Comments arising

A few comments have been made in the past two days, that relate to Saturday, or my nails being green, which was of course for Saturday. All of the comments have been positive.

I had to drop into the building society on Monday afternoon to ask about something. The manager, who I think may have been one of the two staff members present on Saturday who I didn't speak to, answered my query.

Before I left, one of the other tellers who had complimented me on Saturday commented "You look different today", and smirked. The one who had been outside on Saturday and not recognised me until I turned around greeted me by name as I walked past, as if nothing had ever happened.

I bought a wig back in 1999 from a salon that has since moved and changed owner, but the original owner still works there part time. On my way between clients today, I decided to drop into that salon to ask about getting my wigs washed, since they have been sitting out on stands getting dusty, and I haven't worn them in ages.

The current owner commented on my nails, assuming that I was in some sort of show. I told her that I always have my nails done, but that this colour was for my Halloween costume, then showed her the full length photo from Saturday. Aside from being quite complimentary, she asked if I went to the Lotus restaurant, which is where the regular cafe nights are held. I explained that I used to go there all the time but circumstances have prevented me from getting there much this year.

After the hair salon, I went to see a client. The two women at the front counter often comment on my nails, and always in a positive way. Today, the obvious question was why were my nails green. I told them that it was for Halloween and that's all that was said. They didn't ask what my costume was that needed green nails. Like many people, it's a case of knowing but choosing not saying anything.

I guess I'm just a pessimist. I keep expecting bad things to happen because so many other people claim that they do, but I'm happy to say that they haven't happened to me any time recently.

Tony Bianco Egypt

I got an offer of 30% off one online purchase from Tony Bianco during October because it was my birthday this month. Given my love of high heels, of course I wanted to buy myself a birthday present. :)
 
Early in the month, I didn't see anything that was enough different to the shoes that I already have to want to buy. Part way through the month, I checked their web site again and found a new release called Egypt, which is a 14.5cm (about 6") stiletto heel with a 3.5cm platform. Those numbers are the same as the TB Popstar, which has proven to be my favourite shoe.

From the photos on the web site, I assumed that the underlying design was the same as Popstar. The obvious difference, aside from a colour that was different enough for me to be interested (Sand suede), was that the heel is wrapped and the underside of the arch is covered with a continuation of the leather that covers the platform, rather than having the sole extend up the arch and down the front face of the heel. For comparison, I've used the left Sand suede Egypt and the right Nude patent Popstar in these photos.

When they arrived, I was a bit disappointed to find that the box had been squashed, but I've been assured that they will happily swap the box in store. I just have to sort out where I can do that, since I'm nowhere near a TB store.

When I took the shoes out of the box, I thought that they looked more delicate than Popstar. I don't mean delicate as in likely to fall apart ~ they are well made. What I mean is delicate in their proportions and appearance. The heel is noticeably thinner and the sole smaller. The heels are so thin and the soles so narrow that it feels as though they are flexing, because it's difficult to get enough weight onto the sole to keep it flat on the ground!

These are delicate shoes, which call for wearing only in the right places. If I'd had these before I went to IMATS, I would have considered wearing them, as the whole time I was in heels was spent inside the venue, on concrete or carpeted floors on one level. In contrast, I knew that they were not suitable for wearing around the uneven, sloping footpaths of Cardiff (complete with cracks and holes that could swallow a heel) with my Halloween costume, and didn't even consider them when selecting shoes for that outing.

Overall, the Tony Bianco Egypt is a beautiful shoe that is suitable for experienced wearers of very high heels who have good balance. Because of the fine heels and small soles, I wouldn't recommend them for inexperienced wearers of very high heels, or anybody who doesn't have good balance.

As I said a few months ago...

I finally did something that I said in a blog post a while ago that I was planning to do.

I paid someone to come in and mow our overgrown yard, and arranged for them to come back fortnightly to maintain it and progressively tidy up the details that haven't been done yet. The idea is to reduce the list of things that I personally need to do.

No big deal, huh? That's what I thought until I realised that the blog post where I said that I was planning on doing that was from January last year!

As a side effect of that, I was able to stand in our back yard yesterday to take a few photos of my costume, including this one. A week ago, I would have been waist deep (or worse) in weeds!

Something else that I said I was going to do a few months ago was the whole pregnant Tinkerbell or Disney princess Halloween costume, which ended up simplified back to just doing a reasonably straight Tinkerbell (albeit in 6" stilettos).

As a result of a post on my boy Facebook profile and a few comments that arose from that, I am now led to believe that someone that I would not have expected has been reading my recent blog posts.

I won't say who it is, because I have absolutely no desire to embarrass them, but it is someone who initially freaked out when they first learned about me but has since overcome some of that. I'm very happy to know that I no longer freak them out, and I want them to know that they're welcome to add me on Facebook at any time if they want to. :)

It's Tinkerbell

Warning: very long post!

Sometimes it's fun to have young children pointing at you and smiling when you're in a dress, high heels and makeup. When the dress is a Tinkerbell costume and the children are pointing and calling you Tinkerbell, it's very easy to smile and enjoy what you're doing!

In spite of my earlier ideas of doing a pregnant version of a Disney princess or Tinkerbell, I got busy with work and didn't complete the pregnant bulge let alone trying to sort out a costume that could accommodate that bulge.

All of a sudden I realised that it was only a few weeks away, and I didn't have a costume. I looked around several costume shops and found nothing even close to what I was looking for. I looked at photos on google images, and ended up deciding to get 2 different costumes, both California Costumes brand, through an eBay seller who combined postage.

I tried both costumes on the night that I got them. It turned out that I'm a little too fat for the top of the Little Red Riding Hood dress, so Tinkerbell became the only option. To get ideas on accessorising the costume, I looked at images of the original Tinkerbell character. She had her hair up in a large bun, fairly subtle makeup, bare legs and shoes that would be best described as green ballet flats with white pom poms on the front. No earrings, and no noticeable nail polish.

I looked at how to do a bun and realised that I needed to buy a hair bun donut. I looked at the size of Tinkerbell's bun and decided that what I needed were 2 of the largest size donut I could find, to stack one on top of the other. Unfortunately, there were none even close to my hair colour, so I got two in a yellowish blonde. While buying those, I also spotted a green Orly nail polish called Here comes Trouble on special for $5. It was darker than the costume but a similar enough shade.

I tried putting my hair up in a bun, but found that the if the hair wasn't perfectly spread around the donut, the yellow colour showed through prominently. I mentioned this on facebook and a friend suggested using a stocking leg to cover them and help hold them together. Since I had a pair of pantyhose with runs in them that were going to get thrown out, I cut the toe and brief off one leg to get a long straight tube, which I fed around the pair of donuts twice, starting at the inside, through, over the outside, up through inside the original start, back over the outside again, then up inside, leaving only one end loose inside. While the colour is not a match to my hair, it's a lot closer than the colour of the donuts, and makes them into one piece.

With today (Saturday) being the day for the Halloween event, I got the green nail polish put on at my regular nail appointment on Wednesday. It's a lot different to any colour I've worn before. It's bright and very, very obvious, and I find myself smiling just looking at it. :)

When I tried the costume on the first time, I realised that the skirt, which had ties on both sides to allow the length to be adjusted, was shorter than my body shaper. To hide that, I did as I've done before and wore lace patterned tights over 2 pairs of pink ballet tights. The ballet tights almost hide the colour difference between the body shaper and my legs, and the lace pattern breaks up the edge enough to make it invisible unless you know to look for it.

Since I don't have any shoes even vaguely like the original Tinkerbell ones, I had to choose a combination of tights and shoes that would look right with the costume and be comfortable to wear. The first 2 options that occurred to me were the nude Tony Bianco Popstar 6" stilettos (that I wore at IMATS) with cream tights, or my mustard ballet flats with mustard tights. I was concerned that the TBs would be too high for the uneven and sloping footpaths, but didn't think that the mustard was going to look right. I considered the alternative of a pair of nude Bloch dance shoes that I bought back when I was belly dancing, but after looking at the shoes side by side, chose the TBs, which of course meant wearing the flats to drive and changing when I got there.

When I first tried on the dress, I also noted that the neckline didn't show as much cleavage as I wanted, so on Friday night, I tried the dress on again and used 2 small safety pins to gather the vertical elastic between the breasts more tightly than it did before. It improved things, but didn't fix it entirely.

In a common (judging by google images) departure from the original Tinkerbell look, I chose to wear green eyeshadow to match the costume, rather than neutral browns. I used 3 shades from one of the palettes that I bought at IMATS in 2011, which is the first time I've used those palettes!

The costume came with a small pixie dust pouch, which meant packing very light! I put my license, credit card, money, house and car keys and camera in that bag, and took powder, lipstick, brush etc in another small bag that I left in car.

Before I even left the house, I had my first wardrobe malfunction. I went to pull the skirt down, as it tended to ride up on my hips a bit, and in the process tore out the gathering ribbons on one side of the skirt. Oops! I fixed that by yanking on the other side ribbons, which came out too. No more adjustable length skirt. On the way to the car, I hit the next hurdle. My bun was so high that it hit the garage door while wearing flats, and didn't fit in the car. I had to duck to get my hair into the car, and had to recline the seat more than usual and drive leaning back hard against the seat just so that it cleared the hood lining.

I didn't get to the building society to deposit some money on Friday, so that was my first job for the outing. One of the staff giving out lollies at a table outside the front door recognised me and greeted me, but the other only saw me from the side or back and was surprised when I turned around, then greeted me by my male name while trying to pick her jaw up off the ground. Two of the other 4 working in the branch also greeted me by name. Now that I've broken the ice of actually turning up there en femme, I might do it again some time. :)

My next wardrobe malfunction was that the left wings kept wanting to fold over onto right wings, which led the woman behind me in the line in the Building Society to say to me "Let me fix your wings for you", which she then did. I later tightened the wing straps, which reduced the problem but didn't fix it entirely. It really needed something across the hinge to hold them in place, and something to keep them level, as the wings were wonky in the photos.

I walked around the area a bit, and while doing so, I had several young girls point to me, calling out Tinkerbell. I also had one girl who felt the need to tell me that I was very tall, in a way that reminded me of the blog The Junoesque. I think that that was an unintentional compliment, in as much as I think that she, and many of the girls pointing at me and commenting, saw me as a woman dressed as Tinkerbell, not as a crossdresser dressed as Tinkerbell.

After a while, I made my way to the Lifeline op shop, where I was photographed a few times both with my camera and with Bev's phone. That's where the photo at the top of this post was taken. I also went across the road to the other op shop before heading back towards my car. On the way to my car, I greeted one of my neighbours who lives a few doors away around a corner.

My final wardrobe malfunction for the day happened just after I got home, when the middle of the adhesive bra that I use to create cleavage went pop, which I assumed meant that the clip had broken. When I took it off, I discovered that it had not broken, but that the plastic tab that attached the clip to one cup had come unstuck from the cup, so if I can find a suitable glue, I can fix it. Yay. :)

In spite of very few adults being in costume, I enjoyed the outing and wearing this particular costume so much that I'm already considering next year. Tinkerbell's original costume has a much shorter skirt, like a dance leotard with the zig-zag edge of the skirt over it. This one has a net piece around the waist that's a bit like that zig-zag, but over a longer straight skirt. I'm thinking that I'd love to get a matching small diameter tutu with integral undies and a full circle skirt sewn on in place of the straight skirt, make a weighted tail for the wings that keeps them at a nice V angle to each other and keeps them level (like a pendulum weight), and wear it again next year. :)

Choosing high heels

This post was inspired by a conversation I had with Magda at IMATS, various compliments that I received for the shoes that I was wearing, and subsequent discussions on the Beauty Heaven forums and on Facebook.

I'm not ashamed to admit that I have a large number of pairs of high heels. I just opened a cupboard dominated by shoe boxes, and without opening any boxes, did a quick count of heels that I know are 2" or higher, and came up with 24 pairs.

And how many of those do I like and choose to wear often? Six pairs, all closed toe courts with stiletto heels 4" to 6" high.

The list of favourites includes five pairs of Tony Biancos (TBs) ~ Samaire in black kid, Palais in dark chocolate brown kid and in red suede and Pop Star in nude patent and in orange suede. The one other pair are Siren Marcs in red leather, which are at the bottom of my preference list because they aren't as comfortable for me as the TBs.

I have only one other pair of TBs, which I've never worn because of the colour. They are Samaire in blue suede, which is a colour that has just never suited any outfit I've ever worn. If I could re-colour blue suede to olive green, I'd wear them until they fell apart. I want olive green heels but have never found any, and make do with my well travelled chocolate brown Palais instead.

Ironically, typing this has got me wondering about seeing if I can find someone who can dye those shoes for me, as I don't think that I could bear to do it myself in case I ruined them, but if someone else did it and it didn't turn out well I'd be disappointed in them, not me. :P Also, looking at the colours, I think that the timber heels and platforms would look better with olive than they do with the blue.

So why do I choose to wear the most expensive heels that I own, and leave all the cheap ones languishing in the cupboard?

Well, there is style, of course. I have some shoes that I used to wear a lot that have shorter, thicker heels. I could still wear them, but I've got better so I choose not to. I've also got a couple of pairs of proper Bloch dancing shoes with 2" heels, that I haven't worn since I stopped taking belly dance lessons. They would still be suitable for dancing or perhaps for a period costume around WWII.

I have other shoes that are horrible to wear, and aside from being colours that I don't otherwise have, I really don't know why I've kept them. Perhaps I'm keeping them to protect other people from buying such rubbish from whatever charity I'd donate them to, or perhaps I'm just a hoarder.

The highest heels I've got, the TB Pop Stars, are my absolute favourites to wear. From them, I've learned that a good quality platform is no harder to wear than a non-platform shoe with the same rise from the ball of the foot to the heel, and in fact they are easier to step forward onto the other foot because of the rising curve under the toes.

Thinking about why I find the Pop Stars so wearable, I’ve noticed about they have a non-slip patch in the middle and the sole under the platform is very flat across from side to side, even though it’s curved front to back. Being so flat across makes it much easier to keep the foot properly upright. To tilt a foot sideways deliberately for a photo, I find that I have to consciously take weight off that foot and lift and tilt that shoe on the edge.

If you’re looking at high heels, try to find a pair of TB Pop Stars to try on, or at least look at the design, and look for shoes that have that same flatness across the soles. That flatness makes the shoes far more stable, helping to keep the feet upright and reducing the risk of twisting an ankle (or both).


I've lost count of the number of times I've seen women walking in heels with both heels tilted quite badly, and worried about the loads that this puts on the ankles. I used to think that this was all to do with tilting the whole shoe because the sole wasn't flat enough, but I've got some shoes that got me thinking that it is a different problem entirely.

Regardless of heel height, you’re looking for shoes that are rigid from the heel through to under the ball of your foot. Non-platforms that don’t have the curve up under the front are likely to have a bit of flex under the toes to make it easier to roll your foot forward to step off onto the other foot, but if there is any flex between the ball of the foot and the heel, the heel will tilt sideways whichever way you tend to roll your feet. Many seem to be rigid from the back of the sole up to the heel, but aren't rigid enough between the back edge of the sole and under the ball of the foot, so the whole back half of the shoe twists relative to the ball of the foot!

If you put a shoe on and, while standing with your weight spread over the heel and ball of your foot, you can push your heel sideways and feel the heel of the shoe tilt, the shoes are garbage! I have a pair of Miss Shop brand shoes that are a perfect example of this. They are so unstable that I’m pretty sure that I only ever wore them once!

IMATS Sydney 2012

I'm happy to say that I got there. :)

I bought the ticket last month just before the prices went up, then virtually forgot about it (along with my blog) while concentrating on work. A couple of weeks ago, I realised that it was getting close and made a big effort to get work done to catch up so that I could afford to take the day off.

On Friday night, I was still quite short on sleep and not at all organised. I packed a few things into my pilot's case, epilated my face, shaved my legs (which I hate doing, and only do when I don't have time to wax or epilate), straightened my hair and did several other preparatory jobs.

I ended up getting to bed at almost 1am and putting my alarm back to 5am because I figured that I had to try to get 4 hours sleep.

Dragging myself out of bed at 5am, I struggled several times with things that I usually have no trouble with. Even when I'd finished my makeup and had breakfast, I was still seriously considering cleaning myself up and going back to bed, but I kept reminding myself that I'd paid for the ticket and I wasn't going to waste it.

Like last year, I drove to Wahroonga and caught a North Shore train into the city rather than catching a train all the way. This time, I was looking for a specific exit from Town Hall railway station that kept me indoors for longer while walking towards Darling Harbour than the path that I used last year, and it turned out to be called Town Hall Square. At the northern end of the station is the connection to the Queen Victoria Building that I used when we farewelled Su back in June. The end of Town Hall Square is about half way along the western side, and using it kept me indoors for almost a whole block further than the route I used last year, and saved me climbing stairs only to walk back down the hill along the street.

I arrived around 10am, and even with a pre-paid ticket there was a queue to check the tickets and enter. As soon as I got into the venue, I made my way to the cafeteria area at the back to change my shoes. I'd worn the same flats as I wore last year, but this time the left shoe had rubbed into the back of my ankle through my pantihose and chafed the skin quite badly. It was ironic, then, that putting on my almost 6" Tony Bianco Popstar stilettos was a relief from the flats because they took the pressure off the sore spot on my ankle! Yes, that's two 9-volt batteries stacked between the shoes to give an idea of scale. :)

Unlike last year, I hadn't arranged to meet up with anybody else, but through the course of the day I chatted with several people I already knew and a few that I knew on line but hadn't met before. I also had some random conversations, including 2 women I don't know who complimented me on my shoes and a woman in the cafeteria at lunch time who asked me about my bag, asking if it was a beauty case (no), where did I buy it (a bag shop), etc.

While sitting alone eating lunch (in contrast to last year when there were a dozen of us eating lunch together), I noticed a couple of women looking for a table so I invited them to join me. They turned out to be some of the American staff of IMATS who were running the show. :)

Unlike last year, I wasn't focussed on looking at the sales stands, so after wandering around and finding it unappealingly crowded around most of the stands, I stopped to look at what one of the speakers, Becca Gilmartin, was doing with body art, and was so impressed that I stayed for the rest of her presentation, then the special effects presentation by Thomas Surprenant that followed. Even when you watch them being done step by step, it's amazing how convincing makeup bruises, grazes etc are when they're finished!


After chatting with a few people I knew including some who I hadn't met in person before, I had just about decided to head home when I sat down at the back of the main stage area to change my shoes for the walk back to the station, had a look at the program and decided to stay for another session, presented by Donna Mee.

The revelation for me was that the speakers are actually more important to me than the shopping opportunity. I had an enjoyable day at IMATS, in spite of buying nothing but my train ticket and lunch. :)

I had a slightly odd moment when, in the middle of the day, I forgot how I was dressed (stilettos and all), and was surprised when the guy at the register in the cafeteria addressed me as M'am. :)

In the whole trip including the trains both way, walking to and from Darling Harbour and the whole time in the venue, I never once even felt that anybody was seeing me as a guy. I guess I'm convincing enough for some people, others aren't taking any notice, and the rest are simply too polite to say anything. Even a girl of about 3 years old on the train didn't even look twice.

I have some notes for myself for next year, that others may also benefit from.

* Take a jacket, cardigan or shawl. Sitting down for an hour at a time to watch presentations can get a bit cool in the big, draughty exhibition hall. My cape is too big for this!

* I'd really like to be there both days and catch as many of the speakers as possible. I could easily ignore the entire sales side of it and just be there for the presentations and to meet up with other people.

* Take the time to read the program of speakers online before hand to decide who you'd like to see, and plan to be there all day both days. To make that possible, make sure that you get enough sleep in the lead up to the event, and preferably take the Friday afternoon off work.

* Catching trains to Sydney and back and staying within walking distance of Darling Harbour on both Friday and Saturday nights would be a really good idea, although I could probably settle for staying somewhere close to a railway station around Hornsby if I could park my car there safely from Friday night to Sunday afternoon.

Sydney 2012 IMATS tag

I'm not sure where this tag started, but I read this series of questions and answers about the 2012 Sydney International Makeup Artists Trade Show (IMATS) on Caitlin's blog and originally answered it there, but it appears that that wasn't the right way to do it, so I'm posting it here instead.

This weekend is the time to make the decision on whether you're going or not. On Monday, the online ticket price goes up from $30 for one day to $40, and from $50 for the two days to $65. The prices at the door are $45 and $75 respectively.

I'm about 99% decided that I'll go, and will make my final decision tonight and if the answer is yes, I'll buy my ticket before I go to bed. The only thing that makes me pause is that I got up at 4am last year to get there, and I'm not sure that I want to do that again!

For practical reasons, I don't really want to stay over night in Sydney on Friday night. While I could get up later, I'd still have to get up by about 6am, then do makeup etc in unfamiliar surroundings while mostly asleep.


Questions:



1. Have you been to IMATS before?  Yes, last year.


2. What day are you going to IMATS in Sydney?  Saturday.

3. Who are you going with?  So far, nobody, but I'm probably going to drive to Wahroonga and catch a north shore train and walk from Town Hall station. It's a big car with plenty of space so if anybody else from Newcastle wants to come with me, let me know!

4. Is there anyone you want to meet at IMATS?  Yes. That will be my main reason for going. :)

5. What makeup brand/exhibit are you most excited to see?  I'm considering doing a Stacey (Stay C on Beauty Heaven) and putting together a large Inglot (magnetic) palette.

6. Do you plan to be there the whole day? Yes.

7. Will you be having Mcdonalds for lunch with Beautybybrittneyx & Shellbarbie? Nope. McDonalds and I don't agree with each other.

8. What days will you be in Sydney? Saturday. Day trip there and back.

9. What do you want to get out of IMATS? Seeing people I already know, meeting people I know online but haven't met yet, checking out the exhibits and buying stuff, all while showing off in a pair of 5" stilettos. ;)

Getting organised

As I said I was planning to do, yesterday I went shopping (in boy mode, sadly) and bought myself a wheeled pilot's case and a spare battery for my camera.

I looked at several styles of wheeled case, and ended up choosing this one because of all that I looked at, this one had the largest single inner compartment, a sturdy retractable handle and a convenient centre handle. Most of the others were divided into lots of small compartments, had flimsy retractable handles that didn't move easily up or down and centre handles that retracted flat. I could just imagine snapping a nail or two while trying to get the retractable handle down then grab the centre handle while in a hurry to get on or off a train, but the handles on this one behave well.

It's black, and it's only vinyl. I'll see how it goes and if it disintegrates, I'll trade up to leather, hopefully brown.

I expect that this one will get it's first femme outing at IMATS, but there's no guarantee of that. Something else might come up between now and then.

With the size that this is, it should be easy to put a pair of shoes in it along with a jacket or even my cape, and still have plenty of space left to stash shopping. :)

Come to think of it, without the need to fit a wig in my luggage, I think that this would go close to fitting everything that I'd need to change from male to female, including an outfit or two, underwear, breast forms, makeup, hair straightener, etc. Not that I'm likely to need that any time soon ~ I generally get ready at home and go out in one mode or the other and stay that way until I get back home.

Aching legs and shoulders

Have you ever done exercises that you haven't done before and the next day experienced aches in muscles that you didn't even know you had? That's what Thursday was like for my legs, after all the walking that in did in heels on Wednesday. My shoulders also ached from the weight of my handbag and the shopping bags that I carried home.

Do I regret wearing heels on Wednesday? Not really. If I was going to do the same again, I'd wear flats while travelling (even if they didn't quite suit the outfit) and put the heels on while I was at the event. Aside from the balls of my feet getting sore, I actually enjoyed being in heels in large daytime crowds. I pushed my comfort zone in more ways than one, and discovered that the physical pain was the only drawback.

I have, however, come to realise that I need to buy a piece of luggage that I've seen quite a few people using in Sydney. I believe that it's called a train case, and is like a cross between an oversized briefcase and a miniaturised hard suitcase, with wheels and an extendible handle. The ones I've seen used by solicitors, accountants etc. are about the right size to fit a notebook computer, files, books etc into.

I don't need anything as big as the makeup train cases that Michelle bought at IMATS last year, though!

With a wheeled case like that, I could put some of the stuff from my handbag into the case, along with whichever shoes I wasn't wearing at the time. I could also have packed the things that I got from Su and my shopping into the case for the return trip.

I'm thinking that having a case like that would be great for IMATS this year.

The irony is that I could also use a case like that for work, and today (30th June) is the last day of the financial year here, so I need to go shopping. I might also get a spare battery for my camera while I'm out. :)

Thank you, young lady

I made it to Sydney yesterday. I decided to catch the train all the way rather than driving part way then catching a train.

I also decided, by default, to wear the outfit that I had selected for Saturday, including the Tony Bianco Palais heels. I say by default because if I had selected something else, I almost certainly wouldn't have worn heels, but I didn't end up even looking at other options.

The plan was to walk the 800m to the railway station, but by the time I was ready, I was worried enough about missing the train that I got my wife to drive me to the station. After walking that 800m home in heels in light misting rain, I now know 2 things ~ (1) I will never attempt to walk down a hill that steep in heels again, and (2) if I hadn't got a lift to the station, either my outing would have ended before I got to the station because I would have missed the train, or I would have turned around and come home to get different shoes.

Seriously, if I hadn't been wearing my lace tights, I would have walked home barefoot! In hindsight, I should have taken my tights off and could easily have done so, since the train carriage was mostly empty a while before my station, I was wrapped up in my cape (sorry, I didn't get a photo of that) and it would have been very easy to slip them off but I didn't think of it at the time, and I underestimated how bad it would be walking home in the heels!

Getting up and down stairs at Central to change trains was a little bit of a challenge, but I took it slowly and managed okay. Escalators in heels was a new experience but I managed that better than expected ~ I'd always thought that the ribs on escalators would be a problem for such small heels but they weren't.

Aside from not being able to find the underground walkway between the QVB and Westfield Pitt St on the way there (for future reference, take the escalators down from the level that the walkway from Town Hall station is on and ignore the signs that send you up to street level!), the biggest problem was how sore the balls of my feet got from the distance that I had to walk. I have a pair of gel inner soles that I haven't used in years and I'll be using them again soon!

Thanks to a school teachers' strike, there were several teenage girls on the trains in both directions but the worst that happened was that one looked at me and giggled. I have no idea whether she read me, or even whether the giggling had anything to do with me. In the entire day, there were the usual odd looks that could have been people reading me, admiring me, or just noticing that I was overdressed and wearing the highest heels that they saw all day.

The highlight of the travelling part of the trip to Sydney was when two transit officers came through checking tickets. I took out my ticket and held it up, and when the officer got to me I don't know if he even looked at me but he looked at the ticket very briefly while I held it and said "Thank you, young lady." :)

The group consisted of Su and her son, Sarah and her daughter, Jasmine and I. At Su's suggestion, we went to the food court on the 5th floor and found ourselves a table. We sorted out a few things that Su was offloading in preparation for her move overseas, chatted and had some lunch. I was quite impressed with the food court and suspect that it might be the venue for some future Sydney Beauty Heaven meet-ups.

Sarah left to collect her son before we took photos, so unfortunately she isn't in the group photo, but it was great to see her again.

After I said goodbye to Su and Jasmine, I walked up the Pitt St mall to the Valley Girl store there and bought a couple of pairs of light brown lace patterned tights similar in style to the dark brown ones that I was wearing, then made my way back to the railway station. They're not the mustard colour that I thought that they had, but the colour that I got is one that I will use, and they were on sale for under $5 a pair. :)

Paralysed by indecision

I know that it's an old phrase, but I'm finding that paralysed by indecision is an accurate summary of where I've been at quite often recently. Being a Libran and an engineer, sometimes over-analysing things makes the decision easier. :P

I mentioned that the farewell lunch for Su from Beauty Heaven had been cancelled on Saturday, but we've now organised to try again for lunch tomorrow (Wednesday). It appears that we may have a better turn out than we would have had on Saturday, including some of the group bringing their young children along. I've decided that this time, I will be there. I just have to figure out the details.

The weather looks as if it will be cold, wet and miserable. On the upside, there are underground walkways connecting Town Hall Station and Westfield Pitt St via the Queen Victoria Building, so I don't have to worry too much about the weather in Sydney.

This leaves me quite undecided about two things.

I mentioned that I had reservations about the outfit that I'd chosen for the trip to Sydney on Saturday, which consisted of an olive green hooded cape and a dark olive brown dress teamed with the shoes, tights and jacket shown in the photo at right. Part of the problem is that I'm not sure that I want to try to wear 12cm (~ 5") stilettos travelling by train and walking a bit in the city. The shoes are quite comfortable, but I worry that I'll stand out by being vastly over dressed and tall. I still haven't decided whether to go with the outfit I'd already chosen, or to try again and see if I can put together something more daytime, with flat shoes, that I can fit into at my current weight.

The other thing that I have to decide is how to get there and back. There are several options, but my preferred one of driving to the end of the freeway and catching a train from Wahroonga doesn't work during the day on a week day, as I simply wouldn't get a parking spot near the station as I can at weekends or of an evening.

Catching a train from home would mean walking to the train in heels, which I could do, and the trip would take about 2.5 to 3 hours each way including changing trains at Central. Driving part way but not being able to park at Wahroonga would mean parking at Berowra, where fewer trains stop. It'd be about one hour 20 minutes driving and one hour by train each way. Add in slow traffic due to the weather and waiting for trains and it could also be up around 2.5 to 3 hours each way, but means that I'm in the relative safety of my own car for part of that. I'd also need to fill the car up tonight or on the way...

With the miserable weather making driving slower, I think that the balance is tipping in favour of catching a train all the way. I might even take some time to do some shopping before heading home, even if I have to carry it all home from the station. :)


So I've got to decide what I'm wearing and how I'm getting there before I go to bed tonight. I've already blown any chance of getting to the cafe night tonight but I need to decide and prepare, then get to bed early for a change!

Not obvious

Part of the reason why I missed my train home on Friday was that the battery on my internet tablet is playing up, and it decided that it was flat, leaving me without a clock or train timetable. I turned it on again later and it indicated that the battery still had about 4 hours of charge left.

Not knowing when I needed to get to the station, or that there would be over an hour between trains, I stopped to look at an op shop that I was walking past anyway. The shop is a small privately run place, and I had read a positive review of it on a crossdressing forum, where another member said that they had been there in boy mode and had tried on and bought a couple of dresses with help from the friendly, accepting staff.

While I was browsing, there was a young woman working in the shop who appeared to be one of the staff mentioned in the review. She asked if I needed help, and whether I was looking for something for my partner, because it's all ladies here. I replied that no, I didn't need help and I was just looking. That response satisfied her, and she turned her attention elsewhere.

So, in spite of the very obvious freshly tinted lashes, the fairly obvious long hair, pierced ears, long painted nails, etc, she either didn't make the connection or chose to pretend not to. So, like the staff at my local Subway, it's hard to know whether she noticed and just didn't say anything or whether she simply didn't notice. Either way, it doesn't actually matter.

That got me thinking. I know of crossdressers who have beards and a profusion of body hair because they are so fearful that just the lack of that hair will cause people to realise that they are crossdressers. They live most of their life in hiding, hiding who and what they are as much as they possibly can and often struggling with depression as well. I find that quite sad, since it actually seems to take a lot of effort to tip people off to the fact that you're a crossdresser, and even when you do, it doesn't usually actually matter.

So, if you want to grow your hair long, get rid of facial and body hair, get your ears pierced, get your lashes tinted, etc, just do it. Most people won't even notice, and those who do will probably think that it's an improvement without ever even considering the possibility that you're a crossdresser.

Painting your nails, growing them long and having acrylic overlays like I do might be too much of a hint for most people but even that's not guaranteed. :)

The wheels fall off

Sometimes, we make plans and the wheels fall off. Yesterday's appointment and today's planned lunch in Sydney are good examples.

Yesterday, I was a couple of minutes late getting to the station to catch a train for my waxing and lash tint appointment, and ended up having to wait about 45 minutes for the next train, which got me to Newcastle station at 11:59, with about a 5 minute walk to my noon appointment... Yes, being late was my own stupid fault, but why such a long wait between trains? The return trip was worse, as I again missed the train by a few minutes and had to wait over an hour for the next one.

Of course, the result was that I got back to work a full hour later than intended, with a headache from the cold wind prevalent in the post-apocalyptic wasteland style streetscape that is the Newcastle CBD.

I stayed up late last night organising myself for the planned trip to Sydney, got less than 5 hours sleep then woke at 7:15am to find that one eye was swollen and quite sore. I suspect that the cause was a mild allergic reaction to the lash tinting combined with having fished a loose lash out of that eye last night, possibly leaving some goop behind, but whatever the cause it was bad enough that, on top of the lack of sleep, I cancelled my trip.

I also had some reservations about the fact that the outfit that I'd chosen for the day made 5" stilettos the only shoe option. I'm too fat around the waist to wear any of my trousers or skirts at the moment, so, at my wife's suggestion, I chose a dress that would work with my full length cape, added the lace tights and lace jacket then found that the only shoes that would look right and fit were my brown Tony Bianco stilettos. In general, I wear flats during the day and keep heels for going out at night. I also haven't tried wearing stilettos when catching trains or on escalators. I also tend to tower over my Beauty Heaven friends even when I'm wearing flats, and heels would exacerbate that!

Sadly, most of the other people planning on going had also dropped out, so the whole thing was cancelled. With any luck, we might get another time organised within the next week.

The only bright spot in all of this is that it prompted me to polish my brown Tony Biancos, which is a job that had been on my to-do list for months. :)

Farewell lunch

In the few days since I mentioned that Su is moving to the UK, we've arranged through Facebook to meet up for a farewell lunch in Sydney. There will be at least 6 of us from the Beauty Heaven forums. That means I'll be driving to Wahroonga and catching a train to the CBD. I'm looking forward to catching up to a few friends who I haven't seen since IMATS last September and meeting at least 2 who I haven't met before.

I'm still trying to figure out if I can get to Sydney early to take a side trip to the Estee Lauder staff shop, which has moved since we went there last year.

Today, I'm sneaking out at lunch time to get waxed from the waist down and a lash tint. :)

A weighty conundrum

While getting my nails done yesterday, I was chatting with the nail technician about my Halloween costume ideas, including the fact that I'm not sure that I can make the pregnant idea work unless I lose some weight.

The response to that surprised me. Both of the women in the salon said that they think that I look better at the weight that I am now, because it makes my face fuller and more rounded. They then went on to tell me that, in January when I last got my nails done en femme, after I left they had been talking about how pretty I looked.

Both were quite strongly of the opinion that I shouldn't lose weight as it makes my face look too thin. On the other hand, I know that I am carrying quite a bit of weight around my waist, which is not not healthy and spoils my feminine waistline. Sure, I could add more padding to my hips and go up a skirt size, but I think that I'd rather get at least some weight off.

I guess I'm going to have to consider what weight I want to be, to compromise between face shape and body shape. For health reasons, it really has to be under 80kg, but perhaps I should aim for about 77kg rather than aiming to get rid of the spare tyre.

I'll have to think more on this...

Halloween planning - part 3

When I went back on Thursday to buy the stuffed hippo that I intended to use for the outer cover of the pregnant belly, an op shop that had been closed when I was there late the previous day (the one that sister-in-law's mother volunteers at) was open, so I stopped in there and had a look around.

I saw a navy coloured tutu that looked like it was an adult size, but I was so focussed on what I was doing, and uninterested in something that was not in the range of colours that I'm currently wearing (that go with my natural hair colour) that I didn't even try it on.

Like a lot of crossdressers, I like to experiment with clothing that I've never tried before, so having seen the tutu gnawed at me enough that I went back on Saturday morning to try it. In anticipation of this, I wore a gaff and opaque black tights that look a fair bit like mens socks when worn under mens trousers and shoes.

By the time I got there, it was about 11:45am and the shop was going to close at noon. I walked in to find that the place was packed ~ as in a dozen or so people. Once upon a time, I would have turned tail and fled, abandoning the object of my interest ~ but not any more. :)

One of the two dressing rooms was free, so I made my way straight to the rack where the tutu was, popped it under my arm then made my way to the dressing room. I stripped off my shoes and trousers and slid the tutu up into place, finding it a tiny bit loose but otherwise a fairly good fit, which was good since that meant that it would fit okay with my hip padding.

Within the first few seconds of putting it on, I'd decided that I was definitely buying it!

Having decided that I was buying it, I re-dressed myself, tucked the tutu and the hanger that it had been on under my arm and went out to the counter to pay for it ($5!), and realised that there was a woman standing at the counter fiddling with a pile of knitting needles while glaring intently at me. Where once I would have been intimidated by her behaviour, this time I was amused.

I drove home, tried the tutu on over my hip padding then decided that I'd like to go to another op shop before it closed to see if they had any skirts or dresses that might work over the tutu, and perhaps some male trousers that would fit over the padding to wear on similar future outings. I haven't gone out in boy mode wearing padding before, but since the weather is cold and wet, I wore a shirt, jumper and fairly bulky jacket on top and a pair of track pants on the bottom. I think that the bulkiness of the jacket mostly hid the padding.

I ended up going to 3 op shops (the local Lifeline shop and a couple of Salvos stores) and buying 2 skirts. I experimented a little and found that both looked okay, as did a low-cut LBD that I borrowed from my wife. By putting a contrasting top under it, I thought that the dress looked quite good. To some extent, I think that the way the skirts and dress hang over the tutu is reminiscent of 1950s dresses and skirts over petticoats.

The only drawback is that the dress and both of the skirts, like the tutu, are of colours that don't suit my natural colouring, so I'd have to wear a blonde or brunette wig to really make the colours work.

I've decided that I'd like a tutu in cream or a similar warm colour. Out of curiosity, I googled tutus to see how much they cost, and found a company that makes them in Australia to order. I initially thought that the one I have had been home-made, but looking at that site, I think that it may have been custom made by a place like that. It's clearly hand made, but not poorly made. The price? A new one similar to mine would cost about $135!

I don't know whether I'll use it in an outfit for Halloween or not, but I'm thinking that it's going to be either pregnant bulge or tutu, not both together. :P

Halloween planning - part 2

Part 2, as promised. In the accompanying photos, you can see the progress so far with the mutilation of the doll and beach ball. I stripped the doll, pulled its plastic hands and feet and its wig off, removed the stuffing and cut a hole in the base of the head so that the salt could get in through the body. I then sewed both arms and one leg shut, filled the whole thing through the open leg then stitched it closed. I weighed it and it came in at 3kg, which is in the ballpark for a newborn.

I then stitched the arms together and the legs together to hold it towards the foetal position. Looking at it, I know that I'm going to have to take some fill out and shrink the bottom, as it's disproportionate and the overall length is be a bit too long, but I left it as is for now.

After cutting the stem off the beach ball, I stuffed the doll into it and folded it shut so that I could do a trial fit.The lack of fill around the doll made it quite lumpy, so I added one of the lightweight padding pieces in front of it to smooth it out. The plastic slid around while the other padding stayed put, making the results a bit hard to judge and convincing me that the fabric cover will not only be necessary, but will need to be tightly fitted or perhaps taped or glued to the plastic. 

I am aware that part of a the baby is inside the mother's normal body profile, and hence the doll may have to be trimmed, such as cutting the face off so that the remainder of the head will sit further in against the body, but from reading about pregnancy simulators, they deliberately incorporate a piece that is designed to push into the wearer, squashing the bladder in a manner comparable to a baby during pregnancy. I'm just not sure whether I'll be able to find a suitable body shaper that will apply enough pressure there without squashing the whole thing into me too hard.

The trial fit has convinced me that the concept can work, but the spare tyre of fat that I'm carrying around my waist is proving to be the biggest obstacle. At this stage, I'm putting the pregnancy idea aside for a while and concentrating on trying to get at least a little weight off. I'm still going to look for a suitable costume, and if I succeed in getting the weight off, I'll finish the pregnant belly and use if for Halloween. If not, I'll do something else this year and plan on re-visiting this next year.

While typing this, I realised that I made a silly mistake. When I did the trial fit, I first put on the hip and bum padding and a body shaper to keep that in place, then the pregnant bulge and another couple of shapers over that. The first shaper was probably reducing the amount that the doll pushed into my belly, offsetting the effect of the other shapers. I'll have to try it again without that shaper under the pregnant bulge!

Halloween planning - part 1

I've been looking at costume ideas for Halloween. On the Saturday morning closest to Halloween, my local suburban shopping centre (including the salon where I get my nails done, the Lifeline op shop, Building Society branch and Subway restaurant that I've mentioned before) has a Halloween themed day. I went there in boy mode last year, and saw adults and children dressed up and decided that this year, I really want to go en femme.

But I also want to be in keeping with the Halloween theme. I want to present myself as a woman dressed up for Halloween. I've been working on the idea of going as Tinkerbell (currently my favourite option), a Disney princess or perhaps an angel, but with the twist of doing a pregnant version of whichever I did. I guess that I might be either presenting myself as a pregnant woman dressed up for Halloween, or a woman dressed up as a pregnant character for Halloween. I'm not sure which. :P

I've done a little bit of playing with making a realistic pregnant bulge using padding, foam and body shapers, but even when I made the bulge about full-term size, all of the padding (not counting the body shapers) weighed in at about 250 grams, and I wasn't convinced that it would work with so little weight. I'm not convinced that I'll move right without a reasonable amount of weight there, so I decided to look at how to make a more realistic simulation of a pregnant belly.

How do you make a relatively realistic simulation of a baby belly? I figured that the first thing to do is to get a doll about the size of a newborn that will curl up to the foetal position, and fill it with something dense enough to give it a bit of weight, put it in some sort of bag, then fill the bag around it to add a bit more weight and round out the overall shape.

My first thought was to use wheat, as is used in microwaveable heat packs. The first thing I did was to ask my wife where our heat pack (which hadn't been used in several years) was. When she got it out, I immediately realised that it was mouldy. A quick google, some discussion on Facebook and the wheat pack went in the bin. I discovered that rock salt was the preferred filler for heat packs now. A bit more googling and I discovered that the best way to get rock salt was as swimming pool salt, costing about $8 for a 25kg bag from a hardware store!

The only real problem with using salt is that it not only attracts water, but enough moisture will dissolve some of the salt, giving off a salty smell, so I need the salt to end up inside a waterproof bag, and to damp the sound of salt grains moving against each other and to stop a plastic bag sliding around, I need to put the waterproof bag inside a fabric bag.

My first thought was to find out how much a replacement bladder to go inside a football would cost, but that idea went out the window very quickly once I tried a couple of sports stores and discovered that not only is it impossible to buy a bladder, but all of the modern balls are one-piece plastic things with no replaceable bladder.

And so it was that I went to a hardware store to buy a bag of salt, and to a few op shops looking for a doll about the size of a newborn, some sort of waterproof bag, and some sort of fabric bag.

I ended up finding a child's beach ball at an op shop for the waterproof bag ~ I can cut it open, fill it then tape it shut. After looking at cushion covers for the fabric bag, I ended up finding a stuffed toy hippo (merchandising from the movie Madagascar), the body of which is about the right size and shape for the fabric bag, but it would need the padding, head, arms, legs and tail removed and sewing back up. I didn't buy it at the time, but went back the next day and got it.

At another shop, I found a doll. I was originally intending to get a hollow plastic doll, but had realised that the hollow ones have rigid arms and legs and a body that would not curve into the foetal position. When I found a soft-bodied doll about the right size, at first I wasn't going to get it. I walked out of the store, then changed my mind and went back in and bought it.

In the next instalment, you'll get to see my mutilation of the doll. :P

Au re·voir Su

I had a total of 4 trips to Sydney to meet up with other Beauty Heaven members last year. The first was for Fashion Weekend Sydney, because Su (who is shown in the photo at right watching Stacey assemble her new palette at IMATS) had been given tickets. The second was my first daytime outing wigless, when a few of us met up to go to the Estee Lauder staff shop. The third trip was a casual day with friends, when one of the other members from Queensland had a few hours to kill between booking out of her motel and catching her plane home. The fourth outing was IMATS.

I wasn't the only one who has at all four of those outings. Su was also at all four. She was one of a handful of people who were instrumental in getting me out during the day with beauty obsessed friends who simply treated me as one of the girls. I know that my confidence improved dramatically as a result of those outings, and they were the key to my move from hiding under wigs to going out wigless.

If it hadn't been for those outings in Sydney, I doubt that I would have attended the first Newcastle Beauty Heaven meet-up and I would not have been anywhere nearly as comfortable going out wigless locally as I am now. Before, I was always convinced that most women took pity on me and just pretended to be supportive, and that anybody who looked at me would read me as a crossdresser.

I was sad to learn that Su will be moving to the United Kingdom soon, leaving Australia (possibly forever) at the end of June and visiting relatives in India before moving permanently to the UK. I don't know whether I'll get to Sydney and see her before she leaves or not. I hope I do.

Thanks to Facebook, we will stay in touch, but I'll miss her when I go to meet-ups. Perhaps one day she will return, or I'll travel to the UK and we'll meet again.

Su, thank you for being a good friend. Thank you for being an inspiration. Thank you for being you. I wish you the best for your future in the UK.

More Subway stuff

I went to Subway tonight and was surprised to be served by the woman who had commented about my nails several weeks ago. I was surprised not only because I hadn't seen her there in about 5 weeks, but also because she usually used to be there on week nights.

It was a quiet night there, and in the whole time I was in the shop, I was the only customer. When I arrived, the woman serving me commented that she hadn't seen me for a while, and I responded that I've been there a couple of times a week but she hadn't been there. Apparently she hasn't been working there as often as she had been before.

We chatted as she prepared my order, and she was clearly in a good mood, laughing and smiling as she worked. Just before I left, I commented that I'd been there on a Sunday night a few weeks ago in a dress and the woman who served me didn't seem to realise that it was the same person.

She smiled and said goodbye as I picked up my order and left, as if what I had said was completely and utterly normal. I guess with my long painted nails, the long hair, pierced ears, etc, it wasn't a surprise to her. :)

Nothing said

Three weeks ago I mentioned going to my local Subway en femme. I've been there several times since then, but it appears that they've rearranged their staff considerably in the past few weeks and I was starting to think that the two women who had been there that night were no longer working there.

I was surprised to find the woman who prepared my food that night was working there again tonight. While she didn't serve me tonight, I remarked about their recent staff changes and she smiled in acknowledgement of recognising me, which I would have expected based on my previous visits there as a male. I couldn't tell whether she realised that I was the same person as had been there en femme 3 weeks ago or not.

Sadly, the recent staff changes seem to mean that the other woman who commented about my nails a few weeks ago doesn't appear to be working there any more. Then again, I hadn't seen the woman who was there tonight in 3 weeks, so there's always a chance that the other one will show up again. :)

Evolution of a hairline

Back in January last year, I posted about my first wigless outing. In this post, I've finally set out to describe how I create a hairline that allows me to confidently step out without a wig in spite of my naturally receded hairline.

When I was a child, I had a normal rounded hairline. In my teens, I developed a pair of receded patches above my temples which for years I incorrectly referred to as widows peaks, and for which I've never found a correct name. In the second photo at right, I've roughly scribbled my natural hairline in cyan. Yes, that's me without makeup ~ Urk!

While I was at University, I grew my hair long, but never went out crossdressed, in part because I wasn't able to effectively disguise my hairline.

After getting my hair cut short as part of a partial purge to try to sustain an unworkable relationship with a woman who absolutely rejected my crossdressing (who was also a cougar almost 10 years my senior), I bought a wig and stopped thinking about going out without one.

Wigs, however, created a small problem. The sides of all of the wigs I've ever owned incorporate a curved piece in front of the ear with an edge that goes from there up the side of the forehead. The side of my own hairline is quite different, having a curve around the temple that follows my original childhood hairline towards the middle, then turns back to the bald patch above the temple. When I wore a wig, a patch of my own hair would be visible above each temple.

To avoid having hair showing that contrasted against my wig, I took to shaving up each side of my forehead to remove that hair. As I bought different wigs, the shape of the edge of the wigs varied and I shaved slightly more hair, until I ended up shaving an almost straight line from the top corner of the ear to the outside edge of the bald patch, as shown by the green line on the photo. By taking that hair off, I actually made the hairline less noticeably receded, but still not good enough to go without a wig.

I think that it was in late 2010 that one of my friends from the cafe nights, Jenny, mentioned that she prefers her hairline to be higher in the middle of her forehead than it is naturally, and that she shaves it to raise the line. Like the sides, I had already been taking a little bit off there to suit wigs that didn't come quite far enough forward, but I hadn't considered taking considerably more off until Jenny mentioned doing it on purpose.


There is, of course, a compromise to be made. On one hand, the hair that I remove means less hair in my already sparse fringe, but on the other hand, the raised line (shown in lime green in the photo) means that the hairline looks more rounded and that the thickness of my fringe is more even because I've removed some of the thickness from the middle while not altering the edges.

Having shaven the sides and middle, I was left with a pair of much smaller looking bald patches, which still showed up through my fringe. The final step was to colour them in with makeup. I already used contouring and highlighting to alter the apparent shape of my face as part of my makeup, so this was just another small step, which I did by taking my foundation over the whole area then using an eye shadow that is a close match to my hair (the same one as I use on my brows) to colour in the area above the mustard line on the photo.

The last photo here was taken after this week's cafe night. I simply brushed my hair back to reveal the makeup, while the first photo is how it looked with the fringe brushed over it.

Does that qualify as a comb-over? :P