Sewing like the Dickens

The guest room has become a costume closet for items going to the Fezziwig Ball and coming dance performances. What you see above is about half of what I've been preparing in the past few months; the other half was given out at our dance rehearsal last week. Since this is our first year performing outdoors in the winter, I've been scrambling to add warmer articles for the ladies to wear. I've taken two women's suit coats and cut them down into Regency Spencers. I've finished Caleb's coatee, except for the collar trim which I don't have yet.

Lamentably, Scrooge's coat requires more work. When I enlarged the pattern from a size 38 to a 43 I forgot to enlarge the sleeves, so they turned out way too tight. I added a strip down the underside of the sleeve, and now they're too big, and they hang funny. Poor Scrooge.

This is the bodice for Mrs. Crachit, also known as my mother. How do you sew a historical looking outfit for someone who doesn't care if it looks correct or not, and is only going to wear it once or twice? Plus she keeps insisting it's too tight and it makes her claustrophobic. This is our last year as the Crachit family, since next year Jeremy will be too big to be Tiny Tim. And frankly, our family is not very good at acting, so we don't make the best Dickens characters.