25th October 2011: Choker - complete This took somewhere between six and seven hours to complete (seriously, I was sewing all day ¬¬). Handsewn, made from pink leopard print faux fur fabric and black crepe cotton fabric. It closes with velcro at the back.

The coin looks photoshoppe don but I swear it's actually attached to the choker! >.<

24th October 2011: Choker progress I was working on this from about 2pm until 8pm today X_X. Ironed interfacing to the back of black crepe cotton fabric, took apart the bag that I took the leopard print fabric from, cut the fabric to size, then sewed it to the cotton with the edges of the cotton folded over, sewed another piece of cotton to the back to even it up, and I have started to sew the velcro onto the back. I will add the coin once it is all finished.

24th October 2011: Right hand rings Onyx ring made by Frederica_la_Noir, silver ring bought from Claire's Accessories, as part of a set.

Love the onyx ring! It is a perfect fit too. I was worried that it wouldn't fit, because my fingers have been quite swollen lately for some unexplained reason (look at the finger the silver ring is on...you can tell that it is tight...when I bought it, it was loose on that finger).

23rd October 2011: Gold ring Bought from Claire's Accessories. It was originally a double-layered 'spring'-type ring. It was a little on the small side (my fingers seem to have swollen lately :/) so I sawed it in half, filed the sharpened edges down, spray painted it gold and here we have it :). It is not 100% accurate, but it is the closest I could get on my current budget and time frame.

17th October 2011: Onyx ring (and more progress!) Made by Frederica_la_Noir. She did an awesome job - even added detail I hadn't noticed myself >.<.

I'm still trying to source the stacker rings that Maria wears. No such luck - all the ones I can find online are mega expensive. So, I'm just going to see if I can find something similar in Claire's. I did buy a set of plain thin silver rings (using one for the solitary silver ring) but sadly they won't fit onto the correct finger for the stacker rings.

I also have the undershirt! No pics yet; I'm in the process of altering it. Still waiting for black fabric for the choker, which is the only main part of the costume that still needs doing - will order some more tattoo transfer paper soon too.

11th October 2011: 80% done! Ignore ze face. It was about 4:30am when I took this >.<.

The belt is now done, I found the tights and I attached the belt to the skirt to help keep it where it should be.

I may need to take the skirt in a little more at the sides. Didn't believe it when people told me I've lost weight - looks like they were right, because as you can see in the pic, there is a lot more give around the legs than there once was.
The cardigan is a little longer than it looks here...it was riding up in the dash to make it in front of the camera before the self-timer went off XD. need to find a suitable undershirt too.

The wig may also need a little more pink dye on the front on the left hand side. Also going to try and straighten it a little more to flatten it.

10th October 2011: Belt painting Spray-painting the belt and coins (they were originally bronze) now.

Can't help but think that the coins are a little too small, but they are the biggest I could find! I think there were bigger sizes in the set I originally bought, but that got lost in the mail, sadly.

Paint is still wet in the picture, hence uber-shininess. I know that the clip isn't completely smooth but I gave up trying to get it that way lol. It looks kinda worn though, and from the amount of times Maria died, I'm going to say it's in keeping with the character >.<.

What remains to be done:
* Print out tattoo and test (after resizing).
* Find tights (I bought them...they went walkabout).
* Make choker.
* Correct stitching on cardigan.
* Find gold stacker rings or ones that could be used as such.
* Attempt to straighten one side of wig a little more.
* Full outfit/makeup test.

2nd October 2011: Wig Almost done!
I just need to rinse the roots (and maybe perfect them >.<) and straighten it a little on one side.

22nd September 2011: Wig progress 2 It still needs some trimming and styling, but it is dyed. I need to darken the roots, but have no idea how I am going to do that yet lol.
I also need to try and flatten the top...the wig is lovely and thick but sadly Maria's hair is not! I was actually contemplating removing some wefts but I just know that will fail terribly.

It has taken all day to do this so far (in intervals!) and I am too exhausted to do more progress now. It is a shame that the pink didn't come out darker, but it is a light wig so this was expected.
I only sprayed the lower layers, because it appears that this is how Maria's is dyed.

I bought the dye from Katie Bar's website (it is Raspberry Pink) because I did not want to attempt making my own dye.

22nd September 2011: Wig beginnings I love this wig - it is so thick and feels so gorgeous...it's nicer than my natural hair!! It is also a shade darker than my natural hair, which is good :).

I trimmed the wig in this picture (it is a Namine wig XD) but it needs more styling, I was just waiting until it was dyed before I do that. I have dyed it now, I'm just waiting for it to dry. It may need more dye since I just sprayed a small amount of hair to be safe, but I tested the dye on some strands that I cut off and the colour was pretty good :).

The wig was bought from cosplaywig and I would recommend them to anyone - fabulous wig and fast postage.

Excuse the horrible no-makeup face XD

20th September 2011: Boots progress Leather paint arrived today. I only painted the arch and the inside of the heel to stop the soles from becoming too slippery. The rest will stay Sharpied because to be honest, nobody is going to see it.

I am just waiting for it to dry, then it may need another coat.

20th September 2011: Belt progress First off, I am aware that it is bright yellow >.< - it will be painted!!

I have finished adding the links (although may need to add one or two more) and have fashioned the straight clip from Milliput. It is a little wonky, but it's my best effort! Photo is pre-sanding. I will probably attach the belt to the skirt to keep it in position.

Hopefully the coins will arrive soon...they were supposed to be redelivered today but haven't turned up with the rest of my redeliveries T_T.

Apologies for the state of my mirror also...it's desperately in need of a clean >.<.

19th September 2011: Tattoo progress Insomnia can be pretty useful sometimes :).

I basically drew the outline by hand, photographed it (because I couldn't use the scanner at that time of night >.<) and then coloured it using GIMP. It would have been a lot easier using Photoshop, but my disk is still AWOL.

Needs some more work but I'm rather pleased with it for now :).

If anyone wants to use this, I will probably upload a larger version to DeviantArt (link on my profile) once it is finished.

15th September 2011: Cardigan - dyed And it dyed a nice colour! The only problem is that the stitches are still bright red so I'm going to have to remove them and stitch everything back up again. Which is okay since the cardigan still needs a few adjustments.

8th September 2011: Boots I removed the straps and coloured in the sole of one of the boots with a red Sharpie. However, it doesn't show too well on the heel, obviously, so I have ordered some paint to paint the inside of the heel and the arch of the boot.

I love how the boots appear either dark brown or black depending on the light...just like Maria's :).

8th September 2011: Cardigan - 90% complete I wish that I had taken a 'before' picture to show how much work actually went into this!

The original cardigan was bought from the Land's End online sale.

It had this strange triple-seam thing going on around the neck and down the front so I removed the buttons, unpicked the seams, and sewed it all back up, creating my own seams to match the ones on Maria's cardigan. I then reattached three of the buttons (luckily they were white so I didn't have to buy new ones) and created new buttonholes. Then I took the cardigan up and removed the excess fabric. I also had to take it in a little at the sides beacuse whilst it was baggy like Maria's it looked a little too baggy.
And all of this was done by hand, no machine ^_^;. It took days. The seams aren't the neatest but it was the best that I could do.

It looks the correct colour in the picture, but it is actually a lot brighter (it only looks dark in this picture for some reason :/)...it is more the colour of Lisa's cardigan. So, I am going to dye it. I also need to move down the third button. It won't be alligned with the buttonhole but that's okay since Maria only closes the top two buttons (and you can't really see the buttonhole in photos anyway). It also needs taking in a little more at one of the sides.

5th September 2011: Belt progress I found another Maria cosplayer who had made the belt from scratch using foam to make the individual links and it looked pretty awesome so I decided to try the same technique since I couldn't find a suitable chain.

I did initially try to do it on top of an existing chain, but decided to do it on top of the beading cord instead so that it is a little more flexible :).

13th August 2011: Belt beginnings Maria's belt is an omega chain but I couldn't find one that was long enough. So, I am going to attempt to make the links myself and will use this chain as the base after painting it gold (I got the idea of making links from another Maria cosplayer ^_^).

3rd August 2011: Choker beginnings I found a small bag on eBay that looked to be a good match for the skirt. It worked out a lot cheaper than it would have if I had bought another skirt. Well, the bag arrived, and it's a perfect match! And the best thing is that the spots down the middle are smaller, so would work perfectly if I use a bit of that part for the choker. It's also long enough too (it's basically a folded piece of material that has been sewn up the sides and along the top, so I can take a continuous piece. It almost seems like a shame to cut it, since it would be a perfect little bag to carry my essentials in.

Since I only need a small bit of black fabric for the choker, I am going to source some material for Saeko's skirt and use the remains for this. Alternatively, the lining of the bag is black so I may see if I can use that for the backing.

3rd August 2011: Back of skirt The zip in the back of the skirt wasn't bothering me at first, but the more I think about it, the more it is niggling.

I am trying to think about what I can do about it - if I remove it, I will still need to put in a smaller zip because of the fabric, which means that I will have to unpick everything that I have already sewn (plus, a smaller zip would be a lot weaker. And I can't put a zip into the side of the skirt because then I'd have problems with the belt clips. *sigh*

I bought a bag on eBay (still waiting for it to be delivered) that looks to be a similar match to the skirt fabric for the choker, and if the colour matches, I may use the leftovers to try and make a strip to conceal the zip a little better, but I don't think that will make much difference to be honest :/.

Practically, I honestly can't think of much that I can do about it so if anyone has any ideas, let me know!

Ignore the luminous quality of the fabric in the photo - the flash on my camera is very bright ¬¬.

20th July 2011: Skirt I was originally going to make the skirt myself, but I couldn't find a fabric that was a close enough match. And then I found this skirt on eBay :). It is a fur-type fabric - depending on the light it can look either matte or shiny and the same can be said for Maria's skirt, so it is a perfect match!
I bought a size bigger than I usually wear so that it wouldn't be too tight around the waist, and then I took it in and shaped it a little.
The only difference is that it has a zip down the back where Maria's skirt doesn't, but it's not a huge detail. The zip actually helps with the fitting, because the fabric doesn't have much stretch so I could shape it to my legs and it is still easy to get in and out of.

The teal/turquoise band is suede (faux?) beading cord, 3mm wide. I sewed it in place with infrequent stitches so that it doesn't slip out of position.

14th June 2011: Belt clip I had some leftover mixed millput after I'd finished with Luna's wand and made sort of a prototype for the circular clip on Maria's belt. It's not bad for a first try I guess, but I realised that I didn't actually have any clips to attach a little too late. So I will remake it again once I get the rest of the materials for the belt and I can attach it to the clip and to the chain.

Yes, crappy picture is crappy. You can't really see, but the rectangle isn't carved into it, it sort of protrudes outwards. It needs a little work but it's a start ^_^;

15th March 2011: Nails I found an old bottle of Stargazer nail varnish and decided to paint my nails. When I was done...I realised that it was a perfect match for Maria's!
Second detail...sorted!

5th March 2011: Red soles I tried using a red Sharpie on the soles of the boots, and it works! I've only done a little squiggle, but it doesn't just rub off so it may hold, and it is bright enough.
The soles are real leather so I was thinking about trying to dye them with leather dye; the only problem being that the soles are already scuffed and the dye probably won't stick to the scuffed areas. Not only that, but it may be difficult to get the red as bright as I'd like it to be.
However, the heel is just plain wood and the colour comes out a little darker than the sole, so I may paint that part with just ordinary acrylic, since it won't be coming into contact with the ground so hopefully shouldn't scuff.
So, Sharpie it is :).