Getting By With A Little Help From Mr. K

Today I managed to get a nice even gap in the corset, but it was not on my own. After hearing me gasping and stomping my feet in frustration…and a few whines I’m sure…Mr. K relented and helped me even out the gap. He still won’t tighten me at all, but I’m grateful for the small amount of help, which actually isn’t so small because it makes a world of difference, not just aesthetically, but also in comfort. The gap may not look that much smaller, but I assure you that it FEELS smaller, hehe.


The corset feels tighter, and feels very comfortable. The lacing protector was giving me some trouble, but I flattened it under the weight of a few books and a 17 inch laptop (are those really meant to be portable?). The results are encouraging, because I’m not having any trouble with lumps or bumps, which end up being painful little knots after a few hours of wear. I feel like I could go tighter now after wearing for a few hours, but I’m afraid to try to get the gap smaller without Mr. K’s help. The steels are so flimsy that the minute I get my finger under one of the lace Xs’ it balloons out above it and then I have a hell of a time evening out again. I will pull the laces down at the bottom only to see the gap at the very top of the corset closing. Is there anyone out there that can tell me how to prevent this from happening? Any advice on getting a smooth and even gap? Because of course, the more even the gap, the more comfortable and tighter you can wear the corset. In any case, I have taken a few pictures of the more evened out gap as well as hopefully a better look at the length of this corset which really is quite long at the back, covering a good half of my bottom.
So, until next time, wish me luck on closing the gap,

~)x(~ KK

NOTE:
Since my last post I have discovered that these blog posts are being viewed by the very knowledgeable Mr. K. I say this to amend my previous comment about him possibly not being as knowledgeable as I suspected. He is; he just prefers to not discuss the subject of corsets with me and would like to lace a woman, sadly just not me. So it is up to me to discover whatever information I can on my own. I am always grateful for any information readers would like to share either in comments or private mails. And a thank you to “John” for your thoughts on shoulder straps. I hope to make that part of my next corset. I also loved your idea for crotch straps, which I had thought of as well, but I suspect that would require a fitting in person, and if I go in person, I think I’m going to want to go all the way and get an overbust…but that is a topic best left for another post.

The Good The Bad & The Ugly: Pitfalls of Lacing Your Own Corset

I haven’t been posting lately because it is Easter break, which means we have had a full house here and I don’t get much time to write, take pictures, etc. Well, I could, but I am the sort of person who likes a solitary environment to get my thoughts out in written form. It’s also a little embarrassing to take photos of my corset with children running around the house. I did take some pictures the other day of a slightly tighter corset, though when I looked at the pictures I debated whether to post them because they look really bad. However, I have decided to post them so that you can see the mishaps as well as the successes. I have made the unfortunate discovery that Doris did not but double boning in the back on either side of the grommets. This makes the corset not nearly stiff enough and it just collapses under the smallest unevenness in pressure. So, as can be seen in some of the photos, the corset bulges out in odd ways and the dreaded box butt is starting to occur. The frustration that the flimsy back steels cause is such that I gave up for a couple of days. I am starting to think that a corset of this length cannot be properly laced by one’s self…or at least not this self. The odd bulging is also causing my lacing protector to rumple in an unattractive way which keeps it askew…as can also be seen in the photos…again. Of course, I can’t give up completely because now that I have been wearing a corset daily for more than 6 years, my back muscles have atrophied to the point that it is actually painful to be out of my corset for too long. I am afraid I will need to send this back to Doris for stronger steels at the back, or I will have to open the channels myself, which I hate to do on a brand new corset, but depending on how much she charges, I may have to because something tells me that Mr. K won’t be willing to help in this department, though he does surprise me from time to time. I never know what to expect there, and have given up trying. So to all of you anonymous people that are reading this, keep your fingers crossed for me!
KK

A Little Tighter...

It is certainly interesting now that I am doing pictures every time I put on the new corset, because I can see what I’m getting wrong. You can see that the gap is a little smaller, but not a lot. I am not the corset “expert” that my husband is, but from what I understand, you are not supposed to break in a corset too fast. Back when Mr. K used to care about such things, he told me that I should only wear the corset for a short time for the first time and only lace it just a bit, and then just a little more the second time, gradually increasing the compression and the duration in the corset each time. So yesterday I only spent about 3 hours in my corset. Today I have spent about twice that and still wear it as I write. I spent a wonderful hour just laying on my bed savoring the feeling of the corset. I know this is where people probably expect me to make comments about discomfort or tightness, but to me the feeling is almost narcotic. The feeling of compression is one that I enjoy immensely and if the corset is made well, the tightening can be a really positive experience. I can understand now how women in the Victorian era might have gotten a little addicted to tight-lacing. There is definitely an urge to close the gap and to see how small I can make my waist. Today I can feel that it is tighter, and better…but in the pictures I see the protector is askew and I am not lacing evenly down the center, which I will strive to do better tomorrow…and of course I will post the results. I hope to be sleeping in my corset by the weekend. That will be lovely. The smell of the leather when it begins to warm from the heat of my body is so wonderful I am almost tempted to not wear perfume…and for me that is a big deal, as I LOVE perfume! In fact I am pining for a bottle of Profumum Fiore di Ambre right now, but of course the price is half a corset, so it gives me serious pause. Maybe I will stick with some nice Mitsouko. Until tomorrow…

The New Leather Long-Line Corset - First Lacing!

I am not completely well yet, but I cannot wait any longer to try my new corset. The smell of the leather in the box is taunting me, so I gave in… The first thing I notice about this new corset is that it is a bit longer than my last one. It is made by the same corsetiere, but the busk is a half inch longer and it comes down an additional 2 inches on the hip! To those that don’t wear corsets that might sound inconsequential, but I assure you, 2 additional inches in length means it is substantially more restricting…and harder to put on by yourself. I had to open the lacing quite wide to get it on easily enough. The busk snapped closed actually much easier than the last one, or maybe it is just that I am finally getting a little skill in this department. At first glance it looks as if this one will allow a bit more hip-spring, which I like. It evens out the largeness of my bust (a freakishly large in Denmark 38 JJ) and gives me a more “balanced” look I think. The lacing protector design is also new. I forgot to take pictures of that before I put the corset on, so the pictures I am posting don’t look “new”. I am going slowly with the tightening , so as not to damage the new corset, so the photo of the laces is barely tightened. It is just enough to give me the hourglass. Tomorrow I will go a little tighter. Mr. K still refuses to give any advice or opinion…but that’s ok, I think most of his expertise probably comes from observing me and I have gathered quite a bit of knowledge about corsetting over the last 7 years, so let him continue with his ignoring me. If there are any other corset trainers out there that feel like writing, I would love to hear from you. And of course I would love comments from anyone who stops by my page…at first I didn’t think there were any, but now I just found that handy little stats tab and it turns out there ARE people looking at my page. Now I have a little reason to keep posting I guess. Right now I am just at a gentle hug and it feels rather nice. My 13 year old child has commented that it looks better than the last, as it does not give me “box butt”. This is when the steels bend in an ugly sort of way at the back and give you a boxy look that we now call box butt. I’m off to let the corset settle and then sadly I will have to remove it for the night so as not to break it in too fast. This is the hard part for me. I so desperately want to close that gap. But I LOVE the way the new lacing protector looks at the back. I had her make it extra wide so I wouldn’t get the pain of grommets digging in my skin. She made a wide one before but it had channels that caused it to fold up like an accordion, so this seems to be an improvement. It’s all trial and error, so we will see…

KK Meets Mr. K - Part 2

We had exchanged pictures. I was initially a little disappointed. A middle aged, sallow skinned, slightly portly man with thinning dirty blond hair in an Adidas track suit. I thought he looked nothing like what I imagined and I could not picture myself with someone like him. So…NORMAL! How could someone that looked like that be interested in all of the things we talked about? Then I caught myself and couldn’t believe my attitude. Up to that point I loved talking to him and what did looks matter? I have never enjoyed the reality that people mostly judge me by the way I look, but I think that is true of humanity in general. I remembered something my mother said about her brother. She said that people who were hung up on looks missed out on so much beauty. Imagine all the wonderful people her brother would miss out on because he had such a narrow view of what his partner should look like. And of course, my "type" always seemed to leave me...well, they just didn't usually work out. The best relationship I've ever had in my life was with a man who was not my type. I won't say that memories of my first man, who I will call Dr. T, didn't infringe on my perception of Mr. K. There was much about Mr. K that reminded me of Dr. T, who died and is now on a pedestal and will forever be the bar by which all other men will be compared. Sad, but true. I totally admit it. But I should save Dr. T for another post. Mr. K was a man who seemed to be my perfect companion, with so many shared interests, a man who was not intimidated by the craziness of my life, who seemed so in tune with me that I could swear we could be long lost twins. We were polar opposites, but in a complimentary way: I loved to accentuate my femininity, he loved a very feminine woman, I loved a man who was not afraid to take control, he is an admitted control beast, I am walking chaos, he loves to put things in order…and so on and so forth. This man thought I was worth the time and trouble to bring me half way across the globe just to meet me, I would be CRAZY not to give this a chance! Right? I arrived in London amidst some strange circumstances…which is just the usual in my life…I was stuck in the plane sitting on the tarmac at Gatwick for about 3 hours and they wouldn’t say what was happening. Turns out they were evacuating the airport because 12 guys armed with liquid explosives bound for the U.S. had been caught in London. Meanwhile, my makeup was melting and the illusion of perfection after an international flight was fading fast. Finally we were let off the plane to an eerily empty international airport. I could hear my footsteps echo…so strange. Finally as I approached baggage I got my first glimpse of Mr. K in real life. When he smiled at me I was dumbstruck. His photo had not done him justice. He was tall, tan, blond and beautiful. I was terribly nervous that he would be disappointed that I didn’t look better than my photos, and I said as much. He simply said that he liked what he was looking at and that was that. He took me to a beautiful Victorian bed and breakfast that he had reserved and we decided that I could freshen up before we went out for dinner and a bit of exploring. It is such a strange feeling having talked to someone for so long and never having met them face to face. It wasn’t like meeting for the first time; it was like resuming the conversation we’d been having over the last 5 months. When I look back on it now, I can’t believe I let someone be so forward with me, and knowing Mr. K now, I can’t believe HE was so forward with me. When I went to take a shower, he just came right in the bathroom, undressed me, walked me into the shower and proceeded to wash me as if I was already his. When I remembered this aloud to him years later, he just said, “well, weren’t you?” I had never experienced anything like this before. Having a man wash my hair, my body, everything…it was like he was casting a spell with each trace of his fingers. Believe it or not, there was nothing lewd or dirty about this. He was almost reverential in the way he took care of me. No one had ever paid me this kind of attention; I was completely enchanted. After being washed and dried, he did something that pretty much sealed the deal for me: he laid his body over mine and smiled like a cat playing with a mouse. He pressed all of his weight into me and I felt the delicious feeling of being so compressed. In years past I had to devise ways to get a man to do this, as it is a weird little kink of mine…but Mr. K did it without my even asking, and that smile! He told me that I “tolerated it well” and I just kept wondering how he knew I had wanted him to do that. If anyone out there in computer-land knows if there is a name for the desire to be compressed under the weight of someone else, please do tell…I don’t remember exactly what happened next but it went something like, I wanted him very badly and he wanted me in a corset very badly. So I was denied any further physical pleasure until I was properly corsetted. He examined the various corsets I had brought with me and chose one for me to wear. We stood in front of a mirror and while he stood behind me, he wrapped the corset around my body, hooking the busk in a way that only inflamed me further. He then began the slow process of tightening the laces. I could see his face behind me in the mirror and he was clearly enjoying the moment as much as I was. For those who don’t wear corsets, or have never had a partner lace you in, I can’t even begin to describe the erotic feeling of being slowly tightened by him, and the feeling of his hands over my tight corsetted waist. And like the famous Mr. Pearl said, he tied the bow and I was his.

KK Meets Mr. K

So, if my posts seem all over the place it’s because originally I thought I would write just about my corset training and all the trials and tribulations I go through in the pursuit of an hourglass shape and a good squeeze, or that I would write about all the crazy things that have happened to me up to this point…and there have been plenty, but the thing is, all these other things keep cropping up: mainly my new life here in Denmark. So now I think it’s just better if I write about my random as it presents itself. I think mine at this point in time could be called a cautionary tale for those in LDRs (long distance relationships) considering making a move to be with their loved one; telling about how I got here is sort of important. It may take more than one post, so I will start at the beginning: I was a single parent in America. In my search to rediscover myself outside of being a mother, I had developed a very strong enthusiasm for corsets. I joined corset groups and read all of the information I could find online. That’s when I came across the LISA group (Long Island Staylace Association) who are well respected in that community. After several months of visiting their site regularly, I noticed a little section about an online corset trainer who would give advice. I thought this was marvelous because I had so many questions and how exciting to talk to someone with experience in such things. I sent an email. I got a reply about a day later from a very polite and professional person who was generous with information. The corset trainer gave me tips on gradually increasing my time in the corset and they worked. I was ready for my first custom corset, and the trainer helped me to find a local corsetiere, because at the time I felt that a personal fitting was essential (I have since learned otherwise). We got friendlier and began to chat at length (at LEAST one hour a day, but more often it was 2 or 3) every day via instant messaging. It was so nice to have someone so interested in how I was doing with my corsetting and him being so courteous. He never once said anything inappropriate to me. This was refreshing, because there are a lot of people who seem to think that because you are online you can say and do things that no one will hold you accountable for. He never acted that way and was always completely respectful. It wasn’t until about 3 months in that we started to flirt mildly, but after talking with someone every single day for 3 months, you start to feel a real friendship with them so when he invited me to go out on a date with him it didn’t seem so crazy. The crazy part was that I was in America and he was in Denmark! What was I thinking?? But he asked me out…to LONDON! I was a single mom who was in the throes of all that single parenthood entails. Choosing between food and medicine, work and time with children…I very rarely got to think about what I wanted and I certainly couldn’t entertain any ideas about vacations…but the trainer, Mr. K came in and swept me off my feet. It seemed like a fairytale: beautiful Scandinavian man whisks Cinderella in her rags off from her life of drudgery to a week of fun in Notting Hill in London (he paid for my passport, for airfare, hotel…everything, because those were all things that were completely out of my realm of possibility). It all seemed so wildly impossible. Even now I can’t believe I didn’t suspect him of something foul, but he seemed so genuine that I never did.
Being the rambler that I am, this is definitely going to have to be done in installments. So I will write about our first meeting in the next post…

A New Corset From Doris!

Well today I got a new corset finally. Actually, I didn't JUST get it. My husband who I will refer to as Mr. K, ordered it several months ago and we were on a waiting list for several months before that. I almost didn't get it because of our constant disagreement, but by some miracle, he finally relented. Now if I can only talk him into a bra that doesn't look like a frankenstein creation due to the repairs!
So after a lot of hinting and downright complaining (both of us!) Mr. K agreed to get one made in leather, although for this corset he had absolutely zero to do with it other than paying the corsetiere. This was a difficult process because the corsetiere's native language is German. Mr. K speaks German; I do not. He has made all of the decisions on my corsets since we started dating. The reason he is not involved this time is to punish me, as this was our main shared interest and it is a very effective way of completely shutting me out. So naturally I don't feel good about it, but I'm plugging along. I am ill today, so I am not trying it on now because I want to be fresh (read: not sweaty from sickness) when I put it on the first time. Or at least this is what I think now, my curiousity may get the better of me and I may have it on by the end of the day. I am also hoping to put it on at a time when he might muster just the smallest amount of enthusiasm, but I know that might be a cold day in hell at this point.
I am posting pictures of the corset spread out without laces because as usual she sent it with only enough lace to open it about an inch and put it on...now I wont go into why that is ridiculous, but trust me it is.