The big leap.

I performed at Salon Con 2007 as well as Wicked Faire 2008. I performed Closer again as well as a comedy act with a friend of mine where I'm a man and she's a sexy bellydancer and we switch clothes and it was silly fun. At Wicked Faire I debuted a new act (that was only done that one time) with a guy friend of mine to the Foo Fighters' Cover of Darling Nikki. But I wanted to perform more. Every few months wasn't cutting it, and I was obsessing over Richard Cheese at the time.

I was dating a guy at that time as well named Simon. I was head over heels for him. And he... was not a fan of this new obsession with burlesque. He pretended to be. Hell, he even helped stage manage for the White Elephant show at Wicked Faire. And after that, he wanted me to have none of this business. While I wanted all of it.

In late April, WEBS had a bunch of shows lined up for that Summer. But I was still itching to perform! I couldn't get enough of it. I started talking to Simon about it, and it started a gigantic blowout fight. I don't even remember the details of the fight but in the end he challenged me, "Why don't you try doing it in NYC?" He thought it would shut me up. I went home that night and googled message boards. And found the Luvely Rae.

She gave me a spot in her show "The Luvely Rae's One Night Stand". And I pulled out a nurse uniform I used when I performed in Shock Treatment and all of my leopard print undergarments (I have no idea why but this whole outfit made total sense at the time...) and a good friend did my hair for me before the show. Everyone piled into my little yellow Beetle and I told my mom that we were off to the city for a night of fun (more to come on this later) and we were off.

I was terrified. That night it was myself, Sizzle Dizzle, Rae, and a young man named Lo Hung performing. I sat at the bar with my friends, not really talking. And Sizzle Dizzle walked up to me, and introduced herself. I was still terrified. She saw my Hello Kitty bag then told me that the most popular Hello Kitty item is the Hello Kitty vibrator. I relaxed, and we went backstage to change. I mostly kept to myself, or tried to. But I ended up talking with Sizzle and Rae here and there, and making friends with Lo Hung as well. Sizzle gave me makeup tips (that I still use to this day) and then... came my big NYC debut.

Cringe-Inducing

I hope I've gotten better than that. I know the costume has at least... But there I am. In big bad New York City making my big burlesque debut. 

And it was only going to get more crazy.

The Beginning (A Very Good Place To Start!)

It was Summer of 2007. I was 20 years old (21 that September) and avidly participating in a local Rocky Horror Picture Show cast. A large chunk of the cast had created a burlesque troupe for fun for a local Victorian convention known as Salon Con (it can be described as a Steampunk convention before Steampunk was super cool) and it looked just so cool. I saw everyone perform the year prior and it just looked so cool. I wanted, no, needed to do it. I'd heard of burlesque before (on ye olde internets) but I had never seen it before the White Elephant Burlesque Society's show in 2006. Everyone looked so amazing and sexy and everyone was just so talented. So I went to Fae and Viktor and asked if I could do the show at the 2007 show they put on "Burlesque Sucks" (It was a Vampire theme) at the Floating World. They said I could definitely come in and do it with them, and gave me a song. "Closer" by Nine Inch Nails. I knew that song. The heavy beats. The darkness of it. I loved it. I went to work on it immediately. Then raided my closets for everything and anything vinyl, pleather, and Hot Topic-y (I worked at Hot Topic when I was 17, I still had a bunch of overflow). I then went over to Viktor's house to work with him and Fae on my movement. And I needed little correction. I'll never forget how awesome I felt after that first rehearsal, and how excited I was for things to come.

The day of the show I was a huge mess. My mother's wedding was a week away, and I was just too nervous to actually be taking my clothes off in front of complete strangers (though I was doing Rocky Horror for a year prior... HOW IN HELL WAS THIS DIFFERENT?!) I got my hair done that day. And the lady messed it up. It killed me, but I had to push on. I got dressed and then proceeded to tease up my hair and was out the door and on my way! I put on my vampire teeth in the car, and a ridiculous pair of cat eye contact lenses to match.

Lily Stitches the Goth Child was born.

I was terrified. But I think it is safe to say that I rocked it. If I didn't... don't burst my bubble. It was my first time! The following events that evening I'd prefer to forget about... but the show itself went incredibly smooth, and thus... I had dipped my toes into something that I never thought I'd be doing five years in the future...

*Yawn* *Blink* Hello!

Hello!

My name is Lily Stitches. Chances are you probably already know me. Which is why you're here. But if you don't, well...

I'm a burlesque performer out of New Jersey. I've been featured on Kotaku. Felicia Day digs my Codex act. Edgar Wright dug my act as Ramona Flowers with my bff Luna Chase as Roxy Richter. I was featured  in the NJ Daily Record and the Sunday Press. And I'm pretty awesome.

I've been thinking about doing a blog like this for awhile but I just haven't had the time (or the computer) to actually do this until tonight. So here we go. This blog is pretty much going to be these things:

-I'll be posting my "start" in burlesque.
-Videos with my random ass commentary. Like how I thought of the act and so on and so forth.
-Photos from various shoots (again) with my random ass commentary.

Maybe even stuff from my daily life? Who knows. My daily life is pretty dull. But we'll see!