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,