#i'm in a bit of a dai mood

[hajihiko]

Trust and belief and trust and belief and trust and belief and-

[stargirl230]

First (official) day of college!

super nervous haha, wish me luck

(no reposts!)

[osamusriceballs]

The Accident - Part VII

Atsumu x fem reader

Warnings: None

Words: ~ 2k

About: You talk to your mysterious friend and finally part from Atsumu.

Part I II -> Next part

"It's me. I'm okay- please don't worry. I'll be back soon."

"Where have you been? I was worried sick; I've tried calling you all night! You just texted me that everything's alright at 4am, but what's going on? Where are you?"

The voice comes out of the phone, quickly and fast as always, and you hold the phone a bit further away from your ear. "Please, I'm okay, I promise!" You can hear a few deep breaths on the other side, probably the attempt to calm down, and then the voice speaks again.

"Where are you right now? I'll come and pick you up, and then you can tell me everything."

"I'm at the—" you hesitate and then look at the name on the towel and read it out loud. "Do you know where that is?"

"Give me a second." You hear typing noises on the other side and then a little gasp. "That's an expensive hotel! One night costs 500 bucks, and the suits are literally thousands of dollars per night!"

"What?!" you're speechless for a few moments, realizing just how much money Atsumu might own—you are in a suite after all and you definitely did not pay for it.

"It will take some time to get there. I'll be there in an hour? I'll send you my location. Is there someone else with you?" Your thoughts drift to Atsumu, and you hum. "Yes. And I need to ask for a favor. Do you have a lawyer? Or do you know someone who maybe knows someone who can help me with a divorce for cheap?"

"A divorce? Who needs a—wait. Are you talking about yourself? Did you get married?" The voice is so shrill and loud that you almost flinch, and you find yourself regretting revealing that fact already. "I'll tell you the details later. Please don't worry about me." You try to sound as calm and soothing as you can, and after a few shocked gasps, you hear silence again on the other hand. "Hello? Are you still there?"

"Yes. I'll come and get you, and then you'll have to tell me everything."

You agree, and after a few more times of you repeating that you'll be fine and that you're being taken care of, you hang up. You take a deep breath, and without thinking too much about it, you quickly undress and go into the shower.

It's like heaven. The warm water feels soothing on your skin, and there are more products in the shower than you have ever used so far, but you find yourself drawn to the pretty bottles and decide to spoil yourself. It's not your water bill after all, and if Atsumu is paying for it, you can go all out and spend a few more minutes in the shower. The towels are fluffy and warm, thanks to the towel warmer, and you find yourself pressing your face against the soft fabric and inhaling the fresh and clean smell. The mirror is foggy by now, you probably showered at too hot a temperature, but the warm water just felt so good on your skin.

A soft knock on the door brings your attention back to reality, and you find yourself stepping closer to the pompous wooden door. "Y/n? I put the clothes in front of the door. Samu and I will wait on the balcony; you can get them anytime."

"Thanks!" you respond and hear footsteps leaving the room and a loud sound that's probably the window closing behind them. You wait a few more moments just to be sure that they are gone, and then you open the door a little bit to take the small pile of clothes.

It's a shirt with the hotel name, surprisingly tasteful due to the minimalistic logo of the expensive establishment, as well as a matching pair of sweatpants as well as a pair of socks. The fabric is soft, and you quickly put on the new clothes, only regretting that you have to wear your old panties, but there is not much you can do about it.

You take one last look at your phone, quickly checking your appearance one last time, wishing you'd have the time to wash your hair too, but you'll do that when you're back in your hotel room. You're just glad that you feel clean and warm now.

You step out of the room, feeling a little better and more alive already, and look around. You find Atsumu and Osamu standing on the balcony, both of them busy in a heated discussion, and you watch them for a few moments from your position after you noticed that they are not looking in your direction yet.

They are undeniably related. You can find similarities in the way they speak, in the way they use they hands when they talk and in the way they stand. They are both very attractive—something that you can freely admire now that they haven't seen you yet.

A notification on your phone informs you that your friend will reach you in a few minutes, and when you look up, you see that the twins have stopped talking and instead watch you through the window in silence. You pause momentarily and then lift your hand to wave at them. Atsumu's eyes take in your new clothes, checking you out from head to toe, and he gives you an approving thumbs up and a grin. Osamu rolls his eyes at Atsumu and simply pushes the door open.

"Hey. I'm glad the clothes fit." He comments, and you look down at yourself at his words. "Yeah, me too. Thanks. I appreciate it a lot; I feel so much better already."

Atsumu also steps into the room again, making sure to bump his shoulder against Osamu's when he passes him, ignoring the curse of the dark-haired male.

"Ya look better already. Feelin' alright again?" His voice is still tinted with the slightest bit of concern, and you smile at his words.

"Yes, thank you. I'm sorry for being so weird before. I was just a bit overwhelmed." Atsumu shakes his head and buries his hands in his pockets. "Don't sweat it. That's normal. Gettin' married like this is a pretty unusual thing after all."

"Right. Uhm. My friend will pick me up soon; I'll get downstairs and wait there. I'll give you my number, and then you can call me as soon as you find out more?" You look at him questioningly, and he is quick to fish for his phone in his back pocket. "Sounds good. I'll wait with ya till yer friend arrives." He watches while you type in your number and quickly save it. "Oh, you don't have to. I'll find the way on my own, don't worry." You shake your head, but he quickly wraps an arm around your shoulders and leads you to the door. "Nah, I insist. Where are your shoes?" You let him guide you, his arm around your shoulders feeling somewhat heavy but comforting while you look around for your high heels from last night. Atsumu guides you to the chair next to the door and ushers you to sit on it while he grabs the black shoes from the ground. "Do ya think they'll fit with the socks?" He asks with a frown, and you just shrug your shoulders as a response. "I hope so. I don't want to leave without socks; I don't even want to wear the shoes, to be honest."

His brows furrow while he looks at your feet. "Sorry, I wish we had some other shoes for ya." You quickly shake your head. "It's fine. It's just for the way downstairs. It's okay." He nods and kneels in front of you, and you subconsciously slide back on the chair as far as you can to create some distance between the two of you. "What are you doing?" He takes your left foot and places it on his thigh, and you feel every single muscle in your body tensing at the sudden contact. "Helpin' with yer shoes. Stay still for me."

You're at a loss for words while he slips the shoe on your foot; all you can do is stare at him while he secures it around your ankle. Surprisingly, it fits around your socked foot, and he nods before he lets go of your foot and reaches for the other. It doesn't take him long to get it on your foot too, and you shortly admire how skilled he is with his fingers, and then he places them both on the ground. "There ya go." He hums satisfied and gets on his feet, quickly offering you his hand to stand up. At this point, you just accept it and take his hand, allowing him to lead you to the door.

"Uhm. Bye, Osamu. See you. Maybe." You turn around and wave at the dark-haired twin who had made no attempt to come with you, and he nods acknowledgingly. "See ya."

You follow Atsumu through the door, who seems to be familiar with the hotel because he is quick to lead you to an outrageously big elevator. It's silent on the ride downstairs. You're standing each on different sides of the elevator, leaning against the walls, your bodies no longer touching. You don't really know what to say to him; you're too deep in thought right now, and he seems to feel somewhat similar.

"The exit is right there." He motions to the other end of the hall as soon as you get out of the elevator, and you hum while you follow him to the doors. You're lucky that there are barely people around because you certainly feel a bit underdressed with the clothes from the shop, but Atsumu doesn't even spare a glance to anyone you're passing. The receptionist greets you without batting an eye at your unusual attire; you're fairly certain that you both give a very unusual sight. Atsumu with his formal dress pants and half-opened dress shirt, and you with the hotel shirt and sweatpants and heels from last night. Surely not an everyday sight, but professionalism prevents her from looking longer at you.

It does not take long until you both stand in front of the hotel, just far enough from the entrance not to bother other guests but still close enough to see everyone who enters the building. You both stand there for a few moments in mutual silence, until you look up at him with a faint smile. "Thank you for showing me the way. I'll manage from here on. You can get back to Osamu; it's alright."

He frowns at your words and looks around.

"Can I really leave you here?" He looks a bit worried, and you nod with a tight smile. You really need some time to think about everything. "My friend will pick me up soon. You can go back to Osamu; it's fine, really!"

He hesitates for a second, probably not fully convinced that everything's fine, and the next thing you know is that his big arms surround you and pull you into a hug. You're stiff at first, unsure how you should react, but the comfort and familiarity that he is radiating by now makes it all too easy to melt into his touch and to hug him back. "Y/n. I meant it. I'll take care of ya, okay? Everything's gonna be alright. I'll make sure of that."

"Hmm." You hum against his shoulder, deeply inhaling his comfortable smell, and his grip tightens around you. "And if ya need anything—anything at all—call me. Anytime." You nod, hoping that he can feel your response and your gratitude because you don't trust your voice right now. You know you should probably pull back, but it feels too good to be in his arms, too good to be close to him, so you just stay, and he seems willing to let you.

"Y/n!" You hear someone yelling your name behind you, and you quickly pull yourself out of Atsumu's arms. You turn around and face a familiar face with big brown eyes which flicker from you to Atsumu with a surprised expression.

"Wait—Atsumu Miya? What are you doing here?"

Your jaw drops, and you turn your head back to Atsumu, who looks equally surprised to see your friend.

"You know each other?!"

[wildflowercryptid]

thinking about kieran again... particularly about how i feel like he struggles with a weak sense of self and how him identifying so heavily with ogrepon, (or at least the version of ogrepon he originally knew,) probably helped him stabilize how he saw himself, only to have something he considered so core to his identity essentially ripped away from him. not only that, it was by someone he seemingly wanted to trust and open up to, (which i doubt he does very often.)

i definitely think that the way he's handling things is far from healthy, but i can get why he'd have such an intense reaction to losing something that was so important to him and basically being betrayed by someone he wanted to consider a friend.

[softiedingo]

my Pedrito of every day of the week 🗓✅️

[kiwichaeng]

WIP Wednesday

Thank you for the tags @heartstringsduet @lemonlyman-dotcom @fallout-mars @im-overstimulated-and-im-sad <33

“Are you going to hover over me the entire night? Am I going to find you looking down at me at 3 am?” Carlos’ tone is light as he finishes sits down heavily on the edge of the bed. He doesn’t hide the wince as well as he thinks. TK remains quiet in the corner.  Carlos looks up when he doesn’t get a response. He tilts his head and looks at TK curiously.  “What are you doing all the way over there? I know you don’t need to sleep but I would feel better if you didn’t stare at me from the corner the entire night.” TK knows it’s in good faith, that they’ve come leaps and bounds since they met and if nothing else else, the humour in Carlos’ eyes would give it away but tonight, all TK can do is play back the evening’s event in his mind over and over.  He knows Carlos has noticed it. He had kept on shooting glances at TK the entire time at the hospital as he was being treated to the point where the doctor had asked him if he was looking for someone.   The white bandages peaks out from under Carlos’ collar and TK’s eyes are fixed on them like a moth to a flame.  This is on him, that he got someone as good as Carlos tangled up in his mess. He should never have followed him home, never forced him into helping and should have— He should never have gotten attached.   “I have to go. You should too,” TK murmurs in the quiet room and made for the door. He doesn’t look at Carlos once as he slipped out of the room. “What— TK wait,” He can hear the confusion in Carlos’ voice turn into panic. “Where are you going?”  With a heavy heart, TK ignores the calls and keeps walking straight ahead down the empty hallway.  “TK,” Carlos whispers loudly from behind him but TK doesn’t turn back. It is only when he hears a sharp inhale and a wince does he stop.

open tag and no pressure tags under the cut <3

@liminalmemories21 @lightningboltreader @orchidscript @strandnreyes @reyesstrand @paperstorm @carlos-in-glasses @carlos-tk @ladytessa74 @three-drink-amy @chicgeekgirl89 @theghostofashton @redshirt2

[infriga]

Me whenever a fic has Connor take out his LED permanently:

[inkyu]

My friend said to color the lines so I tried that

also I can only draw like teens-adults so kids are hard to draw in my style unless we're talking my old art style

anyways this kid is a great way to practice drawing kids since I literally have like 10-13 year old oc's that are important to my oc stories

[despairforme]

Who wants some fun-? ~

[evarenity]

Hi! It's, uh, been a while

So... I've been doing some... art style studies? 'Cause I randomly decided to revisit an old fixation of mine (hint: it's Seraph of the End). And honestly? I'm likin' this new lineart :0c

So yeah, that's where I've been for the past month or so. I might post those sketches on here, actually...

[honeysuckle-venom]

Big big big thunderstorm!!! I LOVE big thunderstorms!!! I'm more Luna tonight than I've been in quite a while, it's funny to try to describe it bc we're still fused, but just in....Luna mode. But it's nice bc I'm cozy and comfy in clean pajamas in bed with big thunderstorm outside and I'm gonna play computer games and be cozy and listen to the thunder. BOOM!!! The one thing I don't like is my phone isn't getting a signal bc of the storm and if my power goes out and I don't have a way to contact people I'll be very nervous. But for now it's nice and cozy!

[manasurge]

.

[tev-the-random]

I know this is very sudden, but allow me to rant about Sonic 06-

*the crowd boos*

LISTEN! It's not about the game itself, that is a story for another post. I specifically want to talk about Princess Elise-

*the crowd boos harder*

Hear me out: Elise had so much potential to be such a fascinating character. It's all right there. So I'm talking about it. Buckle up, I'm putting this girl in a blender 17 years after her game died.

The absurd missed potential of Elise really boils down to her role in the story as a damsel in distress and how heavily the game imposes that role on her, even when it's unnecessary/uninteresting. Point in case, she gets kidnapped and rescued four different times. In one game. But why? What purpose does this serve?

I believe Elise's repeated kidnapping is but a cheap narrative escape. They don't know how to make Sonic and Elise bond, so they repeat the act of him saving her over and over again to drive in the fact that he's a hero and she's... I don't know, she's just a princess.

Just a princess. That traps her into the tiny box that is the stereotypical damsel in distress, and a macguffing for the whole Iblis thing, at most. But that doesn't really suit her background at all, does it? All of the stuff that's given to us tells us that Elise should be more than that.

Ok so, the story goes out of its way to tell us that, for 10 whole years, Elise was not allowed to cry. Not a single tear. That's her main thing, that she has a warped sense of duty and doesn't get to feel much. But did she even know why? The way the story shows it, it doesn't seem like she does, at least not entirely; she was passed out cold when the whole "let's infuse half of a god into your soul" stuff happened. So in a way, this behaviour could be treated as trauma instilled on her by her father drilling the idea of "a strong queen doesn't cry, stop crying, just smile" into her head — we do see a flashback of him directly saying that to her when she was little and crying on his lap. And this would have been a fine point of her character arc, if only they had concluded it in a more... well, conclusive way. By showing her and the audience that the duke was wrong; crying is healthy and not a display of weakness, and her father's "crying is wrong" speech is bullshit. Or even just by having her realise that not crying at all has a negative impact on her health, because it should.

But if we assume that Elise did know why she couldn't cry, the story gets more interesting. Because it's not as if she held back tears for 10 years — a near-impossible feat for a normal human being — just for her pride or because she believed in those toxic words of the past, but because she needed to. There's a fucking monster inside of her and this CHILD is tasked with keeping it locked away all on her own. If she cries, the whole world will end. So she sees a purpose in being emotionally distant: if she closes herself off to all emotions and reactions, she will suppress her need to cry. If she doesn't allow herself to feel anything, she will be able to keep the world safe.

But like, if she ever breaks a leg, she's not allowed to cry, because she doesn't want one stupid broken leg to cause the end of the world. She swallows the pain in silence.

She lost her father, who apparently was her only parental figure, at a young age and was left alone to learn how to tend to the kingdom. She had to attend her own father's funeral, knowing that she had potentially contributed to his death by being in the lab that day. And she was not allowed to have a little cry about it.

That's a lot of pressure, but it's not like she can complain, so she just has to deal with it as best as she can. Which in the game is shown by having Elise be a bit... bland, I guess? At times, I don't know if her weird way of responding to things was intentional or if it was just bad writing.

Either way, I feel like a better way for that to reflect on her character would be to make her stoic, cold and impassive when interacting with others. For her to be unresponsive to Sonic's jokes and Eggman's threats at the start of the game. As the story progresses, she gets to mature emotionally and realise how fucked up she is and how all of these bottled feelings are killing her inside.

Sonic bonds with Elise by providing opportunities and encouragement for her to feel things and express herself. He can see that she cares a lot about things, but it's buried deep down; he sees that beneath all the fear and responsibility she imposes on herself, there's a girl who cherishes her kingdom and loves the people around her fiercely.

But how to bring her out of her shell?

Instead of bringing Elise back to her castle only for her to be kidnapped again — Eggman does have robots all over the kingdom looking for her, — Sonic decides to bring her along for the adventure. After all, she should want to defeat Eggman and the threat he poses to Soleanna. With that, Elise can have more time to bond with other characters without having her whole personality sacrificed to a trope that does not server her or the story.

And the thing is, at first, she doesn't really believe in herself. She only sees herself as the vessel of Iblis, she doesn't know how to fight or run fast or anything like that. But Sonic pulls her along anyway, because she's determined and, believe it or not, she does have power.

And she laughs. She screams, she gasps, she gets a hug. Because if there is something Sonic knows very well, is that the world is beautiful and everyone should get to live life to the fullest.

Now please picture me this: Elise has a hidden feisty personality. As the story progresses and she slowly opens up, she starts showing a tiny little bit of a sarcastic side. She learns that she's an absolute sucker for adventure and speed and daring situations, a real thrill seeker. She starts somewhat confronting Eggman when he kidnaps her — listen, I'm not saying she shouldn't be kidnapped at all, it kind of ruins the fun of it if there are no stakes, but four times is a bit much — and expressing all her pent up anger.

Picture me an Elise who is so done with this shit while also being glad to blow some stuff up. She has that soft side of love and care but also fuck Eggman.

It's during this whole adventure that she gets to meet the cast. And holy shit.

The potential that the Elise & Blaze duo had, man. Elise has a FIRE monster inside of her, it would make so much sense for Iblis to manifest through FIRE powers. And you know who else has fire powers? You know who else is a princess? Who else started her journey as an emotionally stunted stranger who learns to open up thanks to Sonic & co.?

Blaze the Cat

YES, CAN ANYONE HEAR ME? WHY THE HELL DID THESE TWO NOT INTERACT AT ALL???

It being the "Flames of Disaster", Elise can only see Iblis as a source of devastation and pain. She's scared of ever tapping into that side of herself, for her responsibility is just to lock it away and never look at it. But she can't escape it. And it would have been beautiful for Blaze to teach her how to come to terms with it and harness her fire for warmth, light and protection instead of destruction — but also destruction, because you know, sometimes blowing stuff up is fun.

That would grant character development not only for Elise, but also for Blaze, who gets to see a form of Iblis she never imagined before. Iblis is a world-destroying monster, she can't control or defeat it even if she has a connection to it through the flames; but maybe that's not their job to do. They shouldn't be wasting their time running around trying to kill some hedgehog, they should be protecting Elise from being used by Eggman! — Because surely that's what caused the end of the world, right? Eggman being too greedy and freeing a beast he couldn't control? Seems like a logical conclusion by all Blaze knows.

And Elise meeting Silver. Oh my fucking god.

She remembers him. That is literally the first thing she sees when she meets Sonic! She remembers Silver from when she was a child, she remembers he saved her. He was the one who even remotely tried to comfort her when her father died and the one who witnessed the might of what's inside of her. If anything, she must have spent years wondering if she just imagined him or not, this must be such a surreal encounter!

(It was either that or she actually saw the destroyed future and Silver via Iblis or something, I'm not really sure what that first scene was supposed to be. But I'm going with the "she remembers him" path)

At first, Silver doesn't know her, of course; he's only here for Sonic! But when he travels back to the Solaris Project incident, everything changes. And as much as Silver wants to be bitter about how simple the origins of their problems were — how all of it could have been avoided if only those scientists weren't so greedy, if only they had been able to destroy the base form of Iblis before it became a monster, if only the responsibility of keeping it at bay hadn't been put on a little girl, if only she had been able to keep it trapped forever, if only, if only, if only — he can't find it in himself to be anything but compassionate towards Elise. The two of them are very alike, in a way: burdened with the weight of the world, a responsibility they never asked for, but unable to give it to anybody else or give up because they care too much.

So that's the irony of Silver's story: he came to the past with the intent of ending a life, when this whole time he was supposed to save a life. Not just to save his future, but because Elise, like him, was robbed of many things, and it's not fair. He wants to go back to his time knowing Elise would live to see a safe and happy future for herself for as long as she lived. If he couldn't save the future, then at least he can change the past and delay the inevitable, give this world a little more time.

Oh and that's not even to mention Mephiles. He himself is a wonderful villain, but the fact that he never interacted with Elise is such a shame.

Think of the direct influence Mephiles could have on Elise as the other half of Solaris. The ways in which he could have tried to deceive her. Yeah, he wants to drag this out and see everyone suffer for as long as possible, but he has a damn queen in his board, why should he only play with the pawns?

It could have helped push the story just a little further by having him communicate with Elise in any way, shape or form. Replace Eggman kidnapping her 137 times with Mephiles luring Elise and using her bottled up feelings against her. Let her be Solaris' unwilling ticking time bomb.

And of course, I couldn't leave this without talking about the big issue everyone has with Elise. The fact that most people only ever remember her as that random human girl who kissed Sonic that one time. Not only was that whole romance uncalled for, but I feel like the story could have benefited a lot more from their platonic feelings. Hell, let Elise be her own damn character. Let Sonic have a positive influence on her without breaking everything else. Let them remain as friends at the end of the story without resetting everything — and really, just let her know that, even if Sonic leaves Soleanna tomorrow, she'll be ok; she's more than ok now, actually.

TLDR; Princess Elise from Sonic 2006 could have been such a cool character with complex emotions, the fact that her legacy is what it is is really sad to me.

[lunaetis]

[ sorry about lack of activity / ic content as of late. i've been battling a writer's block that is creeping in from my work stress. my health hasn't been the best either due to stress and lack of sleep as well so writing & wording had been difficult for me. i've been catching up on g.enshin & h.sr quests during the weekend, but i'm going to try to attempt some drafts / writing this week. ( hopefully i'm not jinxing myself with that ! ) thank you everyone for being so patient & understanding with me ! ]

[sheliesshattered]

My last post about the progress on my Batuu vest left off with me contemplating exterior pockets, looking to Bix Caleen as an example of a fitted vest in the Star Wars universe. I ended up talking myself out of any visible exterior pockets, with or without flaps, after looking at all those pictures of Bix. I've got enough other bits of visual interest going on with my outfit that I felt like exterior pockets just cluttered up the look.

Once I had decided against adding additional pockets, I was able to move on to the next step: finishing all the edges and attaching the lining to the exterior in preparation for getting the zipper in place. I turned under the armscyes of the lining and the exterior separately, both using a blue lace hem tape that I originally bought to go with this fabric back in 2016. Eventually I'll top-stitch them together with the hem tape sandwiched invisibly between the exterior and the lining, but for now they're finished enough to allow me to try the vest on without fraying the armscyes.

It took me awhile to think through all the steps for attaching the zipper, with all the asymmetry and overlapping and exterior and lining, while also not wanting the zipper to show from the outside at all. Eventually I figured out that I would need the underlap (left front) to be completely sewn together with the edges finished before I could attach the zipper to that side -- but I would need the overlap (right front) to not be sewn together yet, so that I could attach the zipper just to the lining.

With that finally figured out, I put the lining and the exterior together with right/finished sides together, lined up all the seams and notches carefully, then pinned the edges together from the left (underlap side) shoulder, down the center front of the underlap, and around the lower edge of the vest all the way around to the bottom corner of the center front on the overlapping right side of the vest.

After a lot of ironing to get all of that to lay flat when right side out, I was able to trim the center front edge of the overlap to be nice and clean and straight again. When I drafted the center front panels, I modified that right side to have an additional ~2" of width past where I wanted the zipper to be, specifically so there would be a built-in flap to cover over the zipper. Remember: no visible zippers in Star Wars!

Once I had the overlap panels of both the lining and the exterior all trued up, I marked the center front line on the lining side (in the below pic, the angled line going from lower left to upper right), laid half of the separating zipper onto the fabric so that the teeth were lined up with where the center front line met the lower edge of the vest, then measured from the outside edge of the zipper ribbon to the cut edge of the overlap panel. It was just about 7cm away from that edge, so I measured that distance all the way up (past the dashed line that marked the underbust elevation) and drew a nice crisp line with my chalk pen.

That gave me an easy line to follow when sewing the zipper to the inside/lining of the overlapping flap. Since I hadn't sewn the edge of that panel together yet, I was able to move the exterior layer out of the way and sew the zipper only to the lining, for now. I sewed one line of stitching just slightly in from the outside edge of the zipper ribbon, then did a second pass about halfway between the edge and the zipper teeth. It's on there nice and secure, but has a bit of room to separate from the fabric while it's being zipped, so it doesn't get fiddly.

After that, it was just a matter of pinning the other side of the zipper to the lower front corner of the underlap (this time on the exterior side of the fabric, where it faces the lining of the overlap), then try it on with the rest of my Batuu Bounding outfit and pin the underlap side of the zipper until I had the fit I wanted.

I sewed down that side to match the overlap panel side of the zipper, then tried everything on again to double-check the fit. It was a bit weird with the exterior of the overlap flap still unattached, but it fit well enough that I decided to sew the edges of that overlap flap from the lower corner up to the shoulder seam. The back of the neckline is still open, and the armscyes have been turned under but not attached to each other yet, so I can turn the whole thing right side out by pulling it through the back of the neck. With all that ironed and the zipper zipped up, the vest looks like this currently:

Folding back the outer edge of the overlap reveals the zipper. Because of all the overlapping and underlapping, the zipper is just top-stitched in place. It was way more mind-bending to figure out where everything needed to be placed to get this look, but way easier to actually sew on than, say, an invisible zipper set into a seam.

At this point I was able to try on the vest (with my Jyn Erso sweatshirt) and get a pretty good idea of the overall look. I still want to do a bunch of top-stitching both for accent and to help everything lay flat, but even with that I think I'm going to need something to keep the flap over the zipper from coming open.

I looked at a bunch of options for Star Wars-y looking buckles, settled on one I liked the best, then cut the basic size of them out of paper and taped five of them to the outside of the overlap just to get a basic idea of how it would look. I got Jack to weigh in on it too, and we both felt that the buckles were reducing the sleekness of the vest, and weirdly pushing it more towards an Imperial/First Order sort of look. My character isn't an out-and-out rebel, but she doesn't side with the First Order either. I pulled the taped on paper off again, and both Jack and I felt that that was the significantly better look.

But since I knew I still wanted some sort of closures to keep the flap down -- including one at the top left shoulder, that will hang open most of the time, along the lines of Han Solo's and Cassian Andor's shirts (and a bunch of others, this sort of overlap detail shows up frequently all throughout the franchise) and thus be visible where it hangs open.

I ended up finding these slightly unusual looking hooks-and-eyes that I think will provide a nice, nearly invisible look through the torso of the vest, but not look totally out of place on the flap edge that's hanging open. Bix's fitted coat has a similar closure of just barely visible, just slightly odd hooks and eyes, so I feel like I'm in good company there. They should arrive tomorrow, giving me enough time to hopefully get some of the top-stitching done before then.

That top-stitching is the next step, and one of the last things I need to do for this vest project. I want to top-stitch just inside all the finished edges, including the armscyes, and on each side of each of the seams, probably 2-3mm away from the edge and the seamline. That's going to involve getting everything lined up correctly and all the seam allowances lying flat inside the space between the exterior and the lining, but I think the effect will be totally worth it, both for the smoother fit and the subtle visual interest.

After that, I'll have some handsewing to do to invisibly anchor the zipper to the exterior of the overlap panel and to attach the hooks and eyes, once they arrive. The very last thing I'll do on this project is decide if I want a little stand-up half collar that ends somewhere on top of the shoulder, a bit like the one on Jyn Erso's vest.

I'm pretty sure I want a collar like that, the question is just if I need to lower the neckline in the back first, and then how far forward on the shoulder I should bring the collar. Once I've decided on that, I'll cut it out in two layers, lining and exterior, and sew the outside edges together. Then I'll be able to sew the lower edge of the exterior to the back of the neckline, and hand-sew the lining lower edge to fully encase all the raw edges. I did something similar with the Moment vest, and it comes together pretty quickly. I think I should be able to have the vest completely done by this time next week without much trouble. Hopefully.

Alongside working on my vest, I've been continuing to hand-sew the pleated panels onto Jack's jacket. In the tags on my last sewing update, I mentioned that I had about 5" still to go on the first panel. I was in the really annoying section in the middle of the sleeve where I really had to put my whole arm into the sleeve just to pass the needle through, and it was slow-going. I had to make myself push through that annoying section, rather than continue to put it off.

Eventually I worked my way all the way down to the cuff, cut off the excess from the pleated panel, turn under the edges of the lowest pleat, and hand-sew that into place. I am so pleased with how it turned out, but to keep Jack from making jokes about only having one sleeve done (and so that I wouldn't find myself with time to hand-sew and nothing ready to sew), I quickly pushed on to getting the second pleated strip started. I took a bunch of measurements from the finished sleeve and transferred them to the second sleeve, pinned the pleated panel into place, and had Jack try it on just to double-check the placement.

I was able to tear through the upper section of that second panel, between my increased speed and confidence in my method of hand-sewing this, the easy access through the neck side of the jacket, and a couple of long-ass work meetings where I was basically just there to listen in and take notes every now and then. As of posting this, I'm about halfway through with the second panel, and starting to get into that annoying section of the sleeve again.

The effect of the pleated panels on both sleeves is just so cool that I will definitely be getting photos of the jacket on Jack at some point, either on our Disneyland day or during a try-on before that. He's somewhat allergic to photos, but damn it I'm proud of how this looks, and I want to show it off. I've been calling it a 'sewist flex' from the very beginning -- look at what I can do, look at how cool and Star Wars-y it is -- and I'm really looking forward to sending this beauty out into the world in all its epicness.

And I think Jack feels similarly, based on how he's been talking about wearing this jacket all the time once it's done. His whole outfit together (this jacket, cream colored henley shirt with the buttons and bottonholes removed, mustard-y tan moto jeans, hiking boots) looks wonderfully casual Batuu Bound. The effect of the whole thing is Star Wars, but none of the individual pieces feel weird or costume-y. He might not wear those pieces together for anything other than going to Batuu, but each piece paired with something else looks pretty normal. So if Jack is able to get a lot of wear out of this modified jacket, all the better. I know I'll get that burst of sewist pride every time I see him wear it, lol.

[daughterofhecata]

Got my writing session yesterday cut short by a visual migraine that got to the point where I couldn't see the keyboard anymore, and now the damn thing is *back* and idk yet if I'll be able to write later -.-