A Lovely Little Day

What a lovely little day today.  It was Wednesday, and do we know that that means for this vintage doll?  Yep, no work.  So, I went to visit my very modern best friend in Columbus to have lunch.  We quickly drove through Wendy's, and because it was such a beautiful day today, we ate at a park.  So vintage doll and modern doll had fabulous time discussing things about life.  As we were about to leave, I noticed there was a tire swing.  I love tire swings.  It reminds me of being 4. Don't ask me why.  I never had a tire swing in my entire life, but I get very nostalgic about tire swings.  It's a quirk. 

                      And no, that is not a vintage outfit at all.  Just a pair of skinny jeans
                      and wool jacket from Talbots my mother gave me.  It slightly resembles
                      a Pendleton 49er jacket, so I like it until I get a real one!  My sunglasses
                      are vintage though.  I believe they were my grandmothers and from the
                      50's.  I may be lying though.

                Silly best friend.  She wore a skirt and it was  only 60 degrees out!

We took one more picture on the bench and then she had to go back to boring work and I got to go home and work on important things such as:

Tracing more patterns.  Yep.  5 hours later and I finally finished.  It takes quite a bit of time trace patterns.  Now I just have to study those instructions on how to size them up a size or two.    This is what it looks like:

I use pattern tracing interfacing.  So far, it has done the just fine, though I know most people use Swedish interfacing.  When I opened one of my patterns I had bought at the flea market a few weeks ago, there was this amazing pamphlet on how to care for Rayon and other types of fabric, how to iron it and how to wash it.  It was a great surprise.

I am not sure of the date, but looking at the clothes in the picture and the awesome hairstylings of the lovely ladies, I would say it is from the 1940's.  If anyone knows better, please correct me.
I also received some lovely packages in the mail today: 

The red, orange, and teal fabrics are 1930's feedsack reproductions I ordered from Reproduction Fabrics.  Very cute I think.

This hat, from the 60's??  is in practically perfect condition, and has adorable accents to boot.  I got it but it now price for $3.00 on ebay.  Can you believe that.  When I saw it I swore there had to be something  wrong with it, but not, the lady was that generous. 

The last thing I got was this navy dress from MyCocoonVintage.  At first, when I opened the package, I was a little disappointed because the accents are definitely gold.  A gaudy gaudy gold and in the pictures they had it looks very light gold, almost white.  I thought, "whatever am I to do with this truly awful goldyness."  But then a brilliant idea popped into my head.  Instead of pouting about it, I did something about it.  I found some 1/4 inch white grosgrain ribbon and pinned it on top of on top of the ugly gold trim and covered it up.  I will have to find some white buttons to replace the ones that it has on it, and then it will be very adorable.
Tomorrow I only work a half day, which you know, only amounts to two hours of work, so guess what I will be doing all day??? Any guesses.  I am too predictable I've decided.  Oh and no messy bed shots.  I apologize for those.  I gotta find a new spot to take pictures because I never make my bed.  Very unladylike, I know, but I find it a pointless task whose only purpose is to waste my time.
But as you can tell 

today was a fabulous day.  Forgive the slightly possessed and creepy look I have going on up in that picture and Please comment.  I love hearing from you.  

Until tomorrow

Ahoy Sailor

                                            Picture Credit : The Big Red Apple
It's 1945.  The war has been looming for almost 4 full years.  It has been too long since you have seen sailor fiancé.  You have tried writing back and forth to each other, but after the first year it became too difficult to keep the correspondence going.  You know in your heart, though, that you still love him and he still loves you.  If possible, you love him even more than the moment he proposed to you.  He has been fighting for his country, keeping you and everyone you know safe.  He is the most honorable man you know.  But it is time for him to come home now.  He has done his duty and he has written you a letter for the first time in 3 years saying he is coming home in 2 weeks.  2 weeks, and you have nothing to wear that has not been damaged in some way from working at the factory every night, or been given away to a person more in need than you.  But it is not just any old sailor coming home to you.  It is sailor fiancé, and he deserves something nice... something special...something--new.  The trouble is, the war has caused a shortage of well, practically everything.  There is no way you can afford a new outfit from a store now.  Any money you made you gave back to your family to help out.  You are heart broken   But there is something else you can do. You can sew.  A talent you have gotten quite adept at during these troubling times.  You look through the patterns and find the perfect outfit.  You know it will look perfect on you and sailor fiancé will adore it on you.

 You pick out a splendid coral color cotton fabric and start sewing right away.  Days later, after staying up straight through the nights, your outfit is complete.  You try it on, afraid to look in the mirror, unsure of how it will fit.  But it truly is perfect. 

You pick out your nicest pair of gloves, shoes, and the fanciest hat you own and place it delicately next to your meticulously folded new outfit high above in your closet.  You make sure it is out of reach of any possible accidents.  Just seven days left.  Seven days until you can hold sailor fiancé and never let him go again.  Seven days to try to figure out how to erase all that war has done to him.  You do not know how you will make it seven more days, but with distractions of work and family, you muddle through in a blur.  And your work and time has paid off.  Finally, you will see sailor fiancé in only a few short hours.  You unpin your hair, slip on your nylon stockings you had saved from before the war, and lastly put on your new outfit and gloves.  As you run out the door, you almost forget your hat, you are in such a hurry.  But at the last moment, your younger sister cries out to you that you forgot it.  You grab it from her and position it just so, and then you are on your way out the door once more.  You are later than you planned on being, and there are already a swarm of women, some younger than you, some older with children, all waiting patiently for their men to arrive.  At last, the men start to breeze in.  Some straggle behind, the effects of war clear on their face, others race out to the middle of the crowd cheering that they have made it home and searching for their loved ones at the same time.  You don't want to get lost in the crowd.  How will sailor fiancé ever find you if you stay in that crowd.  You decide to go to the only place you can think of that he will go to first.  The place where he made you say goodbye and leave him to his fate.  He did not want you to see him take off on the ship those four very long years ago.  Sailor fiancé will no doubt know that that is where you will stay and wait for him.  One hour later,  reunions are still happening all around you.  You cannot stand the wait anymore and must sit on the sidewalk before you pass out.  The echoes of everyone around you yelling for their loved ones pass by you in a fog.  By now, your hair is a too wind blown to pass for acceptable, your outfit is wrinkled beyond hope, and your makeup has started to run from the heat.  You almost give up hope, but then you see him.  From where you are sitting, you only see his boots and bottom of his pant leg, but somehow, you just know its him.  It has to be.  You slowly look up, and your eyes meet with sailor fiancé's.  You almost think its a dream, but then he reaches down and carefully gathers you in his arms and stands you up so he can get a proper look at you.  You try to stammer out apologies for the way he found you, for your appearance, for anything you can think of, but then he hushes you with one simple touch of his finger to your lips.  You knew he did not care about unimportant things like that, and you silently rebuke yourself for forgetting.  All sailor fiancé cares about is holding you, kissing you, and reuniting with you.  He promises to never leave like that again, and you make him swear to it.  Sailor fiancé swears to me, and then leans you back, his arms fully embracing you, and plants his lips firmly on yours.  You know that he loves you and nothing can ever change that.

Wow.  If you read that entire thing.  I owe you a cookie.  If you read that entire thing and actually enjoyed it, I think I might recommend you get your head examined.

I write stories sometimes when I am not sewing (which is few and far between), and thought that lame story would go cute with the outfit I just made.  I call it my sailor outfit because on the back it said that it is a perfect outfit to wear to see your sailor off.  So without further ado, here is the outfit I was "writing"about.

Yes that is me waving off my "sailor fiance" to sea.  And no, those of you who don't know me, I am not married, nor engaged, nor have a boyfriend.  Though I am open to any of those:) 
Back detail:  

And, I did do victory rolls like I said I would.  Though I do not think it is fair to judge these victory rolls since I did them in a hurry and it was practically my first time doing it.  I think I need to have them high up on my head next time. 

So there you have it, my sailor dress.  Today I also started to trace all the patterns I have that are 1-2 sizes to small for me and attempt to size them up.  We'll see how that goes.  I read the instructions on Sensibility, and am still confused, so it might turn out to be disastrous.  Lunch tomorrow with Priscilla and we are definitely taking pictures outside whether she likes it or not, so watch for those.  Until tomorrow,   

There's a Little Sailor in all of Us

Picture Credit: War Stories Poster
Well, today it continued to rain.  And needless to say my hair, makeup, well, nothing was cooperating today, as you will be able to see by the pictures.  So I did not take pictures of my outfit I made, but I will tomorrow.  But I did wear a cute outfit today, so without further ado:

I love anything that even hints of nautical, and what better way to show that love than to go straight to the source.  I found this online and snatched it up right away.  It is from WWII.  I absolutely adored it the moment I received it, but it was slightly small.  So, taking a cue from Solanah over at Vixen Vintage, and after seeing her cut up her WWII jacket, I followed suit. I cut it down the middle and made it more like a jacket.

                                  Cuff Detail

I added buttonholes and military buttons.  I had the worst experience I have ever had buying online with these buttons.  I ordered the buttons and the jacket one day apart from each other. I received the jacket 3 days later, I received the buttons 2 months later.  Needless to say, I will not link to the crazy lady I ordered the buttons from.  I am not sure how old the buttons are, but I definitely do not think they are from WWII.
Under the flap in the back there is still a name tag.

Mr. Frank Koch, I know little about you, but I thank you for your service.  My searching has yielded little results, other than what I can tell from the insignia on your jacket.  I know you reached Petty Officer, Second Class.  I know you were a metalsmith and shipfitter and worked on the ships.  I know that this jacket was in practically perfect condition, and I hope that that means you saw little of war. 

I wish I could have had this jacket earlier than I bought it so I could get more use out of it this year, but sadly it is getting warm (obviously except for today since I wore it and another jacket) so it will not be worn much longer.  But I might as well have fun with it while I still can.

I also had lunch with Megan at Casa Fiesta, which was just lovely, then I came back home and slept for 2 hours.  Yep, I had a very productive day indeed.  So tomorrow, its supposed to be nicer and my hair is going to cooperate since I threatened it within an inch of its life, therefore I will take pictures of my new dress I made and I am going to attempt doing victory rolls.
That would be these very lame examples:

A very common style from the 1940's.  I just haven't decided if I look them in my hair or not .  I will decide tomorrow when it is tamer.  
Well, its off to bed now. Oh, I am on the lookout for a new camera in the near future.  If anyone has a suggestion of camera that is not super super expensive but takes clear crisp, true color pictures, please leave a comment!!

Until tomorrow

There's a Giveaway Going on Over There

Just a shout out to Arthelia's Attic who is doing a giveaway. I just started following her and she has a super cute blog.  SO those of you who love vintage, head on over there and check her out!Arthelia's Attic Giveaway

Sunday Sunday, Who Has a Cute Dress?

Well, I have definitely been working on my dress that I cut out on Wednesday. I promise.

See.  Proof, I have been working diligently, but the fabric has turned out quite disappointing.  And I finally finished it last night after hand sewing more things than I cared to do, and it fits like a T, so I will post it tomorrow, after looking all nice and proper with my hair done up right.  But enough about the future, lets talk about right now.  It's a daily outfit post today!  I think I should relabel that as a weekly outfit post, since I seem to be only doing them on Sunday's after church.  Hmm. Well, today I had to get up way too early, at a time I never really care to see again to sing. The chancel choir was singing at early service today with the kid's choir, which was absolutely adorable.  And you would not believe how good the kids are at singing (A lot better than my 4 year old Sunday School class, although my kids are quite cute).  Anyway, enough about the kids.  I wore a dress I got on ebay for $10.  Very cheap, very much a price I can handle paying.

  Cute, huh?  I thought so, until I got it in the mail.  The people forgot to mention that half the buttons were falling off, half the seams needed to be resewn, and there were a few dark spots around the bodice.  I couldn't really complain though, since it was only $10, and I easily fixed it.  I also found time last night to finally start pin curling my hair again after a week of sloppy dressing, and leaving to go to work with wet, sloppy hair, it was lovely to be all nice and proper once again.  My hair thanked me as well.  It does so enjoy getting to dress up.  Although the rain had different ideas for my it.  Very different ideas.  My hair was not tight curled and bouncy like normal, but instead flat and frizzy.

I think if I am going to continue taking pictures of myself in the mirror, I should probably clean off my vanity quite a bit.  Otherwise, what would be the point of taking a picture in the mirror if you can't see anything but my accessories.  It would be quite terribly boring.

Sadly, it was only in my imagination that I wore this truly lovely hat.  When I go to church and sing in the choir, we have to wear very drab and unflattering choir robes.  Well, I don't have to tell you how funny I would look with the maroon choir robe on and this delightful hat on.  So, only when I came home did I put on the hat just for a moment to have a complete look.  (Although I did wear a hat on Easter with my choir robes.  Quite funny looking.) 

Side not: Those of you who know little Dexter, know that he a small, little black feisty fuzzball poodle who is quite a demanding little fellow who in fact demanded to be featured in my blog today.  So after promising to be perfect in every way, and promising to pose quite adorably for my pictures, I agreed.  As you can see, he was a little gentleman.

I also had a quite lovely dinner at Red Lobster with Megan today, after searching around Dublin for a Halloween Store.  We were unsuccessful.  She is one of my very best friends, and when I am actually doing something fun and adventurous, and not staying around the house to sew or be lazy, it is usually with her (or Priscilla).  Next time, I promise to get some pictures of our adventures.

And look, I am wearing my new shoes!!!  Aren't they just full of character?  I received several  lovely comments from some very lovely ladies in choir today.

So, tomorrow, I will, depending upon how my hair decides to cooperate, post my new outfit I made, and anything else lovely that comes along.  Maybe a hot geek crush this week, perhaps.  We shall see.

I almost forgot, a close up of my makeup and I wore very splendid jewelry indeed today from the flea market! And if anyone knows any tips for getting some bounce and spring into your pincurls, please don't be shy.  Comment!
I bid you adieu, until tomorrow!

Dress: Forever Lovely Vintage
Shoes:Kohls
Hat: Flea Market

Oh My Stockings and Garters (and hats too!!)

I love hats.  I love vintage.  I love hats and vintage and the two go hand and hand.  Yay for me.  One thing I have definitely learned during my short time in the vintage world is that no lady's outfit is complete with out a hat adorning her head.  However, until last Saturday during the flea market, I was sadly lacking in proper head attire.  Not one vintage hat (except for my not quite vintage half topper hat I wore for Easter).  Well, I sure made up for that in a hurry by buying no less than 6 hats from the 40's and 50's.  Yep.  I think the most I paid for one was $6.  I don't think I need to tell you that that was much cheaper than buying them on Etsy or Ebay.  I would have been broke if I bought six hat's on those sites.  If anyone knows better than I about dating hats, please speak up, because like I said, I am learning as I go, but here's a rundown of what I got:

  I am guessing this hat is from the 40's??  And I honestly do not know which way is front and which way is back.  Your guess is as good as mine.

This poor hat.  I am guessing you are from the 50's.  The netting was a little ripped, so I had to fix it, but otherwise it is fantastic.  The gorgeous netting adorns the sides, although you couldn't tell from the way it is placed on the snoglobe.  It looks more like a black netting looking scary manta ray. But it is still one of my favorites.

This one is from the late 30's.  It was labeled at the flea market and I believe the label.  I think.  I wore this in a post a few days ago.  I think it is my favorite because of the butterflies.

I am guessing this hat is from the 50's.  I gotta get a hat pin if I ever plan on wearing this very dramatic hat.  It was in perfect condition and I was lucky to find it for only $3.  You can't beat that.

I'm not even going to guess at the date of this hat.  It still has it's labels, but as far as I know it could be late 60's.  It is definitely Asian inspired though.

This last hat is in poor shape.  It's such a shame because hat, you truly are cute.  It does look as though some heartless cruel fiend sat on it just out of spite, because otherwise it truly is in gorgeous condition.  If anyone has any tips on how to reshape a hat, please comment.  I can just imagine wearing this hat over the summer when we go to Oxford, MD.  Yep!
I also got two pairs of 50's clip on cluster earrings and a "pearl" necklace, and a fantastic black 50's dress that had a petticoat underneath.  You can't beat that.
Although, I could have made another one.

Yep, every vintage gal needs her needs her proper undergarments.  I am still learning about the different eras and what women wore underneath, but I do know that they had support in every part of their upper body.  No fat was left unsupported.  I need to get a garter belt to hold up my fully fashioned nylon stockings, but for now, I have 2 different types of corsets that made.

The top one, I had actually started to make for a 4-h project when I was a sophomore in high school, but it never got finished.  I actually forgot about it until my mom pulled it out.  So I resolved to finish it since all it needed was for the binding to be hand sewed and the buttons and grommets needed to be put on.  Not too bad.  About 3 weeks later I finished.

 I also know that women wore a slip with most dresses because clothing was rarely lined, and it just helped clothing to lay nicer.  I got this one on Etsy and it is from WWII.  I had to fix a couple of seams and take the darts in a little more, and now it fits perfect. 

Lastly, there are the fully fashioned nylon stockings.  I Love, with a capital L, love these stockings.  How can you not??  They are super comfortable and soft, and they are separate for each leg, so they are not as constricting as hose and tights are nowadays.  And there is the back seam.  Much more fashionable than the hose/tights ladies wear now.  Does anyone know if they wore hose during the summer months as well, or did they just go bare legged with socks? I honestly do not know. There are some shoes that I cannot see without hose, and would look simply dreadful with socks, so any comments of others more knowledgeable than I would be greatly appreciative.

And last but not least, these are not in any way shape or form related to hats or stockings or undergarments, but look at what my mother surprised me with when she got home today:

Couldn't you just scream.  I know I did.  These are very sharp shoes indeed.  Modern, but with a vintage flair.  You can't beat that.  So yay!

Shoes: Superly Cute Shoes