For Want of Webbing
January 22nd, 2011
My new stays are on hold again. This time, I’m waiting for 16 inches of 3/4 inch webbing to encase the busk. I’ve finished re-setting the stomach gores (now twice as large as before) and hemming down as many of the bone casings as I can without placing the busk.
Once I get some webbing, I’ll be able to sew the center seam and position the tapes for the little diagonal bones at the top of the center front. The next step is to bind the top and bottom and make holes for the bones. But before I get to that, I want to put all the bones in temporarily and lace it up. The instructions don’t show side bones of any kind, but there are indications from other sources that side bones were pretty common. I want to see how they fit as written — without side bones — before I commit.
I also have to buy corset lacing. Wherever I go for the webbing, I’m sure they’ll also carry lacing. I guess I could go uptown today and acquire the supplies. But it snowed yesterday and the streets are still gloppy. And the temperature dipped well below freezing and promises to remain so through the weekend.
So I think I will stay in my cozy apartment (where a big casserole of made-from-scratch macaroni and cheese is bubbling merrily in the oven) and work on something else. Another repeat on my Broderie Anglaise petticoat trim? A pair of serviceable calico undersleeves with matching collar? A new chemise?
P.S. Did you know that Catherine Beecher classified macaroni and cheese as a vegetable in Miss Beecher’s Domestic Receipt Book, 1846? I like the way she thinks.