wanted to take a picture of because she had the cutest shoes with tape measures for bows on. Her name was Kathryn and she designs very elegant bridal wear.
All the photos with black frames were taken by the incredibly creative Enigma Arcana Designs.
The whole day ends with a wand with a chocolate star on the tip… a thank you from the amazing organizers of the Cinderella Project.
I’ve been having a really hard time posting anything lately…. I’m always trying to keep it ‘light’ and ‘positive’, so when times are tough, I find myself with very little to say.
Time to lay it all out there… to bare my soul, as they say, or as close as I can get to that.
Last Christmas, my daughter and I kept a really low profile. We stayed home by ourselves. We went out for dinner one night and saw a movie with coupons someone had given us. We put up our tree and enjoyed our new little kitten, who entertained us by running up the centre of the tree, over and over again.
As this year winds down, I’m asking myself, how the heck I ended up here… more broke than last Christmas, wondering how on earth I’m going to pay my rent. I feel like I worked every second last year and really didn’t have time to even stop to evaluate my finances. I just had to keep moving ahead with my goals with little time to stop and reflect on my personal situation.
I’m just going to start by trying to remember all the things that I did accomplish or put into action.
In the fall of 2009, I started working with Teresa, from Blacklake, who I’ve been working with ever since to establish quality manufacturing for a price that would make it possible to start selling Buggy Bag® at wholesale to retailers. The manufacturing costs here made the price untouchable at that level, so I was only able to sell the product one at a time, directly to end users… I wanted more people to be able to find it and use it.
The year 2010 started out with work for the movie ‘A-Team‘, going to a local theatre to fix a velvet stage curtain, and the construction of some Fencing Jackets for the Arts Club Theatre.
Much work with Rina from Liddleworks, and a photo shoot with the lovely Jessie Claveau for our new flyer which Rina designed.
Got my first set of samples back from Hong Kong. They looked pretty good, but, I wanted to make some changes to the fabrics, and components, and see what the prices would be like….shipping costs $350
My generous friends took my daughter and I to Whistler for Easter weekend where I was able to prove to my self that I could still ski. That weekend was such fun!
Went to the Dragon’s Den auditions and was told I didn’t have enough sales to move ahead. That was fine, and it was a benefit to me to work on the numbers etc. with Rina before hand. These exercises always shed light on the value of planning ahead and setting goals. My friend Wendy from PumpEase made it through the auditions, and onto the show which aired in October.
I was contacted by LandMark Direct, who do TV commercials like the ‘As Seen On TV’ ads. I decided to have them make a 1 minute commercial for me that would run in 150 spots across the US. The purpose being to test the market to evaluate where advertising $ are best spent. I sent some samples of the Stroller, Jogger and Wheelchair weather blankets, and the process began.
Received another round of samples from the factory … shipping $340
I met with the SCISN Board for the Rick Hansen Institute where I met with Gary McPherson about designing some custom wheelchair weather protection for him. I made a few sales there and met some lovely and inspiring people. It was through my work for former Vancouver mayer Sam Sullivan, that I ended up there. I had done a custom wheelchair poncho for him in the fall of 2009.
I did a bit of work for a friend who had a contract to do some costumes for the Olympics. Then, an old school friend of mine moved back here from Singapore. She needed a place to land while she settled back into the Vancouver workplace and found a place to live. It was really nice having Kai here for that time and we had many fun times and good meals together. We went to many free Olympic festivities. It was really fun being in Vancouver at that time!
I shortened many, many sleeves for a TV show called ‘Human Target‘, did some pattern work for two local women’s wear designers, then I headed over to my friend Deb’s studio to help her with a bunch of gaberdine 50’s styles she was manufacturing for a TV show called ‘Fringe‘. I think I spent a few weeks over there. Nice to get out of my place… even though my place is like heaven, I still get lonely… I know I talked her ear off… I miss working with people.
Got another set of samples back, decided to focus on just the three main products for now, because of the minimum order quantities. The zippers and fabrics now looked good, but we still have to work on the reflective logo…. shipping costs $275
Found a US Patent and Trademark Lawyer and started to proceed with this process…$2500 later, I find out that even though, I have the trademark Buggy Bag Registered here in Canada and have owned the buggybag.com address since 1998, and I make and sell mobility accessories…. they feel that there will be some ‘confusion’ with the other company that makes shopping cart covers and uses my name only with an extra “g” on the end….I should have applied for the US TM back when this company first offered to buy my URL…. who knew they would just add another ‘g’ to the name. The patent is still in process… and the cost is unknown, but a fair guess would land it in the $10,000 range.
Had Lawyers read contract with Landmark Direct… $500
Found out I need some very pricey licences to be able to sell a ‘stuffed’ article in Ontario, Quebec or Manitoba. One for each province and for each year at $500 each! Ouch, there goes my rent for that month.
Next, I stumbled across a blog written by the mom of a beautiful little guy by the knick-name of Bugg. I was moved by her ability to document their life and the wonderful quality of her blog photos. http://thebuggslife.blogspot.com/ I sent this little guy a Buggy Bag Stroller Blanket to use on his tiny wheelchair. I was so happy to meet this family and help make Bugg’s outings a bit cozier. We still keep in touch and I hope to one day meet them in person.
I then built some leather dresses for the character ‘Ginn’ on ‘Stragate Universe‘, and started working on another dog movie called ‘Treasure Buddies‘ featuring lots of cute children’s costumes, and also squeezed in an alteration of a down jacket for the movie ‘The Big Year‘, hemmed some shirts for ‘Ice Road Terror‘, and a bunch more custom work for ‘Stargate Universe’.
Got some more manufacturer samples still with issues …. shipping $400
It was around this time that I met a great guy by the name of Brian Bell, the founder of Interfit in North Vancouver. Some friends and I went to their fundraiser, which I also blogged about.
Got many different script revisions over this time and finally approved one and then had to get the money together before the commercial production could begin…. $3000
I made 9 pairs double layer fleece leg warmers for Sam Sullivan to give out to his associates, the moved onto yet more alterations for ‘The Big Year’, much more work for ‘Stargate Universe’ and the leather coat I made for ‘Sanctuary‘, which I also blogged about. It was right around this time that I got the sad news that Gary McPherson had passed away.
More one on one work with Liddleworks… business plan.
Got a first copy of the actual commercial. It looked great and I was really happy with how our conversations went. I was so apprehensive about the whole thing to begin with and the amount of $, but, if everything went well we would be getting lots of sales and valuable information about the marketplace, not to mention the commercial to use in whatever way we liked…$3500
More work with Liddleworks… hangtag designs…. three tags with usage illustrations. Had a friend help with the french translations and found a hangtag manufacturer close to the factory in China.
I made a dozen various aprons for ‘Red Riding Hood‘ before starting on the years fun show…. ‘The Fairly Odd Parents’ I always have fun working for Angus Strathie and this show was no exception! Many wonderful costumes for this show.
More work on business plan…more $$$ I owe Liddleworks.
Right after that I had the pleasure of meeting Jim Byrnes and making him a pair of trousers and an overcoat for ‘Sanctuary’.
A man I spent two years trying to forget, suddenly appears in my life again, only to vanish again two months later.
Another photo shoot featuring 5 wheelchair models and one stroller model, a mom and a sweet working dog…$600
Pay for hang tags… $1100
September finally rolled around, the commercial was ready to air, the production was in place and would be ready to ship at the end of Sept. I had to decide where to have the product shipped to, and decided that most of the sales would likely be from the US, so I found a ‘pick and pack’ place in Blaine.
Volunteered at the World Wheelchair Rugby Championships. So fun, met lots of athletes and got to see some of the games.
Commercial aired to no sales and therefore no stats… frustrating, but, must keep looking ahead.
Landmark proposed an agreement to sell the product through catalogue sales.
Lawyer read another contract…. $500.
Chris, my brother and I head down to the ABC Kids show in Vegas to see what the competition is like, what to expect when we go to the show as a vendor, evaluate what kind of a booth we need, to look for sales reps and get a bit of R&R. We walked hundreds of miles that week and most of it was in the convention centre. We also, visited just about every hotel in the city, we won $76, and we had some fantastic meals.
Launched new version of the Web Site that has been in the works for many months… it looks great and it’s only Phase I! Was immediately “de-friended” on facebook by the fellow that did the last version of the website.
Went on a sailing trip to Molly’s Reach with some friends, which was another stellar weekend!
Product is ready to ship, need to get financing… bank turned me down… evidently I should have bought an apartment instead of trying to make this great product available… at least that’s what they would have me believe!
Went to a private investor, who saw the real reason I’m doing all of this and wants to help make it happen…. $17,000 debt
Landed the product in Canada and the US and took delivery the same day that we had our Buggy Bag reception for friends, customers and media…$550. Had a blast even though no media showed up, the important people were there. Including David Rountree, who I met when I volunteered at the World Wheelchair Rugby Championships back in September. He brought his ‘Floor-Board‘ for all of us to try. Sylvi MacCormac was a special musical guest at our event, who was also one of our models at the last shoot. We felt so honoured.
Inspected the shipment that arrived here in my living room with Teresa from Blacklake. We realized there was a small QC issue with the shipment and had to look at our options…. do we send them back? I’m totally against that idea. I try a few different methods to deal with the issue and discover that I can solve it 100% with the use of my commercial iron.
One of the perks of working in film is the ‘wrap party’ at the end of the show. I went to 4 wrap parties and a gala benefit for Spinal Cord Injury. I wore the same outfit to 3 of them!
Got an order for the stroller and jogger blanket from Babies’R’Us… a small trial order for the Canadian web site.
Had to buy a Universal Bar Code number for the company… $500
Dear friend Barbara passed away, which left me in a blue funk for some time. Sadly missed.
More work for the TV shows ‘Stargate Universe’ and ‘V‘.
Teresa and I head down to the States to deal with the QC issue on that part of the shipment. One day and two very sore backs later and we are back in Vancouver, satisfied that the product is 100% perfect.
December rolled around with no movie or tv work for me, so I started making phone calls. I always said I wasn’t a sales person, but, one call led to another and another and by mid December I had already shown the wheelchair weather blanket to at least 7 places and got it into 4 stores and 10 locations in the lower mainland. This is the easiest thing in the world to sell. It just makes sense because it’s easy to use and it helps people stay warm. I’ve been focusing on the wheelchair weather blanket, but, also got the jogger weather blanket into two stores as well.
I read a blog that really touched me and I responded by sending a wheelchair lap blanket to the autor, Patrick, for his wife Patti. The response I got was worth every bit of the hard work I’ve done this year!
I put 2 paid ads on Craig’s List one in Seattle area and one in NYC, looking for commissioned sales reps to rep the wheelchair weather blanket… $50. There may be a few potentials among the responses… I sure hope so. And it looks like I may have a rep in the Chicago area, who is a friend of Teresa’s…. Yeah!
Ok… now it makes sense! As a single mom, with no financial help from anywhere, I’m just getting deeper and deeper in debt. This year of business has cost a lot. I’m financing my business with my income from film work, my lines of credit and those kind enough to help me. My coffee maker, my kettle, my watch, a computer, and my hair dryer have all become incapacitated in the last couple of months… not sure if I’m just noticing all of this because I can’t fix or replace them at the moment….but, it just adds to my anxiety levels. I have to keep reminding myself of the quote I put up on my facebook wall a while back:
”I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance. It overcomes almost everything, even nature.” — John D. Rockefeller
I sure hope that’s true… because my intention is to keep on keeping on, no matter what, because I believe that it is the right thing to do, and to continue to count my blessings.
This year I:
posted 171 times on the facebook fan page….
tweeted 684 times….
wrote 28 blog posts….
responded to 479 emails about the offshore production….
did work for 16 different production companies
responded to 275 emails from Liddleworks….
added a store front to my FB page as a way to sell old stock…
had 750 Buggy Bag units manufactured
took 49 guitar lessons….
spent 60 hours in dance classes….
got to 99% on Brain Challenge….
hugged my daughter 730 times….
toilet trained my cat….
After reflecting on the past year, I know what my blessings are as clearly as I know everything is going to turn out great.
I’m thankful for my daughter, my brother, my parents, my friends, my guides, my supporters, my vision, my health, my atitude, my customers, my humour, my suppliers, my teachers, my dance partners, my employers, my mentors and everyone who has crossed my path for whatever reason…..please know that every single one of you are responsible for at least two of the things I’m grateful for.
I’ve been asking on Twitter if anyone would like to hear a bit about the building of the Stargate Atlantis Wraith Queen costumes. I say ‘a bit’ because… well, it was some time ago and I don’t have pics from building the first one, but, I’ll give it my best from what I can remember.
I had just finished a four year stint working as the head cutter in the costume shop on a show by the name of Andromeda. One of my friends was co-ordinator for SG-1 and SG-Atlantis…. yes, two distinctly different shows working out of the same costume shop! A huge job for a shop co-ordinator, but, my friend is that kind of amazing. She asked me if I’d like to come and cut as part of her huge team in her shop, and I jumped at the opportunity to work with her again.
The designer for Stargate Universe was Christina McQuarrie and she gave me the honour and challenge of executing one of her amazing designs for the Wraith Queen. This one was to be made out of a white leather, and utilized a textured pale kid leather along with white StingRay.
As I said, I didn’t have any pics of this, so I found these ones on-line to jog my memory. It seems that the top pics may be action figures… how exciting to think that one of the costumes that I built was made into an action figure!
The coat was very fitted in the top and if I recall, we padded out the bust (a common thing to do) You will notice that the top two pics have blue trim… this is not the original costume. This is someone else’s interpretation of it. The lower pic is an on-set shot and shows the more subtle contrast of the different leathers. The waist cincher was the most difficult aspect of the costume. It was cut out of stingray, which is similar to cutting through a piece of glass that is glued to leather! Very, very horrible to work with. Couple that with the fact that it was bound with leather to finish the edges…. huge job.
The contrast pieces were made out of a lovely textured leather that I backed onto another leather to add stability. They were cut into asymmetrical patterns which were then riveted together and onto the garment. Cuffs were done in the same way and they had an interesting shape on the back side. The over belt was also made in the same way.
You know, it’s funny, the amount of work, time and money that goes into one of these costumes is just amazing… especially when you take into account that I can barely make out what it was or see any of the details from the pics, and I made it! I can only imagine what someone would go through to duplicate it from guess work!
Actually, I can imagine, as I was hired once to duplicate all the dresses from the Titanic as part of a touring theatre exhibit…. I sat for hours and drew pics frame by frame from the movie and I still had to use my imagination for almost all of the backs! I’ll save that story for another post.
I just found this picture of the original costume taken by the set supervisor. It’s a really good shot that shows the details and the fact that there was no blue on the costume.
That was my only season working in the shop at Stargate… many changes happened after that…. Christina McQuarrie moved on to become the illustrious designer of Sanctuary, I started doing contract cutting from my own studio and Valerie Halverson took over as designer of Atlantis (she is now the designer on SG-Universe)
Valerie asked me to do the next Wraith Queen that I built. This was the Hive Queen, her thrown was amazing and she was all connected into it. It looked like some kind of a web/goo…. creepy….
This dress was constructed from the base up. We started with a foundation garment. I cut and stretched the two layers of fabric over the bust, and then hand stitched it onto the bra to give it stability and shape.
This dress had a centre back invisible zipper and the skirt split in the centre front and had a long train.
The pic shows what a disaster zone my apartment turns into when I’m working… actually it looks pretty good in this shot!
The outer fabric layer is a gold mesh with sequins in it. It’s really effective because of its random nature.
I was good about taking pictures of the dress, but, I didn’t get any of the building of the the outer layer. The outer layer was like a leather corset, but it was not boned. The leather was extremely stiff and didn’t need any support. It was an embossed, stiffened cow hide that had a shiny finish. The whole thing was built by draping it and stitching it as I went. I then bound all the raw edges with a soft lamb. I think this was a very strong and effective costume for the Hive Queen. Lots of make up though.
If you have any questions you can follow me on Twitter and ask away…. @BuggyBag
Last Friday I start a 3-day stint as a volunteer for the 2010 World Wheelchair Rugby Championships. It was a slow start of putting promotional packages together and poking holes in the credential holders and attaching the lanyards to them. It was still fun because the company was good…
Me, two other volunteers and a mountain of lanyards...
This morning started out at the Sheraton Hotel, with me merchandising some swag in the athletes lounge… that was fun. I was to keep the shirts, posters, pins, etc. in order and make sure that any visitors to the lounge had what they needed. I had lots of people come in to buy games shirts and I bought one of the delicious chocolates.
Games shirts and stuff
A few guys from team Sweden came in for a rousing game of foosball.
Foosball
Then, later in the afternoon, they were seen playing doubles tennis…
Doubles Tennis Match
Then there were the guys from the UK that were Rocking out on Rock Band…
Rock Band Team GBR
Manni and Ash shot a great game of pool, although it turned out that Ash was a bit of a “shark”… it was a fun game to watch.
Manni and Ash
I met David Rountree, the inventor of the Floor-Board Wii Platform for wheelchairs. This is a really neat thing. The platform is designed to be seated right on top of the Wii Balance Board. It tips/rocks down at the back as the wheelchair pushes onto it and then it even back out when the chair is perfectly balanced on the platform….Game On!
Original Floor-Board
David demonstrated to me how it worked and showed me how easy it is to slalom…yet later when I tried it myself, it proved to be much more difficult!
Tight Slalom David!
Travis from Canada, Vancouver to be more precise, gave it a whirl too.
David and Travis
From what David was saying, he’s just about to get the 3rd prototype back from the factory, each one better and lighter than it’s predecessor. I can understand what he’s going through, trying to get this great product out and into the hands of people that will use and love it. I feel like we have a lot in common when it comes to moving our products ahead…I have a lot of the same issues when it comes to buggy bag… it’s a long road, but, certainly an enjoyable journey.
David and 2nd prototype
I had such a great day and met so many wonderful people… I can’t wait til tomorrow when I go and volunteer at the Richmond Oval. I’ve never been there before and hopefully I will get to glimpse a few minutes of these sold out games.
Court 1 Court 2
12:00 3 SWE v FIN 4 NZL v ARG
These are the games that will be on when I’m there tomorrow…. there will be others, but, not while I’m there. I’ve never seen the famous game of MurderBall played, but, I’m told it is very exciting…. anyway, I will let you know in my next post.
A whole week has gone by already since the shoot… I feel bad that I haven’t talked about it yet, I’ve been really busy this week… fittings for SGU, alterations, volunteering at the Wheelchair Rugby Games, getting fitted for contacts… many stories to come!
Last Friday, Rina from LiddleWorks, organized a photo shoot, so we would have some more shots for the new website. I don’t know how she did it, but, it all came together really fast and without a hitch. We had seven models, a dog, a photographer and Rina and me. Rina chose a wonderful park just to the east of Granville Island. It’s got a duck pond, a wooded area, and sea wall with city background. We got some really different looks without having to change locations.
Rina, Derek and Georgina at the duck pond
Georgina, and Duncan were the first to arrive. Duncan was fairly worried when Georgina was off with the photographer…. he stayed with me at our work table/bench and whimpered while keeping a close eye on her. Duncan is a working dog and he obviously takes his job seriously. Although, I have to say, I had a hard time taking him too seriously. I’ve never seen such “puppy dog eyes”… dark brown pools…sooo, cute!
Me and Duncan
Derek and Duncan
This was kinda funny… Derek was trying to get Duncan to go back over to to Georgina… Duncan had other ideas about how the day was going to go…
Sylvi was the second model. Now there is some talent, and I’m not referring to her modelling, although she was great at that! She is a multi-talented performer and composer of modern music. Sylvi has generously offered to let us use her music on our site, which we certainly will when we get to that point in its development.
Sylvi and Me in conversation
The next models were a team, my friend Samantha and her darling little Elizabeth, who is now about 10 months old. Elizabeth is just one very patient child. We had her in two different strollers and lots of pics were taken, she gave us smiles and was just a great model…. (so were you Sam)
Samantha and Elizabeth
June and Ken showed up next and went off with Derek while I hung around the table with our stuff.
June and Ken
Kent was the last one for the day and while Derek was shooting with him, Rina and I packed up all the things we had brought and folded up the table and started to move in the direction of the cars.
Rina, me and Kent
It was a good day. The light was flat, the rain held off, and there were lots of laughs. I feel so lucky to have such great people coming into my life…. Thanks to all of you…Rina, Derek, Georgina, Sylvi, Sam, Elizabeth, June, Ken and Kent… oh, and Duncan! …and of course Lydia from the British Columbia Paraplegic Association for helping us with the model search.
It’s been how many days since my last post?… Wow, 3 weeks, too long… Today, was the first full day I’ve been off in at least three weeks, but, I’m thinking that in reality it’s more like 6 weeks. I can’t really remember. What have I been doing?… I can’t really remember that either, but, I’ll try.
Let’s see… oh yeah, 26 costumes for Red Riding Hood, 9 costumes for Fairly Odd Parents, one suit, with long coat for Jim Byrnes‘ character on Sanctuary, 2 jacket linings for my friend, 10 pairs of pants for Sanctuary, 6 T-Shirt for Stargate Universe, and a skirt for myself…I draft the patterns, cut them out and construct them, so it’s fairly time consuming. As you know, I’m also working on my Buggy Bag® business, which has, for the most part been phone calls, emails, filling out forms, approving samples, Trademarks, Patents, manufacturing, Stuffed Articles Act Registrations, Duty Judgements, PO’s, Proforma Invoices, working with designers on hang tag designs, trying to line up bridge financing….shelling out much, much money…. which leads us to the real reason that I haven’t taken any time off. I need to finance my business start-up costs and, support my daughter and myself, at the same time. The build up to this falls commercial airing and it’s outcome is absolutely exciting! I have put so much into this thing… especially the wheelchair lap blanket, that I just can’t wait to get it out to more people. The feed back on last falls batch was so positive, that I just know that this falls’ line is going to be met with even more enthusiasm….it’s even better than before! The Stroller and Jogger models are really looking fantastic too. The commercial is going to focus mainly on them, with a 10 second spot on the wheelchair. The idea is to get a demographic read on the market based on the purchases made, through 150, 1 minute spots… This is going to be really interesting.
Because I work as a contractor, for the film and TV work that I do, I feel compelled to take everything I can possibly manage to do, and sometimes it gets so busy that I don’t see any time to relax… this has been one of those periods. It’s great though, because it is one of the things that I simply love doing.
Ok… well, that’s not quite true… even if I haven’t had a day off, I’ve taken many evenings to enjoy live music, dancing, friends and playing my guitar…. it’s just sometimes hard to squeeze all this fun into one lifetime!
Before I go, I just have to say that last night I went to see a Cuban band by the name of Wil Campa…. an absolutely sexy band and music… fantastic…. Which leads me to my next question… Why don’t more men learn how to dance cuban salsa? It is sooo sexy and at most events there are usually about 4 women to every guy. Last night the place was full of women wanting to dance… here is a link to a fantastic Cuban dance instructor if any of you guys want to learn… Latidos!
I spent all day yesterday out in Richmond at the Kwantlen Polytechnic University, in a master class with designer Julian Roberts. He was doing the class on Subtraction Cutting, something that he invented and has spent his life perfecting. He is very abstract in his thinking and as a result, I think everyone came away feeling inspired.
Subtraction Cutting forces you to look at the garment from a different perspective… the inner, or negative space, as opposed to the front and back view only. You start with the full cloth and take away parts. Instead of deciding what to keep, you decide what to get rid of. It’s quite a leap for someone who has always been dependant on rulers and calculations!
All we used was a sleeveless bodice block and a paper circle…. and two 3 yrd lengths of fabric. The two fabrics are sewn together to resemble an extremely long pillow case… one end open.
Julian demonstrates one idea with paper
Bodice block is positioned where Julian wanted it.
Julian demonstrates, using black fabric on one side and white on the other. This makes it easy to see what he’s doing.
Negative space is removed
Julian joined the front SS to the back SS with a line that he eyeballed, then cut the negative space away. The piece that is removed is called the “Subtraction Pattern”. Just in case you like the final outcome so much that you would like to duplicate it. Otherwise, these creations are very much “one of a kind”.
Now he just pulls the two shoulder seams together and joins them at the machine. Then, starting at the armhole, he joined each SS. Then he let the rest of the fabric just fall. Because of the way he laid his bodice on the fabric, the white portion of the “tube” ends up curving around to the front in a natural swirl.
Now the fun begins… Julian starts to decide where to incorporate the negative spaces where the body will pass through. Each space that is created is joined to a second space to form a hole on the inside of the garment, while the outside begins to transform in a truly organic way…. billows, folds, pleats, twists…. each one different and determined by the designers choices of fabrics and placement of the holes.
This is the dress that Julian created in about an hour by removing 7 holes in total.
These are the two fabrics that I chose… (what I had in my closet that didn’t clash too much) It’s a cotton spandex, so it’s pretty heavy compared to what some of the others chose to use. I started by putting curved corners on my “pillow case”, and placing my bodice so that it wrapped around to the other side, and so it would have that curve across the front. I think I used 7 holes for mine as well….
That’s me lurching forward in the centre of this shot. Probably a good thing, that way you can’t really see that I’m squeezed into a dress that’s 2 sizes too small!
Leslie and Julian
Here I am with Julian, and below is the dress I made on the proper size form.
A Tight Squeeze
Ok… so, you can see me squeezed into it after all….
The possibilities for this technique are virtually endless from what I can see. I’m looking forward to finding new ways to use this new knowledge! Who knows, maybe I’ll come up with some new avant-garde Buggy Bag®!
Last Saturday night, 3 of my girlfriends, my brother and I, went to the 2010 Spring Frolic. It’s a fundraiser for the InterFit Integrated Fitness Society in North Vancouver. If you’ve ever come to visit Vancouver, or you are lucky enough to live in this amazing place, you know, that there is nothing that takes you closer to the wonder of this planet than a walk in our great forests. That is what the Integrated Fitness society is all about.
We got all dressed up and headed out to the Delbrook rec Centre. I didn’t know what to expect, because I had never been to one of their events before. The event used two large rooms, one of which was decorated in a magical way with twinkle lights and tables of 6 or 10, each with white linens and the most lovely floral arrangements. The floral arrangements were mostly indigenous flowers, placed into a wide bamboo tube… really beautiful. Surrounding two sides of the dining room were about 10 gambling centres… if that’s what you would call them… there were Black Jack tables and Roulette and Craps and a few other games…. by now, you probably have guessed exactly how many times I’ve gambled… well, I did win 10 cents when I was in Vegas at a slot machine! Anyway, it turned out that I had some kind of magic touch with the dice that night and ended up winning $500! When we arrived at the event, we were given $300 worth of “funny money” to gamble with. It was so fun! There is something really great about gambling with pretend money…. I just loved it.
One end of the room had a stage where Adam Woodall entertained. I really enjoyed him. I had never heard him before and am pleased to say that he was really great… and, as a one man band, he had people up and dancing. Nice work.
The other room harboured the food, and the silent auction items. I had put a few Buggy Bag Lap Blankets in, so I was hoping they would get some action. Both of them sold and I got to meet both of the people that bought them, so that was really cool. It’s always exciting to get to talk to and meet the people that use the product.
There was also a live auction with a very good auctioneer. What makes a very good auctioneer you ask? Well, to me, if I can understand what they are saying… they’re good! MC Denny Williams also had my girlfriends and I chuckling numerous times…. oh, yes, and, did I mention the bar tenders? There’s something about a man in a Tux…. 🙂
My only regret about the evening, is the fact that I got so wrapped up in the fun, friends and food, that I forgot to take pics for my blog… I did put a plea out to people, for some shots, and, if any come, I will insert them later… sorry! Pics are always the best part, especially when you are weeding through the banter of my brain….
… come to the next event… I’ll be the one blowing on dice at the craps table!
