Bomber Girl

This week we're making this.

2011-12-01T17:03:00.001-05:00

I'm not completely sure why, but I've been invited to three Sexy Xmas parties in Atlanta this year. The first of which, XXXmas, is taking place on December 9. Am I really that sexy? Who knows, but I'll roll with it. If three different people invite me to a sexy party then it must be so! Or something like that.

Why are there so many sexy Christmas parties in Atlanta you may ask? I have no idea, but I guess they don't call it Hotlanta for nothing.

I wasn't completely sure what I wanted to wear until I found this little number on Trashy.com.

I would call this love at first site, but with a $200 price tag and an order processing time of 2 weeks it was not meant to be. Then it occurred to me: I have a sewing machine! So off I went to plot my own ~~rip-off~~ Trashy.com inspired version of this little number.

First task, find fabric. Seriously, this has got to be the hardest type of fabric to find ever. NO ONE has any sparkle stretch velvet. Even my normal specialty spandex provider did not have any in stock. So I headed out to the thrift store to see if I could find any used children's holiday dresses. I figured that would probably be my best bet for finding what I was looking for and it would be a heck of a lot cheaper anyways. Sparkle velvet tends to go for anything from $10-$20 a yard. Yikes.

Luckily I found something at one of the local consignment stores that will suit my needs with only a little bit of alteration.

It's a size 12 girl's holiday dress. Most of the velvet is not glitter, though it does have a little bit of sparkle on the chest. I should be able to use the dress part without too much trouble (luckily I still haven't gained back all the weight I lost for the wedding), but I'll have to completely reconstruct the top. 12 year old girls don't typically have C cups.

I'll keep you all posted as I get this ready for next Friday. Happy Holidays!

-BG

Sorry: Interuption. Saucy Nurse Costume.

2011-11-14T14:59:00.001-05:00

Slight interruption here. If you follow the facebook you'll know that I was invited to this lovely little shindig on Friday night. I was invited last tuesday which gave me three days to pop out a costume.

A challenge which I happily accepted. I didn't have a nurse's costume so hey, why not?

I started with this shirt dress pattern. Butterick 5421. I used view D (blue dress) and went to town. Really all that needed altering was a little bit of shaping around the waist and some shortening of the length. I removed the pockets for time's sake and added a little bit of trim here and there.

I was pretty satisfied with it. Particularly the collar. Other than cutting the facing a bit too short it came out very well. My best shirt collar to date actually. Now if I could just figure out stand collars.

The only real problem I had was with sewing the ruffle on the bottom. I sort of kind of possibly sewed it on backwards for the party (which I did not have time to fix) and then I kind of sewed it on backwards again when trying to fix it for blog photos over the weekend. There wasn't much I could do to fix it the second time since I'd already lost too much length (don't rush kids, it f***s things up).

Sadly, this thing is short short short so I'll probably end up putting another layer of ruffle on the bottom eventually. The only thing I could think to do for now was bind my raw edges with some casing. It's okay, but not my best work.

But overall, quite satisfied and I was definitely a hit at the party.

Just try to imagine this with some yarn hair-falls, pale blue contacts, a good smearing of white powder, white knee socks, my giant clonking white platform shoes, and some black eye shadow. I'll have to see what I can do about getting the whole outfit together and snapping a few photos since this really doesn't do it justice.

I would show you photos from the event, but unfortunately about 10 minutes into the party the camera crapped out so I didn't actually get any photos of myself so here are some photos from their facebook page of some of the other fantastic costumes.

Thanks for reading, lovelies! See you soon!

PS. Don't forget to follow Bomber Girl's facebook for updates on current projects, free patterns, and more. Peace!

A year of backlog: Let's continue the January Dress posts

2011-11-07T11:02:00.000-05:00

Heeeeeeeeeeeeey Readers,

Long time to chatty chat. As you all know very well at this point due to the wedding I've been MIA for a loooooooong time. Not that I haven't been doing projects, taking tons of photos, and doing the general crafty craft business. In fact the last year has been a crafty overdrive. I started a new costume making business (more on this later), I may be about to start apprenticing under a corsetiere (super exciting, fingers crossed), and I handcrafted every inch of my wedding and wedding reception. So as a result I have a year of backlogged posts just waiting to be free!

So for the first backlogged post I decided to go back to a project I started many many moons ago. Namely the January Dress, a dress I was patterning after this fabulous vintage piece of amazo-sauce.

When we last left off I had only just completed the muslin. So onto the next step!

Step one was to underline the bodice pieces. I used Tasia's fantastic underline tutorial over at Sewaholic for this one.

I stitched a 1/4 inch in and trimmed the underlining to fit 1/8 of an inch inside the outer fabric. This worked fantastically and lays nice and flat.

In addition my desired color result was created. A white eyelet fabric with just the tiniest touch of ivory peeking through. Just a little bit of a vintage colored touch while at the same time allowing the white fabric to modernize the dress enough to make it wearable for all sorts of functions.

After underlining the step 2 was to dart the shoulders on the front and rear of the bodice. The darts help to build the breast cups on the front and add a nice little bit of detail to the back (pictured above).

I apologize for the mess in the above photo. I hadn't trimmed the threads yet. I decided to do the old pull the bobbin thread through and tie some knots trick. Holds just as well as locking the stitches in with the machine and makes for a much cleaner line on your darts.

See? Nice and clean. After the darts were ironed down in the direction facing the neckline it was time to add some facing. The pattern I used did not include facing so I had to draft it. Pretty easy to do. Just trace about an inch or so out from your shoulder line and neck line.

I decided not to underline the facing. I didn't really see a need to do so and it seemed to me that it was add a little too much thickness. As for the edges of the facing? I just pinked the edge since this fabric doesn't seem to unravel too badly.

On the first side of the facing I combined the shoulder and neck facing into one piece. You can do this for almost every sleeveless bodice, but unfortunately this was one of the few where it didn't work out. The eyelet fabric was just a little too thick and made the sleeve poof up a little too much. No problem though. A very quick fix. I simply sniped down the center and the results were one thousand times better.

Stay tuned for more January dress tomorrow!

Much love,
BG

Guess who has a new last name

2011-11-01T18:30:00.000-04:00

Well it's official! I want to thank you all for sticking with me while I handcrafted my special event. Lots and lots to share with you now that everything is said and done and we are back from the Honeymoon in Japan!

-BG

Wedding Business: The Bridesmaid Dresses

2011-08-01T17:18:00.000-04:00

So I suppose with all my excuses about not updating as much due to wedding business I should probably start putting my money where my mouth is and actually show you what I've been doing all these months.

First up, the Bridesmaid Dresses. I would show you my wedding dress, but as it's staying a secret from Mr. Fiance I'll just have to post about it the day after the wedding... which is 8 WEEKS AWAY. Holy what? Did I just write that? I did. There's so much still to do! Darn handmade weddings...

Anyways, we'll worry about that later. Back to business here. First the girlies. When I first started discussing the wedding with Mr. Fiance he let me know that he really wanted to wear tails. He is one of the few men I know who owns his own tuxedo and wears it on a fairly regular basis for networking and so on. He wanted to wear something special for his wedding and so this whole idea of the tails was born.

This of course meant that the girls (including me) would need to be in full length gowns. Let me tell you how fun it is to find a flattering full length gown these days, particularly one that would go with my somewhat unique wedding gown. So the search began.

In January I flew up to New York where my mother and sister reside. We planned a day long shopping trip that took us all over Saratoga Springs and the surrounding area. We met up with one of my Bridesmaids, Bradlea, and another good (and honest) friend of mine, Jen, and off we went.

Bradlea and my sister tried on mmmm..... maybe 25 gowns or so for me. Honestly it probably could have been more considering we spent an entire 8 hours shopping. Eventually we stumbled across this little gem by accident. I only pulled it out of the rack because it happened to be the only sample in the color I was looking for (an iridescent non-blingy gold) and I wanted to check the color on the girls.

The Beautiful Mrs. Bradlea who was just married in November. She is modeling Bari Jay 233.

The dress was really cute, had sleeves (a key criterion for me), and was sampled in the exact color I wanted. Someone was telling me to buy this dress. We tried on a few more dresses for giggles, but I had pretty much made up my mind after seeing this one. A few days later I had my girls go ahead and order this style.

Here are the images used on Bari Jay's website. This poor girl has been photo-shopped to within an inch of her life, poor thing. I don't think these images do the dress justice at all, but it is enough to give you a general idea of what the gown looks like.

Mr. Fiance if you are reading this stop now. I'm about to give away a spoiler here. For everyone else, another key reason why I enjoyed these dresses is they have the same short quasi train in the back as my gown. They match perfectly with my dress down to the weight of the fabric. These dresses are chiffon, my gown is organza so they both have a very light airy quality to them. I am very excited to see these on my girls come October!

So let me tell you about my week.

2011-07-29T14:13:00.000-04:00

So if you follow the facebook or twitter feeds you'll probably have some idea of what's been going out at Haus of Bomber Girl this week, but I promised to give a little more detail in a post so here it is.

Rewind, Saturday. We help future inlaws clean out attic of the house they are putting up for sale. Doesn't sound too bad except for the fact that we are in Georgia in the middle of a heat wave and the attic has no air conditioning. So we spent all day working in a 115 degree (no joke) attic. All we were really doing was getting out Mr. Fiance's things from when he was a child so that they could be sorted or tossed. Mr. Fiance worked on attic removal and I was on bring-things-downstairs duty.

It worked out pretty well for us except for the fact that we were both a little ill at the end of the day. He from mild dehydration--we kept a supply of water up there for him, but he just couldn't drink it faster than he was sweating in that heat --and I from constant temperature changes as I went up and down the stairs all day.

Mr. Fiance's father, or as I will now call him Mr. Fiance Sr. was a riot and kept our spirits up. I've gotten so lucky as far as inlaws go. I get along so well with my soon to be dad-in-law and my soon to be mum-in-law is my shopping buddy already. In any case Mr. Fiance Sr. was more than happy to explain every strange object we came across from Mr. Fiance's childhood included a strange game involving winding a plastic dog's tail and plastic ticks. I didn't get it either.

At some point during the day we discovered some old book cases that Mr. Fiance senior said we could have if we wanted them. We wanted them. Only problem? The movers could only transport them on Tuesday and the only room they would fit in happened to be the unpainted guest room. These things are heavy has heck and they screw into the wall so once they were in they would be in forever. That gave me Monday to paint since Sunday was already dedicated to more sorting.

Let me tell you how much I like to paint rooms in one word - meh. I don't dislike it, but it's a lot of work and I am not a fan of paint fumes. We tried using low VOC paint in a few of the rooms in our house, but the coverage was pretty poor and it tended to dry too quickly. On top of that there is a very limited color selection. So we decided to go back to regular old house paint for the time being. If we decide to have kids sometime soon of course we'll use the VOC free stuff again, but seeing as we're not planning on that for years I should have the whole house painted in time.

Anywho I'm not a huge fan of painting. Paint fumes aside I think mostly because I did it so often when I was working in exhibitions at a photography museum. When you have to repaint a giant gallery space every two months or so the charm really wears off. That leads to a lot of procrastination on my part. I have meant to paint the guest room ever since I moved into the house, but never really had a reason to. Well now I certainly had one. So let me tell you how Monday went.

8:30am: Drive to hardware store. Buy Paint.

Luckily I had the color picked out already so I didn't have to worry about that. I went with a lovely color called "Nutmeg" which was not the color of nutmeg, but it was still a lovely shade of chocolate brown.

9:30am: Drive home to this room which is currently full of wedding decor and junk.

I was a little embarrassed to show these pictures, but I wanted you to know what I was up against. Our house has been in a constant state of construction lately and things seem to get moved from room to room if they don't have homes yet. As evidence I moved pretty much everything that was here sans towels and put them in the dining room.

10:30am: Finish cleaning room and vacuum floors.

This blanket is my pride and joy. Seriously, I would go back into a burning building for this thing. I knit it my senior year of college while completing my thesis. I literally finished sewing in the ends of this blanket the day of my graduation. It took me six months to make this thing and it is my favorite knit blanket by far.

10:45am: Move my nemesis.

I hate this TV. It serves no purpose other than taking up space. It can't play DVDs without routing it through a VCR because it only has a cable jack connector on the back. It's not super heavy, but it's big and bulky and a pain in the butt to lift. The terrible thing is that this is the nicest TV we have in the house, but I still hate you 1990s TV.

11:45am: Try to move bed, find it too heavy. Remove mattress. Move furniture.

This is the infamous "Tornado Hiding Under" mattress. It is really bendy and not fun to move by oneself when one is a 100lb 5' tall girl. To me it weighs a ton, but at least it's only a full so it was manageable.

If you don't have these things you need to get them. Fantastic invention. I didn't have to disassemble the bed frame or anything. Sweet.

Moved IKEA dresser and weird side table that totally doesn't match the decor, but whatever. We're a young couple. We're excused.

12:00pm: Move all tarps from upstairs office that we just finished painting last week to downstairs. Jury rig them to fit over the bed so I don't have to remove it from the room. Selectively add painters tape.

3:00pm: Take small drink break for a diet coke. Let paint dry 10 minutes.

4:30pm: Finish the cutting in.

The room has a window and three door frames to paint around.. It took me a long freaking time to finish.

5:30pm: Finish applying first coat of paint.

Looks pretty good, but definitely showed the problems with the builder's painting job. There were three different types of paint on one wall. One type took way longer for the brown to dry over. Then there were the dried paint drips and blobs, the poor execution of said paint job, and the fact that the ceiling is higher in some parts of the room than others. Thanks for a quality job builder guys.

Afterwards I finally took a lunch break and ate for the first time that day. I don't remember what I had, but I'm sure it was good. I think it might have been an entire tub of coconut milk yogurt mixed with frozen cherries and flaxmeal.

7:30pm: FINALLY finish the stupid painting. Take shower. Not totally sure how I managed to get paint all up the back of one of my arms, but at least the latex paint comes off pretty easily in the shower.

Next day: Get book cases at 8am in the morning. They look sweet.

Pat self on back, vow to do no work for the next three days.

A Brief History of Men's Shirts from 1900-1949

2011-07-22T13:23:00.001-04:00

Something I've always been interested in as you know is the evolution of clothing. I'm always curious to know things like how this:

approximately 1840

Turned into this in a period of 20 years:

1860

Now granted men's fashion has changed a bit more slowly than women's fashion in the past few centuries, but we can all agree that it has still evolved fairly quickly.

1810

1910

2010
(Nancy note: This girl lived the next town over from me and went to my rival high school at the same time as me. She was even on our rival cheerleading squad. Please don't think any less of me...I promise no one else from that area talks like her.)

But all joking aside I could write a book on how men's fashion has changed in this century alone, but what I'd like to do today is talk about how a man's everyday shirt has changed since the beginning of the last century.

1900s:

Ca. 1900s (1907ish)

Here's an example of a pretty typical late 1900s shirt. There is a high detachable wing collar (rounded) and two cuff options. The sleeve plackets are pointed and the yolk is straight. This is what is called a "coat shirt" because if the fact that it opens all the way down to the bottom and can be slipped on like a coat.

The type of work shirt you wore, like today, depended on what you did for a living. Business men typically wore suits and white shirts of finer material while day laborers wore more colored shirts of much sturdier fabric (color hides stains and dirt). A man had many shirt patterns and colors available. Polka dots, double stripes and single stripes were popular as well as the traditional white.

Both acceptable shirting fabrics.

Collars came in detachable variations like the shirt pictured above and rarely softer attached collars. In the early 1900s collars were much more popular as they increased the longevity of the shirt. Shirts were still yet to be mass produced and a gentleman typically had less than a weeks worth of shirts in his possession at any given time. You will also note above that the collar is quite high. This is left over from the late Victorian era, but as we approached the end of the decade shirt collars start to shrink in height.

1910s:

late teens (source)

So this is a Negligee shirt or what I would call a semidress or casual shirt. It is not a night shirt. That's something completely different. (Nancy note: the term negligee doesn't become associated with bedroom attire until 1930s.) This shirt also has a detachable collar option and what's called a front-plait opening down the front. The placket ends a little more than midway down the shirt and the shirt is meant to be slipped over the head, though the pattern does give you the option to make it a coat shirt. The neckline is still quite high, but lower than the previous shirt. The rounded collar was still the more popular style at this time, but it would be going out of fashion shortly.

There are two versions of the shirt pictured above. The far left is the negligee version, the center collarless version is what's called an outing shirt. This shirt could also be considered a work shirt if it was made with a sturdier fabric. The type of shirt at this time was determined mostly by the fabric used. Lighter fabrics for casual wear, slightly heavier fabrics for casual wear, and sturdier still for work shirts. The pointed yolk was typically found on casual shirts like these, but on occasion it would pop up in more formal wear.

From a Guild to Making Shirts reprinted 1928

Many colors were still popular at this time. Stripes, half stripes, and even on occasion checked fabrics were worn.

1920s:

Early 1920s

This shirt features a slightly more modern look. You still have the option for a detachable collar, but the main image of this pattern shows a pointed attached collar. Even the detachable collar is slightly pointed. The shirt again gives you the option of coat shirt style opening or front-plait style opening. There are two cuff options including a detachable reversible soft cuff.

During the 1920s the silhouette of the shirt begins to change due in part to improved manufacturing techniques. Shirts become more fitted, with straight fitted sleeves. French cuffs are the norm. Pointed soft attached collars become more and more widespread thanks to the invention of the home washing machine. Rounded detachable collars are still popular among the older population, but for the trendy folks pointed collars become the normal shirt for business wear. They were secured with collar studs or pins and a tie. Detachable collars are still popular among day laborers for their ease of care and increased shirt life.

1930s:

source

Now we're cooking with gas, as they say. This is really starting to look like today's men's shirt. This pattern only gives the option of the coat shirt opening. Plait-front shirts are pretty much obsolete. The placket still ends quite high on the shirt, but this is in accordance with the pants style of the 30s in which a high waist was preferred.

French cuffs, pointed sleeve plackets, and a longer shirt collar point are all features of this particular shirt. Also popular at this time. Collar stays!

Which were really more like tie clips, but still amazingly effective. Clip stay to tie and each side of collar and voila! Collar stays put all day long. Genus says I.

1940s:

The 1940s bring with it an explosion of different styles of shirts. Shirts become more and more casual. Short sleeve shirts are very stylist for casual wear, sport wear and even work wear.

Fabric choices explode. Flannel, cottons, rayon, prints, prints, prints, and more prints all become popular for work and casual wear.

Western shirts become popular in the late 30s and into the early 40s. This is caused the increased popularity of western movies and stars like John Mack Brown, Red Berry, Harry Carry, Jr. and more. I have a secret love for these, but Mr. Fiance has promised me he will never wear one. Bummer.

The button down business shirts stay about the same. Detachable collars disappear and the softer pointed collar firmly cements its place in men's fashion. Shirt tails become shorter and plackets extend as the waist on men's pants lowers.

And that, my lovely friends, is that. If you found this helpful drop a comment in the comment section below. Next post: 1950s-1960s.

If anyone was confused by some of the terms I used in the post here's a helpful diagram.

source

Additional References and Some Good Supplemental Reading Recommendations:

I got a present!

2011-07-20T11:30:00.000-04:00

I am always always amazed by the kindness and the generosity of others. Especially when I head to the post office and find this in my box:

It was a huuuuuuuuge box of patterns from Ms. Contessa Timmerman. The box was just packed full of patterns from the 1940s all the way up to some that are less than 10 years old.

By the way Ms. Contessa I just love your handwriting:

I took them out of the box and laid them in my front entry way so I could examine them all. First of all, Contessa, you have excellent taste. And second, would any of you believe me if I said this wasn't even half of what she sent me? I was completely blown away.

This was my personal favorite pattern as bridal gowns are a subject that's currently very near and dear to my heart.

I also loved this really sweet Butterick dress which I had never seen before and this Advance gardening apron which I may or may not have already busted into and cut out the fabric pieces for....

She also sent lots of patterns from the 1960s including this sweet little sundress. Or at least what will be a sundress when I get through with it. Probably in sunny yellow floral print.

Here are a few more of the other great 50s and 60s patterns she included. I also love the 1970s shorts pattern that you can see peeking out on the far right side below.

Lots of full outfit patterns and this great pattern which included interchangeable collars.

and I now have another caftan pattern. Which is awesome.

So thank you so much, Ms. Contessa. I'm overwhelmed by your kindness and I am definitely going to be busy for the next six months making all these lovely garments. All I can say is thank you thank you thank you and I promise to take good care of these lovely patterns.

Best,
Nancy

Fourth of July Post

2011-07-07T13:20:00.003-04:00

Hey, Readers! Hope you're all feeling well this morning. I am feeling pretty good myself (at least compared to yesterday.) I had some dry cereal this morning for breakfast and when that felt alright I ate 6 raspberries and a small handful of buckwheat groats. If all that stays down I may try some coconut yogurt for lunch.

Since I am feeling way better than yesterday I figured I'd go ahead and finish up my 4th of July post that was so rudely interrupted by dizzy spells and vomit. So there.

So for this belated 4th of July I have scanned some of my favorite things from the Bicentennial edition of Workbasket magazine.

I always love looking through these old magazines. This particular one has some great little patterns, tips and advertisements. Of course it is the 70s so there is a great amount of kitsch and scratchy acrylic yarn to stuff your kids/spouse into.

Workbasket actually had a rather large selection of mail order patterns. I'm sure most of you would recognize the pattern line if you saw a photo of one of their patterns. Here's what they recommended for the summer of '76. I'm digging on the Chinese top in the top left corner and the summer shirt dress in the lower right.

Need some help removing those tough stains from clothes?

Most of the knitting and crochet patterns were a little too much for me, but I thought this one could be turned into something rather charming and office worthy if you used the right color yarn. I've got some Malabrigo Chunky yarn in celeryish green hanging around my stash that might work well for this:

My favorite section of this whole magazine was definitely the part titled "Women Who Make Cents." It's a section entirely devoted to recommendations from women on how to make horribly kitschy crafts that you could potentially sell for money. Here are a few of my favorites.

I Vlogged.

2011-07-06T17:38:00.000-04:00

Vintage 4th of July recipes and a crochet pattern.

2011-07-01T14:14:00.003-04:00

It's almost the forth of July which means that we can all look forward to a day off from work (if you live in the USA and your office actually gives you the day off). It's a day to spend time with friends and family and to eat delicious food. In celebration of one of the more fun holidays of the year (in my humble opinion) I busted out a bunch of my old cook books, personal recipes, and craft magazines to find some old school summer picnic fare. Some are a little odd, but some are pretty good. If you happen to try any of these recipes drop a comment and let me know what you thought of them.

Pear and Banana Salad
From the Workbasket July 1953 edition.
For each serving arrange 2 pear halves on salad greens, one with cut side up, the other with cut side down. Peel banana, run tines of fork lightly down sides. Cut into 1/4 inch thick slices and arrange in half circle over-lapping slices in front of the pear halves. Garnish pear with a cherry or other berry and serve with a tart or sweet dressing.

Sweet Dill Pickles
From the Workbasket July 1953 edition.
- One Quart Dill Pickles purchased in store
- 2 cups sugar
- 1/2 cup terragon vinegar
- 1 tsp celery seed
- 1 tsp mustard seed
Wash and drain cucumbers, cut into chunks. Mix all other ingredients together and bring to a boil, remove from fire, let cool, and pour over chunked pickles. (Nancy note: This sounds awesome, though so not on the Bomber Girl diet plan... alas, maybe next year.)

Cherry Coke Salad
Date unknown, recipe from private collection originally obtained from Charming Vintage Recipes.
- 1 package of cherry or black raspberry jello
- 2 cups water
- 1 12oz coke
- 1/4 cup cold water
- 1 #2 can crushed pineapple
- 1 #2 can bing cherries (Nancy note: #2 cans = 20oz)
- 2 small packages cream cheese (Nancy note: small package = 3oz)
- walnuts
Heat water and add jello to dissolve. Add 2 cups coke/cold water. Drain fruits and discard liquid. Add fruits, softened cream cheese and walnuts to jello. Mix, pour in mold, and chill.

Baked Beans and Lettuce Sandwiches
From Better Meals for Less Money (1917)
Press cold baked beans through a sieve; spread bread with butter, cover with a lettuce leaf, cover lettuce with beans, and sprinkle beans with chopped mustard pickle. Cover with a second piece of buttered bread. Brown bread or any dark bread may be used.

Apple-Lemon Summer Cooler.
Personal collection, ca 1950ish.
- 1 quart apple juice
- 1/2 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
- 1 fresh peach
- 1/2 cup fresh strawberries
- 1/2 cup fresh raspberries.
Dice peach and strawberries, place with raspberries in bottom of pitcher. Add apple juice and lemon juice. Stir and chill. (Nancy note: I like mine with a little more bite so I tend to add more lemon juice, but it's really up to you.)

And just for fun I present this pattern for this crochet American Flag from the July 1974 edition of Workbasket. I typed out all the abbreviations and rewrote a few things to make the pattern more readable.

You all know you want that office. Don't lie, I know you do.

American Flag
Yardage: You will need 20 ounces of white yarn, 16 ounces of red yarn, 12 ounces of blue yarn, and 4 ounces of gold yarn. All worsted weight. (Nancy note: That's about 900 yards of white, about 760 yards of red, 570 yards of blue, and about 170 yards of gold. They're definitely using cheap scratchy acrylic for this so if you're going for historical accuracy go find some Red Heart value yarn.)
Gauge: 7 single crochet equal 2 inches
Hook: Size F

Work Begins on lower edge.
Base Row: Starting with red chain 218, single crochet in second chain from hook, single crochet in each chain across, chain 1, turn.
Pattern Row 1: Single crochet in each single crochet across. Chain one, turn.
Repeat Pattern Row until there are 11 rows of red. Fasten off (Nancy note: Fastening off is really up to you, you can also carry the red yarn up the side as you go.)
Join white and work 11 pattern rows.
Continue Changing colors from red to white until 3 red stripes and 3 white stripes are completed.
Change to blue and single crochet across 109 stitches. Chain 1, turn.
Continue in blue until 77 rows are completed.
Join red in first single crochet after first blue row. (Nancy note: this might be a little confusing so I made a diagram.)

Work 11 rows of single crochet in red for first short stripe, fasten off.
With White, work 11 short stripe rows.
Work 4 red and 3 white short stripes.
Sew blue panal to edge of short stripes with small stiches. (Nancy note: Use whip stitch or blanket stitch.)

Stars: Make 50. With white chain 4, join into a ring with slip stitch.
Row 1: Chain 1, stitch 15 single crochet stitches inside ring, join to first single crochet stitch with slip stitch.
Row 2:* Chain 6, slip stitch in second chain from hook, single crochet in next chain, half double crochet in next chain, double crochet in next chain, treble crochet in next stitch, skip 2 single crochet, slip stitch in next single crochet, repeat from * around until you have 5 points. Join with slip stitch and fasten off leaving about 12 inches of tail to use to sew star on.
Sew stars on blue panel as shown in photograph (Nancy note: or like in any photograph of the flag), 6 in a row for 5 rows and 5 in a row for the 4 rows between them.

Fringe: With gold, cut strands about 6 1/4 inches long. Fold 3 strands in half and put them in every other single crochet around. Trim strands to even them out.

Tomorrow I bust out my Bicentennial magazines so stay tuned.

Stockings on the ration.

2011-06-28T14:37:00.003-04:00

Sooooo I started this post about two weeks ago. 13 days ago if you want to get technical, but you know... I'm like that. My brain got sidetracked as it tends to do and I did things like paint and stuff.

Anywho today let us touch on my most favorite subject of subjects: Underpinnings. Specifically stockings. More specifically I want to talk about stockings on the ration; a subject that I've always found incredibly fascinating. No matter what was going on a fashionable lady in the 1940s still just had to have her legs covered.

I tried to think of something to equate this trend to in today's terms, but nothing came to me. The best I've got is today's requirement for toe nail polish with open toed shoes, but even that example doesn't really cut the mustard. Stockings had more to do with propriety. We were wearing shorter skirts and starting to lose the corsets and girdles, but stockings were still something that you just wore. According to my grandmother you found a way to get stockings during this time even if you didn't have much money for anything else. It was just something you did.

Woman wearing stockings in the 1940s

I still think all ladies should be wearing stockings, but that's just because nothing looks better to me than a lady's finely stocking-clad leg. (sidenote: Not being sexist, Dudes, but few men were wearing stockings back in the day. If you want to wear stockings today though I say go for it! It's 2011 baby!)

1933 Advertisement for Silk Chiffon Stockings.

So rationing. Silk stockings were first rationed in the united states in 1941 due to deteriorating trade relations with Japan who had been our leading source of silk. Silk stocking production came to a halt. This meant that the stockings still available in the US quickly became very much unavailable. When the US did finally enter the war the military immediately began collecting used silk stockings to re-purpose into essential military supplies. Parachute material comes to mind first, but it was also made into other war time items such as barrage balloons and powder balloons for navel guns. Apparently escape maps were sometimes printed on silk as well though I don't think that was taking up much of the supply.

Woman donated their damaged silk stockings in droves. A great show of patriotism says I! Those stockings that were undamaged were often reserved for very special occasions like Christmas or formal events and they were treated with great care.

The solution to the stocking shortage for most women was a switch to nylon, cotton or rayon stockings. (Though nylon became unavailable in 1942 when the War Production Board took DuPoint's complete nylon supply for the war effort.)

Ann Sheridan Shows off her cotton stockings during wartime.

Cotton and rayon stockings were not the complete solution however. The main problem with these types of stockings were that they didn't fit well and tended to sag around the knees and ankles. I've worn a pair of rayon stockings and I can attest to this. They also tended to be much thicker and therefore considerably less attractive.

Another popular solution was for ladies to literally paint the stockings onto their legs using oil based liquid makeup (typically MAC). They would then have a friend apply the back seam with eyeliner. Apparently the stockings could last for up to three days if the woman didn't bath or get caught in the rain. One also had to be careful when crossing one's legs as they could rub off.

Women painting stockings and back seams on legs.

Interesting self seam application tool. Not totally sure why she needs to be standing on a stool for this, but you know.

Another really interesting option particularly for women in the UK where makeup was far less available or for women who just couldn't afford the amount of makeup necessary was Gravy Stockings. Yes, you read that right. Gravy stockings. The technique was pretty simple. Boil down bones and left over bits of meat from dinner into a thick dark colored gravy and then paint away!

Here's a cute little video from a British show called horrible histories demonstrating this process (with a little less care than a lady would have used at the time.)

See you later, Alligators!

Thief in the night!

2011-06-27T10:55:00.001-04:00

Happy Monday, everyone! I can't begin to tell you how busy we've been. October can't seem to come fast enough. I really don't know what I was doing with my time before I started having to plan a wedding. I'm busy all week long and then there's no rest for the weary on the weekends. Overall this weekend wasn't too bad in terms of business. We had some ups and downs, but overall we were very productive.

Down: I received my writing scores for my GRE in the mail. Not what I thought it would be especially considering the fact that I paid a good amount of money to take a prep coarse and followed their strategies which were "guaranteed" to get you higher scores. But from what I hear with what I want to do for my Masters the school shouldn't care too much about my writing scores. My math and verbal scores were high enough so I guess there's nothing more to worry about other than my own disappointment in myself. Booooo...

Up: We found a fantastic bistro in our town while looking for a place to have our rehearsal dinner. This is extra awesome because until now we thought there were only chain restaurants and sports bars in town. Mr. Fiance had a fillet and I had delicious braised asparagus with creme fraiche. Yum yum yum.

Down: We have a THIEF in our backyard. Here is the crime scene.

Those were powder blue asters. Now they are stems. The weird thing is that our thief didn't go after any of the other plants including the zinnias (shown in the lower left) or the shasta daisies. Luckily I know the theif's Achilles heel.

So far we've had no more flower thievery since I sprinkled this stuff around the bed on Friday. Guess the thieves don't like it hot. Can't say I blame them. I'm not a huge fan of spicy foods myself.

Here is the flower garden as of this morning. It's looking a little shaggy because of a couple of nasty storms we had over the weekend. It's also looking a little thin because the marigolds are reaching the end of their lifespan and I've started pulling them out to give the cockscomb room to grow.

Up: We were invited to Mr. Fiance's cousin's daughter's birthday party this weekend and it was just about the cutest thing I've ever seen. She was turning two and they decided to throw here a Sesame Street themed birthday party. My favorite part was this full sized sign post so lovingly created by her daddy.

I won't even get into the matching Sesame character family tee-shirts, big bird feathers leading up to the door, Oscar can including Wormy, a real Dorothy the goldfish, handmade character cupcakes, and delicious food. These people know how to throw a party and I was taking notes the entire time.

Downs: We were supposed to go to Athens, GA for a debate society meeting after the party but unfortunately one of us came down with a stomach bug so we scrapped the trip. We went home and watched Beau Pere instead.

Up: I'm almost done painting my sewing room now that the nasty test is over. The hardest part was choosing the color, but I finally went with a pretty sunny yellow. It's got a good sixties-ish vibe without being too dated looking. I'm trying to decided on the wisdom of adding some green damask curtains. Perhaps something along these lines.

What do you guys think? Too much?

And that's it for me so how about all of you? Anyone have some good ups or sucky downs this weekend?

Story time: Test test test test t-t-test.

2011-06-08T11:32:00.003-04:00

It's done it's done it's done!!

My graduate records examination that is. If you follow my facebook or twitter feeds you'll know that I have been cramming like no woman has ever crammed before for that @!&# test.

Cute Vintage Math Flash Cards from Brooklyn Retro

Mostly my issue with this test came from the math/quantitative section. I don't have anything against math. In fact I've always liked math, but I have a BFA and my BFA comes from a school where no maths or sciences were required to graduate. So other than one chemistry class that I took when I was briefly considering becoming an animation historian I had not touched math since 2003. If you're counting that's eight years.

So began two months of relearning your basic algebra, geometry and statistics for me. I started by forcing myself into a strict study schedule. Every day after work I would pop over to a coffee shop or the library and do math problems for anywhere from 2-4 hours a day depending on how much time I had available, but those of you who have taken the GRE know that that is only the beginning of preparing for the test.

I find the above comic strip hilarious as it isn't far from the truth. You think you understand the math, you think you've studied enough, and then they throw in questions that don't even use any math and are really just there to make you squirm. What the GRE tests is your ability to take a examination. It's kind of like the SAT, except much more sadistic.

I took practice test after practice test after practice test and eventually I started to plateau score-wise. I kicked up the study time again, but finally decided that it was time to just suck it up and take this thing. I was fairly sure of what score I would get and even though it was still below my ideal score I just didn't have any more time to devote to this thing.

Of course over the weekend (two days before the test I had been cramming for for two months) I caught a cold. A nasty knock you down sore throat couldn't talk kind of a cold. I swear I have never gotten sick as much as I do at the radio station. I don't know if it's the enclosed space and the recirculated air, but when someone at the radio station catches something we all catch it.

So Monday I go in for this test dripping from every part of my face. Somewhat nervous, not super excited about it, with a sore throat and my ears so clogged I could barely hear. I would have rescheduled the exam, but you have to do that three days prior or you have to eat your entire test fee. That fee happens to be $160 so I decided to just suck it up and go.

The first 45 minutes of the test are an essay which is followed up by another 30 minute essay. Then they give you a 10 minute break which I took full advantage of. I went out to the front office and crammed a granola bar into my mouth as fast as possible, took a few sips of water, went pee, and went back into the testing room with one minute and thirty seconds to spare.

Then I broke the test.

For the record, if you are taking the GRE and a little window pops up that says something like "do you accept this break" and gives you a yes and a cancel button, click cancel. It is not okay to accept a break. Basically it freaks the testing software out and it won't progress to the next section of the exam no matter how many buttons you slam. CTRL-ALT-DEL also will not help you.

Did I note that this is a timed test? So here I am slamming every single button on the keyboard, clicking my mouse on every section of the screen, and having a general panic attack. I waved my hand to try and summon the test proctor, but she was off having a sandwich or something and definitely not paying attention. So finally I ran out to the main office in a tizzy and finally found someone who could fix the testing computer for me. Phew.

After that there was another 30 minutes of verbal and 45 minutes of math multiple choices, followed by a "experimental section" that lasts 28 minutes. Yes, the questions were full of things like the comic above, but for some reason I kept finding them easy. Maybe it was my heightened state of awareness from my almost melt down, but of course the first thing that popped into my mind was that I was getting them all wrong. The test is supposed to be adaptive so if you get questions right it should give you harder questions and vice versa.

But after several other Murphy's Law moments including snapping the lead off both my pencils and running out of scrap paper I completed the test!

It was time for the moment of truth.

The next question on the screen: Do you want to cancel your scores or view your scores?

I clicked view.

AND HOLY BOLOGNA, BATMAN.

Not only had I beaten my ideal test score by 60 points, I had beaten my highest practice test score by over 100 points. I was so shocked by the outcome that I let out a rather loud "OH!" If you were one of the other students in the center, I apologize for interrupting you momentarily. I would have liked to get out of my chair and done a victory dance.

But I didn't.

I did call my fiancé, Mother and best friend immediately after leaving the test center and retrieving my cellular telephone.

The End.

So what have you been up to, Dear Readers? I feel like we've lost touch. Leave some comments to update me on your goings ons. If you've got a blog I promise to head over there and catch up this week. If I haven't been a regular commenter at your blog leave me a link and I'll make sure to add you to my blog roll.

Peace out, home slices and please enjoy this photo of Mr. Fiancé testing out towels for the wedding registry.

Wedding Business: Save the Dates

2011-05-19T15:51:00.003-04:00

Somewhere along the way I decided that I wanted to be "crafty" with my wedding. This was all well and good until I remembered the size of my guest list, but luckily I've got some lovely ladies in my life who have been more than helpful with all my crazy schemes.

First scheme. Save the Dates.

I started making these about a week ago with my friend and bridesmaid Stacey, but we spent most of the session coming up with the design and color arrangement. So this saturday my little sister flew down from New York to finish them up with me (as well as handle other maid-of-honor duties).

It took us about half a season of TrueBlood, but we managed to get all the save-the-dates done in one evening. She stamped, I addressed, and we still liked each other at the end of the day.

Here I am at about 12pm after destroying my living room and going on our second mysterious coffee company run. There you can see one of my traditional working faces. The other one is with my tongue hanging out and is decidedly less attractive. Yes, Readers, I confess. I am a tongue sticker-outer when I sew, but since I was only addressing I used my head tapping lip puckering concentration face.

The save the dates weren't overly complicated. I hit the craft store and picked out a few different stamps that I liked. One batch of letters, one pack of swirls and a nifty humming bird stamp that caught my eye. I used three different colors of ink in three different textures. One metallic gold stamp pad, one goldish chalk texture pad, and a little kid's washable yellow ink. All the other yellows I found just were not bright enough so I'm just praying that no one gets these wet because that ink is going to run.

Interesting fact. Briana loved stamps when she was kid. As a result she has excellent stamping skills. No missing pieces just good solid stamp lines 97% of the time. Best of all she works for free.

In any case the next step was to get some paper. I picked up some index card weight paper at the office supply store, designed the postcard face and printed them out. We went with post cards mainly for economy's sake. The stamps were cheaper ($0.44 - $0.28 x a ton of cards =savings!) and I didn't need to purchase envelopes. I managed to make each save the date cost me $0.63 including the postage. The ~~cheapskate~~ frugal gal in me did the happy money saved dance. Now I can afford to spend a little more on formal invitations which is great because I really want to have foiling or raised gold lettering.

This is about the time Briana's stamping arm was ready to give out.

So we took a coffee break. In case you are wondering it was delicious and energizing and that definitely had nothing to do with the two shots of espresso I had them add.

And ended up with these. Over 100 Save the dates, all hand stamped and hand addressed. I feel very accomplished. I'm also really happy with them. Simple, in my colors, cheap, and special because we made them ourselves.

Best of all is the color of the bird matches the flowers our florist picked out for us.

These roses were huge! 3 inches across at least. I would have brought more flowers home, but everything else in the bouquets are not in season. It was really important to me that we used fall flowers since that's my favorite season for flowers. And speaking of flowers I'll have to post some pictures of my Georgia flower garden. Just for the record you can totally plant things in red clay and somehow they grow.

Halfway to Halloween Shindig

2011-05-12T11:00:00.000-04:00

So if you follow my facebook or twitter feeds you'll already know that Mr. Fiance and I were invited to a Halfway to Halloween party tomorrow night.

So if you're in the Atlanta area you should totally stop by and say hello to us. Just saying.

As you can imagine there is not enough time to make new costumes for tomorrow so I'm busting out our Logan's Run costumes again. I wasn't completely happy with Mr. Fiance's Logan costume last time around so tonight I'll make some adjustments.

Here's a photo of us from last October.

Over all I was satisfied with the costumes. I was very happy with the mock turtleneck undershirt, but I thought the tunic was off. When I made the tunic Mr. Fiancé was unavailable for measurements so I traced one of Mr. Fiancé's teeshirts to make the tunic pattern. I didn't take into account where the shoulders were going to lay and thus this happened.

Poofy Poof Mc Poofyshoulders. Luckily it only needs some minor adjustments. I just need to take in the shoulder lines a little bit like such:

And adjust the neckline like so:

Cake. No problem. Just a few quick snips and some blind hem stitches and we'll be good to go.

As far as the Jessica Dress I really only need to redo the belt. I'll swing by the hardware store this afternoon and see if I can't find any 2 inch silver O-rings. I had originally ordered 3 inch rings but they were way too big. I had thought the 3inch referred to the total size of the ring, not the opening. I still think it normally does, but I bought my rings off etsy and I suspect the seller was a little confused.

My Stacey, what nice boobies you have.

I ended up tossing out two of the rings and making the belt with three rings rather than the five rings used in the movie.

Three rings in front, two larger rings in back.

I also need to reinforce the inside of the belt with a stronger fabric so that it can actually support the rings. I'm not going to lie... the last time I wore this costume one of the rings popped off and another was barely hanging on by the end of the night. So I figure I'll either shove some interfacing in there or a piece of scrap flannel depending on what I've got lying around the house.

All in all I suspect it will take me a couple hours to complete the miner alterations. I'll update you on how I jury rigged everything afterwards. I briefly contemplated getting us some fabulous wigs for tomorrow night, but meh. I'll save that for Dragoncon.

And hey, if you think you might make it out tomorrow send me a line or leave a comment and I'll make sure to look for you at the event.

My first tornado.

2011-05-03T13:17:00.001-04:00

A few quick changes today. As you'll note I took down the old $25 Vintage logo and wrote in the words Bomber Girl. This is mostly because my Bomber Girl logo design looks like this thus far:

I'm thinking the new name will also make this blog a great place to show off some of my pin-up drawings among other things... because seriously who doesn't have 12 sketchbooks full of pinups hidden away in their closet from my first year post-animation school? I mean right? Right? And what better place to put them then in my blog posts, right? (Read: I am so loving the freedom my new blog title is giving me.)

But back to the topic of today's post. As I believe I've stated before I am from New York. More specifically I am from the Hudson River Valley, New York. In the entire 22 years of life I spent in the Hudson River Valley we never even really mentioned tornadoes. It just wasn't in the local vocab. Tornadoes in that valley mostly don't exist. Every once in a while one jumps over a mountain and does a little damage, but the last time that happened I was in the third grade and didn't even notice what was going on.

This week however.... well, lets just say I had a serious scare. We knew there were going to be bad storms that night with a possibility of tornadoes. We were under a tornado warning from about 8pm onward, but it really didn't even start to rain until close to 10:45pm that night. It was a pretty nasty night. Very windy, lots of lightning, and our backyard started to flood about 25 minutes into the storm.

At about 11:15pm and I was upstairs brushing my teeth when our tornado sirens went off. Would you all laugh at me if I told you I didn't even know what a tornado siren sounded like before last Wednesday? Mr. Fiancé who was downstairs at the time yelled at me to get downstairs immediately. I spit out what I could of my toothpaste (but didn't have time to rinse, bleh) and zipped downstairs as fast as I was capable of.

I landed at the bottom of the stairs and Mr. Fiancé essentially threw me into the downstairs bathtub, laid down on top of me, and pulled the guest room mattress over us. I think all this occurred in under three minutes, but as we hid in the tub Mr. Fiancé could hear the sounds of a tornado outside. I couldn't really hear anything from under the mattress, but I'm told tornadoes sound a bit like freight trains.

We stayed in the tub until about midnight and I still had a mouth full of toothpaste that I ended up having to swallow. I placed a call to my parents at some point to get storm information and we occasionally got updates from Mr. Fiancé's mother about where there had been tornado touchdowns. All in all we had two miner touchdowns within five miles of our house. One was just up the road.

We eventually crawled out of the bathtub (a might bit stiff I should add) and stayed up for another two hours in case of more tornadoes, but it was just rain, thunder and hail for the rest of the evening. We finally ended up sleeping in the downstairs bedroom since our master bedroom is on the second floor. In the morning we were finally able to get a good idea of what had happened the night before. Our neighborhood, thankfully, was not damaged by the storms. We had some downed limbs and lots of debris laying about, but I consider us to be very lucky. Even my newly planted flower garden survived unharmed. Some of our neighbors were not so fortunate.

One of my co-worker's parents lost two cars and had some damage to their home home in Griffin, GA. He shared some pictures of the aftermath with me. Thankfully no one in his family was hurt.

His Grandfather's truck.

His Mother's car.

Image from the Times Harold of cleanup in my county.

I'm sure you've all heard the stories about the death toll throughout the southeast. There are many tragic stories coming out of the region. Georgia applied for and was granted a federal state of emergency and there are several FEMA offices opening in the region tomorrow. I'm so grateful and thankful for everyone that remained safe from the storms and my heart goes out to those who lost their loved ones.

Stay safe, everyone.

Current Project

2011-05-02T16:45:00.001-04:00

What's next at BomberGirl (formerly $25V) you ask? Well here's a little preview of what I've been working on. I've also got some other costumes in the works including this year's dragoncon costumes. If you're a member of the facebook group you will know that my life has been one crazy bit on insaneness after another. I won't go through all the details, but if you're interested you can stop over there for a look. I've missed you all very much, Readers, and I hope you'll continue to stick with me now that I can actually begin the switch over to the new server.

$25 Vintage's New Name!

2011-03-04T18:32:00.000-05:00

Hello Readers! If you've been following my facebook or twitter accounts you'll already know that today is the day of the big new blog name announcement!

I love $25 Vintage. We've had some good times together, but I've outgrown it. I've always felt bad about talking about anything other than sewing on this blog. Sure it will still be mostly sewing centric, but I want to be able to focus more on vintage photography, vintage fashion, vintage stores, vintage recipes, antiques and rockabilly events in and around Atlanta. $25 Vintage has been a great little blog, but it's time for name that gives me a little more leg room.

So $25 Vintage's new name will be... (insert drumroll here...)

"BomberGirl"

Stay tuned for more announcements to come including the new web address, the new logo, and the new server.

Thanks, Readers! Hope you have a wonderful wonderful weekend!

Big News! Changes in the Wind!

2011-02-17T11:20:00.000-05:00

1930s Daisy Picking from the Vassar College Photo Archives.

Lots of changes going on here at $25V and I've got some BIG news! The biggest news? We're getting a domain of our very own! That's right $25V is hitting the big time my friends!

We've also got a new name, a new logo, a new design, and a new server. I'll keep you posted as the change over happens. I'll be taking the month of march to make the change over during which time I'll be posting to both servers simultaneously. So you'll have plenty of time to adjust your bookmarks and feeds.

The other big news? I've purchased my wedding dress for the big day! I can't post a photo because one of my subscribers happens to be Mr. Fiancé, but I'm more than happy to share a link with anyone that sends me a quick email.

Hope you're day is going just ducky!

Our Engagement Photos

2011-02-15T17:46:00.000-05:00

We finally got around to doing our engagement photos last weekend (read: Superbowl Sunday). We've been engaged for about 9 months now so I guess it was about time to get around to these. We're "frugal" and we didn't want to spend too much on these. I want all the extra cash we can manage to go to the honeymoon and the reception or as I like to call it the "after party." We opted out of getting a professional photographer and instead ~~dragged~~ toted my best friend all over Roswell with us. Cost $0.

These are just a sampling of the rough photos. There's plenty of photoshopping to be done, but I must admit that I am very happy with these proofs. I wore a vintage inspired dress from Pinup Girl Clothing that I had received for Christmas. Cost $0 (thanks Mom). Mr. Fiance wore one of his favorite suits that we bought during a 60% sale at Dillards a few years back. I can't remember how much we paid, but he's worn this enough times to work that I can hardly justify it as a cost.

We did all of our photos outdoors at public parks and in public spaces. So that also cost us $0.

Hair was done with my awesome set of hot-rollers (under $25 I might add). I was once a sponge roller girl myself, but Mr. Fiance doesn't let me wear them around him. Apparently they're a bit unattractive and I can't say I disagree with him.

My make-up came from a smashbox make-up kit which was also a Christmas gift (Thanks Mr. Fiance's Mom).

In total these photos cost us about $2.00 and about half a day of walking around. We ended up snagging some books at a thrift shop we happened to pass in case you're wondering where that money went.

I'll be sure to post the final photos once I've finished the photo editing. I just love my engagement photos and I'm so happy we decided to do them on our own. So what do you think, Readers? Did they come out okay?

Hand Tinted Love

2011-02-14T10:07:00.000-05:00

Happy Valentine's Day, Readers! Will you be my Valentine?

January Dress - Weekend work

2011-01-31T10:11:00.000-05:00

This weekend wasn't the most productive weekend of all time sewing wise. I took a trip down to Mississippi to visit my grandmother and for my Uncle Robert's birthday dinner. It was nice, but sad.

My grandmother is in the early stages of dementia. She's still mostly herself, but she has a lot of trouble remember dates and names. She recently had to be placed in an assisted living center and this weekend was the first time I got to see her new home.

My two grandmas and my Mother at my college graduation in 2008. My Mississippi grandmother is on the left.

Overall the place was very nice. There were a lot of people her own age and she has a very nice roommate. Still it's hard to think that the woman that played countless games of Uno with me, took us to vacation bible school, and who made these huge lunch spreads every time we came to visit can't remember what day of the week it is.

I suppose that's life, but I can see that she's becoming less and less of the Mom-mom I've always known. She's forgotten everyone's last names and it's only a matter of time before she forgets the first names completely as well. There's not much I can do but be supportive and understanding of what she's going through, but the day is coming when my Mom-Mom isn't going to be Mom-Mom anymore.

Mom-Mom at my cousin's wedding in 2009.

I'm going to make sure to visit Mom-Mom as much as possible. It's difficult when a drive over to Mississippi costs me over $100 in gas and I'm currently only working part-time, but some things are more important than money.

As far as the January Dress goes I've gone ahead and cut out all the fabric pieces for the bodice and underlined them with the ivory colored cotton. This evening I have class to attend until 10pm, but I'll try to assemble the bodice after I get home.

I used Tasia's tutorial (I just love her name. Tasia, it sounds so pretty) on underlining a bodic e. If you haven't read any of Tasia's tutorials you are in for a treat. Her instructions are crystal clear and she creates the most beautiful dresses.

And I'm really stoaked to tell you that $25V now has over 1000 twitter followers! Thanks everyone for following me! I'll try to keep bringing you interesting sewing related tweets daily!

Updates: January Dress and around the house

2011-01-27T14:14:00.000-05:00

Hello Readers! I just got my new fridge this morning!

This is the old ugly broken fridge.

And this is the new side-by-side fridge! It's shiny and new and I love it! My OCD will kick in in a few minutes and I'll have to scrub the whole thing down with soapy water and windex, but for now I'm admiring it. We've been keeping our food in the little wine fridge. You can't imagine how great it's going to be to put the food in a real fridge in the kitchen.

But enough about my appliances. I realized I hadn't posted the fabric for the January Dress yet. So here it is.

I went with olive green 100% linen for the shirt and bow. The eyelet is a white cotton paisley. I'll be lining the bodice with an ivory cotton (center). I wanted to use ivory eyelet fabric, but that's almost impossible to find in the shops around here. I compromised by choosing an ivory lining. It will add a little bit of the ivory color and it will help to really show off the eyelets.

When I overlay the eyelet onto the cotton it will create an effect like this. You'll get just a touch of the darker color. Just trust me on this one, it's going to look fabulous.

So what did I pay for all these fabrics? Well my plan had been to find an eyelet dress or top from one of the local thrift or consignment stores because eyelet fabric is so expensive. Unfortunately, eyelet hasn't been super popular in couple of years or so. I did see quite a bit of it last spring, but I guess it hasn't hit the thrift stores around here yet. So I had to go with this white eyelet that I found at Joann's. It was originally $11.99 a yard, but I had my 50% off coupon. Heck yeah. I ended up going home with one yard of the eyelet for $5.99.

The linen was a bit more expensive. I think I paid $6.99 a yard for it, but I'll check the receipt before I do a grand total post.

For the skirt of the dress I decided to use the skirt from this pattern.

It's just a simple 1950s circle skirt, but it's easy and won't cause me too much trouble. This particular skirt is pretty poofy so I'll be taking a few inches off the width of the skirt panels. I'll add a few inches to the length of the skirt panels to be safe, but I shouldn't need it. This particular skirt already ends near my ankles since it is not a petite pattern. (I'm 5'1/2".)

The plan is to make this an ankle length dress, but what do you guys think? Should I make it floor length or bring it up to the mid-calf and make it into more of a day dress? You're all my stylists so let me know what you think! Just remember that the bodice will end just slightly below my natural waist.

January Dress - The Muslin part 1

2011-01-26T17:24:00.000-05:00

Okay, so here is the fabulous part two of the January endeavor: the making of a muslin. For this little experiment I used some cheap cotton muslin from Hobby Lobby that I got for about $1.50 a yard.

I cut out all the pieces and lined them up. I like to line up my front pieces over my back piece to check for length and such. So far so good. You'll note the fabulous pointed join from the yolk piece to the bust piece that's going to have to be sewn here. Pointy joins are one of my least favorite parts of sewing, but I'll suffer for my wardrobe.

I didn't take too many photos of the sewing up of this baby, mostly because I wanted to get it done as quickly as possible so I could check the fit. You'll notice some pretty common features of a 1930s bodice here.

#1 is the loosely fitting bust. That's achieved by gathering the shoulder seams or in this case adding some pin-tucks. I actually could probably let this out a little more, but since I've got that big bow going in I probably won't.

#2 is the gathering under the bust line to make cups. I don't know why this was so popular. Okay I do, that was more about the loose bust aestetic. It's not like the dart didn't exist. You see them all over the place in Romantic and Victorian Era dress, but for some reason they fall out of favor during the 1920s and early 1930s. Personally I find making darts to be quicker and nicer looking, but you don't get that nice gathered edge which was so popular in 1930s evening gowns.

#3 I actually lowered the neck line here by about 3.5 inches. Originally it was straight across, but since my inspiration dress had the drop neck I went ahead and lowered it.

So here is the muslin on. You can see there are still some fitting issues. The sleeves have not been hemmed so you can expect them to be about an inch smaller in width. I'm suffering here from 1930s saggy boob syndrome. This happens to me with every single 1930s pattern I make. At the time we were still deemphasizing our busts rather than pushing them up and out. I don't particularly like the look of the boobs here, but since they'll be covered in a giant bow I'm not too concerned about that. I'll probably move the gathers an inch towards the center, but other than that I'll leave them alone.

I'm happy with the silloette. It's shaped quite well to me, but that also makes it more difficult to get on and off and it's probably going to be impossible once a shirk is attached. So I've decided to go ahead and add a zipper even though it's not really period appropriate. By the way, does anyone know when zippers became popular? I know they were invented in the 1850s, but I don't believe they became popular until the late 1930s. Please correct me if I'm wrong on that.

And here is the back which I love! I was originally going to drop the back into a more curved shape like my reference dress, but this back was just too pretty to change. I just love it! I'm going to be installing my zipper in the side seam to preserve this awesome back.

So here's what I'll be changing between this and the final garment.

1. Adjusting the bust gathers to give me less "saggy boob"

2. Adding 1.5 inches onto the bottom of the bust piece and dropping the yolk accordingly. I'll probably also drop the neckline a bit more and redraw the seam between the shoulders and bust pieces.

3. Add closure of some sort, most likely a zipper.

So how are all your January projects going?

January Dress - Pattern Fixin' part 1

2011-01-25T23:18:00.000-05:00

I have got to stop making promises on this blog that I can't keep. I'll tell you something is always coming up around here. Monday's post was delayed until today (late Tuesday) mostly because of issues ordering our new refrigerator. Our house was struck by lightning a little while back and it fried most of our appliances. We've been using the wine fridge to keep our food since then. We finally placed an order for a new fridge Sunday afternoon, but there was an issue with the ordering system and we ended up spending most of the day trying to get our purchase refunded. I am happy to say, however, that we got everything worked out an our new fridge will be here on Thursday!

The other reason the post was delayed was because we're getting ready to paint my sewing room/office.

So this is my current sewing space while we paint my office. It's a collapsible table in my dining room. The sewing machine is currently residing in the kitchen and the ironing board has set up shop in the upstairs hallway. Actually it's probably safe to say that my stuff has exploded all over the house. Oh well, I have more elbow room in the dining room.

But, you'll be pleased to know that I actually have sewing to post today! Hurray! My wrist injury has really been holding up the production line, but I've been taking my supplements and working the tendons during yoga. I'm still having a little trouble with certain things like opening jars, inking drawings, and certain yoga poses. Still not ready to do some of the Ashtanga inversions, but I've almost got my adho mukha svanasana back which is awesome.

I know I've written before about how terrible a draftswoman I am. I'm not lying. I'm terrible at it. Something about creating a pattern from thin air just doesn't mesh with my brain. I guess I'm just not wired for that stuff. Still, give me a pattern and I'll modify the heck out of it. I actually take great pleasure in transforming one pattern into something completely different. It's a fun challenge for me.

So today I'll be sharing part one of the process of turning this pattern:

Into something similar to this dress with my own twist, of course.

So the first thing I did was look into what pieces I would need. I decided to use a standard circle skirt pattern for the bottom. I opted out of the pajama pants on the suggestion of a few friends. So that left me with the bodice pieces only.

The first thing I like to do is write down what pieces I need somewhere. Post-its are my paper of choice. I'll normally stick them to the wall, the sewing machine, or my shirt to remind me of what I'm doing. I tend to get forgetful when I get really focused on a task. This dress required relatively simple alterations, but making notes is a good habit to get into so that when you do have to deal with altering 6 or 7 pieces you'll know which ones you need to worry about.

Next step is to trace your pattern pieces onto paper. I traced the bodice piece (A) first as it was going to require the most altering. You'll note my clear ruler above. If you don't have one of these you really need to get one. I picked mine up for less than five dollars at a Micheals and I use it every single time I sew. It makes altering patterns a breeze.

The first thing that I needed to do was decide where I wanted my seam to go. This is more of an art form for me. I'm self taught so I'm sure this isn't the right way to do it, but it's the way I like to do it. I wanted the band to be about 5 inches wide and to lay completely across my bust. Looking at the pattern the top of the yolk reaches just below the bust so I marked five inches from the bottom curve of the bodice. From there I just played with the seam until I got it where I like it.

The seam obviously had a few incarnations here. The biggest reworking was due to the fact that I forgot to adjust the neck line before I drew the seam. Whoops. I ended up reducing the darker bust portion down to about 4 inches across with an additional 1/2 seam allowance below the adjusted neck line. I freehanded the curve.

Basically my method works as such; I draw my seam, pin the pattern piece to my shirt and then see if I like how it looks. If I don't get what I want I'll go back and rework the seam again. This time it only took me two tries to get it the way that I wanted, but I confess reworking a line 5 or 6 times on other garments.

Next I separated the pieces. When I have more than one cutting line on the piece I'll normally mark my actual cut line with a marker. I wasn't totally sure where my markers were today though so I used a blue pen instead. It works just as well.

I like to write myself a lot of notes while working. It's not uncommon for me to forget what lines are seam allowances, which are tucks or darts, etc. So if you ever borrow a pattern from me expect there to be lots of scribbles along with it.

I then traced the pattern piece again and added a seam allowance along the bottom edge where it would connect with the dark strip of fabric across the bust.

By the way, cans make the best pattern weights. You've probably noticed them in previous posts, but they're cheap, heavy and work fantastically. Who needs fancy pattern weights when you have canned pumpkin?

I added in the rest of my seam allowances and my notches and was quite satisfied.

It's a good idea when you transfer a pattern piece more than once to check it against the original. You can see here that my notch had migrated and needed to be put back in place.

All that was left was to cut out the pattern piece.

Rinse, repeat on darker bust strip, and end up with your two new pattern pieces. I've named them A1 and A2, but I normally just number them.

Up next: The Bodice Muslin

Delicious Frozen Yogurt Time for a cure!

2011-01-22T12:22:00.002-05:00

So in case you're local and you didn't know, the south side of town now has it's own TCBY. Little known fact about me: I love TCBY. Not just like, love. We had a TBCY at the local mall while I was growing up and almost every time we went I would beg for TCBY yogurt. At the time my favorite flavor was their White Chocolate Mousse, which believe me I would still be enjoying on a regular basis if my stomach could handle the dairy.

In any case the new TCBY is in Peachtree City, Georgia and is just a stones throw away from Haus of Nancy. When I scheduled a meeting with one of my favorite local ladies and fellow health food enthusiast, Mrs Carol, on Thursday we both knew where we were going.

The new Yogurt store is way too cute. I just love the funky updated retro-design.

The colors are really fun and right up my ally. Best part of the trip? The store was donating one dollar to the American Cancer Society for every 16 ounces of yogurt purchased that day. You don't have to tell me twice! I can easily rack up 16 ounces of fro-yo. Well, actually fro-so since I can't really eat fro-yo.

The Peachtree City TCBY is more like other popular frozen yogurt bars such as Yoforia, Cloud 9 (another personal favorite of mine), and Frozen Yogurt Bar. You start with a giant cup and the rest is self serve.

I really wanted this....

But I was good and went with this raspberry fro-so[rbet].

And then I topped with some Strawberry-Kiwi sorbet for color. Who am I kidding? I just wanted more sorbet.

They had your usual display of toppings. I always go for the fresh fruit myself, but you can get anything from sprinkles to captain crunch to peanut butter cups. Michael, the store manager, tells me that they are working with local farms in the area to get all their fruit fresh and in season. I'm a big time local foodophile so I was very excited to hear that.

I was very close to grabbing some of these maraschino cherries, but I went with blueberries instead.

I'd much rather have fresh blueberries then sugary food-colored semi-fruit, even if they are super delicious.

Of course I added a ton of my favorite thing on earth. That would be coconut.

Delicious, delicious coconut. I also tossed on some toasted almonds and strawberries. Yum!

My finished creation was just under 16 ounces, but at least I gave it a good shot.

I guess TCBY donated about 90 cents in my name and I got to eat delicious sorbet and enjoy the company of a great lady who also happens to be cancer free for 29 years! Congratulations Mrs. Carol!

So you're probably all thinking this is becoming a food blog with two posts in a row being food centered. Well I promise you it is not. I've got lots of sewing going on this weekend.

Goals for this weekend are:

1. Finish last baby surprise for Mrs. Eleanor

2. Cut out the fabric for the January Dress

3. Put some paint on the walls.

Expect a sewing post on Monday all! Have a great weekend!

Forks Over Knives

2011-01-20T12:58:00.002-05:00

I know I don't typically talk much about my diet on this blog. For one thing it's not the topic of the blog, but because Atlanta was host to a preview screening of the new film Forks Over Knives yesterday evening and I just had to share the preview with you.

For those of you who don't know I am technically classified as a high-raw ovo vegetarian. That basically means I eat a lot of raw veggies and do not consume meat or dairy products. I do consume eggs, but I only eat organic local free range eggs on occasion. Now don't go thinking I'm crazy. I have spent a lot of time researching my food choices, weighing the risks of certain foods, and decided on a diet that works for me and my lifestyle. I'm not trying to say my diet is best or that it's "right", but I will tell you that there is a lot of research out there that points to consuming large amounts of animal protein as being a large contributer to heart disease and diabetes. Forks Over Knives examines the idea that many health problems can be reversed by simply changing the ratio of meat to plant based foods in our lives.

I can't tell you how excited I am about the release of this film! I've been a long time fan of the books Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease by Dr. Caldwell Essestyne and the China Study by Dr. T. Colin Campbell. I strongly believe that as Americans we do not put enough whole and living foods into our diet. I know too many people who will not touch anything that's green and I hope that this film will help some to see the "veggie light." I don't think everyone should go out there and immediately adopt the vegan lifstyle, but I do hope that it will inspire people to incorporate more produce into their diets.

So what do you think, Dear Readers? Would you watch this film? Do you eat a lot of veggies at home? Am I just some crazy nut job? Let me know your thoughts!

New information on an inspiration post and LOTS of updates!

2011-01-19T11:56:00.002-05:00

Hello, Dearest Readers! I've got quite a few updates for you today! First, and most exciting of all is that I was contacted by Ms. Mady Genco Nichas about a post I had made back in August. I had posted this photo of Ms. Mady's Grandmother and Grandfather's wedding.

Apparently someone in Ms. Mady's family found this blog and showed it to Mrs. Vita Genco (the Bride). Mrs. Vita wasn't able to contact me directly, but Ms. Mady gave me all sorts of info on this photo and I really wanted to share it with all of you. When I posted the photo and my questions from Mrs. Vita's wedding I never expected to hear about the wedding especially from the Bride herself! I just thought the info was too cool not to share with all of you.

Ms. Mady tells me that the wedding was in 1952. Mrs. Vita's mother made the wedding dress and all the Bridesmaid's dresses. That's seven full gowns, quite the accomplishment in my eyes! Everyone looks so beautiful. Mrs. Vita's mother was obviously an amazing seamstress because those gowns look fantastic. I especially love Mrs. Vita's gown because of that fantastic train. Ms. Mady tells me the train was so long because it represented her purity. How cool is that! I had no idea that there was still a connection between train length and purity in the 1950s. I had known about a similar tradition in the late 1800s, but I did not know that tradition extended as late as the 1950s. I guess the explains the trend towards long trains in the 1920s and 1930s as well.

The best part of Ms. Mady's information? The color of the bridesmaid dresses of course! I'm told that they were lilac so my guess of pastel pink or blue was pretty close. Thank you so much for sharing all that information with us Ms. Mady and Mrs. Vita!

After geeking out on that bit of information I guess I should move on to the rest of the updates. Second on the list is that Ms. Lisette at What Would Nancy Drew Wear? is doing another sew-along. This time she's tackling a Sense & Sensibility ensemble.

I wouldn't exactly call this sew-along a vintage sew along, but I'm a total Jane Austin geek so I enrolled myself. If you're worried about the complexity of this project don't be. Ms. Lisette has giving her sew-along a nice slow pace. The patterns are a little pricey, but they're actually quite reasonable for reproduction patterns. So if you're interested in one of these cute ensembles for yourself head on over there and let Ms. Lisette know.

And don't forget that Ms. Tasia is running her Sewaholic Pendrell blouse sew-along right now and Ms. Gertie is mid-way through her Crepe sew-along.

Third on my update list is that I spent the morning with some awesome folks from the Peachtree City Powercore team. Powercore is a really fantastic business networking group that Mr. Fiancé is a member of. They're a group of great professionals who provide fantastic services. They gave me some great ideas for future blog posts and put me in contact with some really interesting people. I can't tell you too much about what's going on because nothing is set in stone yet, but there are some really great sources of vintage and historical awesomeness around here in the near future.

Fourth: Don't forget that I'm giving away this free knitting pattern to anyone that mentions or links to $25 Vintage.

It could be in your facebook, on your twitter, in an email to a friend, or even on your own blog if you like. I've gone through and updated all the instructions, yardage requirements, gauge, added a terminology key, included a high resolution photo, and added my own little comments. It comes in a pretty pdf and is the first of $25 Vintage free pattern releases! Hurray! All you've got to do is leave a comment for me or copy me on the email and I'll get that pdf sent right to your inbox.

But wait there's more! Fifth Point! We've reserved our church for the wedding! So reception venue, dress, and ceremony are all taken care of. My wedding is started to feel so real. I even spoke with someone this morning about ordering save-the-dates! 8.5 months to go!

And finally you have got to check out the hilarity over at Molly's Garage Sale Adventures. She's making this:

with that fabric. It's so fantastic it hurts!

Have a great day everyone!

Did you know $25V's facebook links to all kinds of free stuff?

2011-01-18T11:06:00.003-05:00

Did you know that $25 Vintage's facebook fan page posts links to free vintage patterns from all across the web on a regular basis? Today I shared a link to this cute 1938 knitted hat pattern from Vintageous.com.

I also post links to vintage patterns from my personal collection as well as stories and updates that you won't find here on the blog. It's pretty cool. At least I think so.

If facebook isn't your thing $25 Vintage also has a twitter! We're @25dollarvintage. Yay Twitter!

And I totally have something nifty for you Readers today. As of today if you mention or link to $25 Vintage on your blog, facebook, or twitter I'll send you a copy of this ridiculously cute 1930s coat and hat pattern.

All you have to do is mention this blog and then post a link to your post in the comments below. Be sure to leave me your email address and in return I'll send a pdf of this pattern straight to your inbox! The pdf comes complete with updated knitting instructions, yardage requirements, gauge, terminology key, high resolution photo, and snarky comments by yours truly.

The hat pattern is especially cute and very quick to knit up. I know you'll enjoy it. All you've got to do is mention me and then leave a comment or send me a message to let me know.

Have a good one!

First Look: Vintage Pattern Lending Library 1932 Ladies Frock

2011-01-17T10:21:00.002-05:00

Well Friends, between injuries, holidays and ice storms $25V has not been very active in the new year. There's also some other surprises in the works that you'll have to stay tuned to see. What I can tell you is that $25 Vintage is getting a total makeover in February including a new website design and logo that have been in production here in Haus of Nancy.

Well, I hope that your weekends went well. Ours was great. For starters we're finally free of our house! Georgia Snowtastrophe 2011 has finally ended! We had 55 degree Saturday which really helped the thaw out all the roads. Looks like life around here is finally getting back to normal.

The only good part about being iced in is that I was able to get a lot done around the house. I caught up on all the laundry, I reorganized the master bedroom closet, we cleaned out the upstairs office so we can paint and get it ready to become my sewing room, we reserved our church for the wedding, I cleaned all the base boards in my house, I put away the rest of the holiday decorations, we recycled the tree (which was sadder than expected) and we may or may not have had a Robotech marathon on Sunday. I never said we weren't dorks....

But the most exciting news of the weekend? Ta da!

My Vintage Pattern Lending Library Pattern came in the mail! I've never ordered one of her patterns before so I was super excited to open this thing up and take a look. I thought I'd give you all my first impressions of the pattern before I started chopping it up and turning it into January's dress project. Call this a mini-review.

My first impression of the pattern was very good. It was packed very very well. My mail man had forced the shipping envelope into my mailbox and creased the cardboard "do not bend" envelope right down the middle. The outer packaging also tore while I was trying to pry it out of the mailbox. After an angry phone call to the post office I peeled back the shipping envelope and was ecstatic to find that pattern was still in pristine condition. Awesome!

The pattern is packed in a heavy duty plastic zip-top sleeve and printed on good quality paper stock. My favorite part was the actual pattern pieces themselves. They are printed on two large sheets of vellum and are very tear resistant. I tried tearing an empty corner as a test and it took quite a bit of strength to do it.

She's added seam allowances to the pattern which I really appreciate. She's also added things like tucks and darts in easily readable red ink. That's going to be a major time saver.

I also really appreciate additions like the dotted line above which will save me quite a bit of time on sleeves down the road if I want to make this dress as intended.

Overall I am really happy with the quality of this pattern. I haven't had a chance to read through the instructions yet, but so far I'm really impressed. She has really added a lot of time saving features to things that always slow me up when working with unprinted patterns. The only down side to the pattern that I see is that it is one size only. She gives fabric recommendations if you do chose to scale up the pattern, but otherwise you're on your own.

It was a bit more than I like to pay for a pattern, but with all the features VPLL has added I have to say that this dress pattern was a great value. I paid $12.00 for it and I know that the velum pattern pieces are going to stand up to multiple uses.

Baby, It's Cold Outside.

2011-01-11T15:43:00.000-05:00

We're well into day two of being snowed in. I suppose though that it might be better to say that we are iced in. It was snow on Sunday evening, but as of today (Tuesday) it has all become an half inch of solid ice. Did I mention that I live in Georgia? The sunny south?

Here is my driveway. You can see the six inch by three inch spot where the heat of the day (a staggering 36 degrees) has melted through to the concrete. The first sign of thawing!

I'm starting to go a little stir crazy! I've never been snowed-in in my life! And I'm from upstate New York! Of course the North is set up to handle these kinds of situations. Without any trucks to plow or salt with it's almost impossible to clear the roads. Our only hope is that the sun will melt the ice enough for us to drive safely again.

So for now this is the scene around our house. Not much of a view I suppose.

Picking the Pattern

2011-01-07T13:52:00.000-05:00

It looks like the January Dress is a go! I went ahead and grabbed this Vintage Pattern Lending Library Pattern that I've had my eye on as a base.

Obviously some changes will have to be made to turn this into this

And I just might be using this project as an excuse to buy said pattern.... but, sometimes a girl has to do what a girl has to do. Don't judge me and help my justify this purchase.

Every once in a while you see a dress that you MUST have.

2011-01-04T14:05:00.000-05:00

Hello, Readers! How was your holiday? I was sick over ours which was totally lame, but we still enjoyed ourselves. Instead of going out we got dressed up and enjoyed an evening in. We bought a bottle of Barefoot and streamed Dick Clark's Rocking New Years Eve to the laptop. It was lovely, but back to the Vintage.

Every once in a while you come across something that you MUST have. The feeling came upon me when I saw this super cute 1930s Tour Eiffel eyelet dress in an email from a dear friend.

It was love at first sight, my friends. I'd never seen anything quite like it, but I knew that I loved it. The eyelet lace top, the super cute giant bow (very 1930s), the neckline....

But at $425 it was about $400 out of my price range. Still, after three days of thinking about this dress non stop I decided that I may have to make recreating something like it my January project.

As I thought about it more pictured this new creation as more of a play suit. I was thinking about changing that skirt into pants and adding a zipper up the back. Everyone seems to be posting about 1930's Pajama Trousers lately and that probably accounts for why I've got them on the brain.

From Wearing History

From Tea with the Vintage Baroness

From Jennifer Anyan

Tooooooo cute! I just love these ladies who are wearing their breezy summer trousers to the beach or on a picnic. They look fashionable, carefree, and so comfy. I was thinking of redesigning the blue dress into something like so...

"Sketched" and photographed during 5 minute lunch break. I need a better cellphone camera, but anyways.

I quickly hopped on my favorite vintage pattern source (read: etsy) and managed to locate a few patterns that would make a good base for my play suit/jumper/frankensteined mental creation. I especially loved this little lady from 1930 who seemed to be just want I was looking for.

But what to you think, Dear Readers. Is this a great idea or a major fashion don't waiting to happen? You've never led me astray with your advice before so I'll trust your judgement.

Our First Christmas Tree!

2010-12-23T14:10:00.000-05:00

Growing up we never had a real tree. Not that we didn't have a place to get them, but I grew up in New York and we never really felt like trudging out into the snow to find a tree when there was a perfectly good one in a box in the attic. (We also never really felt like cleaning up after a real tree.)

Fiancé has always had a real tree. I can't say that I blame him with how beautiful the weather is down here in Atlanta around tree hunting season.

Just look at that. No snow, no slush, no muddy ground. Perfect!

This is actually our second Christmas together though the first that we've been able to spend at home. Last year in December 2009 my Fiancé (then Beau) was admitted to the Hospital for double pneumonia and Swine Flu. He was put on a respirator for almost three weeks. Two similar cases that had come in before him had died from the same sickness. The doctors warned us that he might not get well at all.

I'll tell you that I've never been so scared in my life. I have never prayed as hard as I did those three weeks, but on December 21 of last year we were blessed with a miracle. The CDC allowed for emergency use of an experimental anti-viral drug called Peramivir. On this day exactly one year ago my beau was taken off the respirator and was on his way to recovery. The drug literally saved his life.

Last year was the best Christmas ever because God brought my love back to me. I'm thankful every day and every time I see Fiancé's smiling face. This year we wanted to celebrate his recovery by celebrating Christmas like we were unable to do last year. We wanted to get our first Christmas tree.

The weekend after Thanksgiving we went searching at our local tree farm.

Most of the trees were a little too big for our house as we do not have 15 foot ceilings.

Nope, still too big.

We must have spent an hour walking through rows and rows of trees.

But finally decided on this guy, a 7 foot tall Leland Cypress.

Fiancé made short work of the chopping.

The hunter and his trophy.

They even baled it for us in fancy red & green Christmas baling netting.

Fiancé did most of the work though...

Next they hooked the tree to the car and we headed home.

The Christmas tree arrives!

We removed it from it's baling net.

We propped it up and gave it lots of water.

Then it was time to string the lights. We were a little short on lights so we had to take a short break to go get more from the local Target.

Fiancé hung our first ornament.

And I hung the second. Right there. See, right there. There.

Fiancé even surprised me with this cute little Belle ornament. Favorite princess, hands down.

A few hours later we had our tree decorated and complete. It smells fantastic and I love it!

Happy Holidays everyone! I'll be out of touch for the next few days, but I hope you have a great holiday season and I'll see you next week!

I have a secret

2010-12-22T11:46:00.001-05:00

Dear Readers,

I have a secret. A nasty little secret.

I suffer from chronic tendinitis. Mostly in my right wrist.

Tendinitis is inflammation or irritation of a tendon — any one of the thick fibrous cords that attach muscles to bones. The condition causes pain and tenderness just outside a joint. While tendinitis can occur in any of your body's tendons, it's most common around your shoulders, elbows, wrists and heels.

I think I gave it to myself back in animation school. Being on a computer 10 hours a day trying to finish your 3D senior thesis film isn't the greatest thing for your wrists. Spending the rest of your day drawing, tracing, inking, and typing papers certainly doesn't help. When your wrists start to hurt and you work through the pain to finish assignments... well, you get where I'm going here.

In any case ever since art school I've had bad flare ups. They mostly involve massive pain in one wrist or the other, the need to wear a wrist brace, and copious amounts of anti-inflammatory herbs. There have been fewer and fewer periods of pain lately because I try to take good care of my wrists, but every once in a while I have a major flare up. During these times I'll even resort to ibuprofen which anyone who knows me will know that that I don't take pharmaceuticals unless I am in major major pain.

So to give you an idea I have taken four Motrin this morning on top of my herbal regimen. It hurts, my friends. In fact I've just typed this whole post to you with one hand while the other one is being iced with an ice donation from the lovely cafe next door. I won't be finishing my sister's handmade sweater for this Christmas and it's killing me. I hate to resort to a store bought gift for my sister when her sweater is literally two hours away from being finished. It's really killing me and I feel like a horrible sibling for not finishing it sooner.

So my secrets out, Dear Readers. When I stop sewing for weeks at a time you now know why. I'm probably nursing a hurting wrist and my hurting pride.

Do you suffer from similar ailments, Readers? Do any of you bloggers suffer from tendinitis or another blog interrupting ailment? What do you do when you can't sew?

Updates, updates, updates

2010-12-20T10:25:00.001-05:00

Point 1. Look what I picked up yesterday!

A super cute pillow from Mrs. Eleanor over at Unfamiliar Ceiling. You might remember Mrs. Eleanor from the Ruby Shorts Sew-along a few months back. She's also one of the recipients of a secret surprise if I ever make it over to the UPS store. Things have been nuts around here, but I suppose that's the holidays. With the layoff my whole world got turned upside-down and we're still trying to righten ourselves. Don't get me wrong- I love seeing family and friends over the Holidays! But darn if I haven't had a night at home since November...

But anyways this cute little pillow is going right into my sewing room. It's really too cute. If you like this pillow I suggest you check out her etsy store. I especially love her line of Matryoshka plush dolls.

So cute! I think these would be cute stocking stuffers for a little girl (or not so little girl) that you know. This month has been a little rough for her family and I'm sure they would appreciate any business you could send their way.

Point 2!

The New Vintage Lady posted a nice tutorial about dying your own cotton stockings. I actually didn't know that dyed stockings were popular for young ladies in the 1940s. Awesome!

Point 3!

Regan over at Stitch-In-My-Side is running a Burdastyle sew-along. If you've never read any of Regan's tutorials you totally should. They're very clear and she includes lots and lots of pictures. The subject for this sew-along is the Marie skirt. It's a free pattern so it's a great way to use up some of those misc yards of fabric you've got lying around.

I plan on jumping into this thing, but I've got my own ideas about how I want mine to look. I've already decided to replace the waistband with some wide elastic, but I'm really looking forward to Regan's tutorials and howtos. Oh and did I mention the pattern is free? How can you say no to that?

Point 4!

I might have found THE dress while wedding gown shopping last night. I can't post a photo because Fiancé reads this blog from time to time, but I can tell you it has a great Hollywood feel to it. I've got a few more shops to hit before I make the purchase so it may not be the one, but I'm feeling pretty confident about this one.

The plot thickens?

2010-12-16T13:22:00.002-05:00

For those of you who haven't been reading Tuesday's autochrome post's comments the Vintage Baroness and I have been debating over the time in which two of the Autochromes were created. Mrs. Baroness is a fabulous vintage dealer so I very highly respect her knowledge and opinions on the matter, but other than deciding that that one photo was very likely incorrectly dated we've still been pretty stumped.

I did manage to find out some information about the autochrome titled "Man and women carrying suitcases" by Charles C. Zoller. The catalog date on this photo is 1907 - 1932, but I'd like to narrow it down a little further.

My first thoughts were that this was a photo from the late teens or very early twenties. Based on the cut of the dress and the man's sweater/shirt combo. The Baroness suggested that this dress may in fact be an maternity dress and that the frame under the woman's hat looked like a 1930s horsehair type thing.

I became very excited at the thought of this lady's dress being a maternity dress because the thought had not even crossed my mind.It meant that this photo could very well be from the early 1930s, but I was still not convinced that this photo was from the late 20s/early 30s based on her lack of cosmetics. Of course not all ladies wore cosmetics, but with a color photo being such an expensive and time consuming process I highly doubted that a couple would spend the money on one and the lady would not bother to use some rouge.

Then the thought hit me that perhaps these people were friends or relations of Mr. Zoller's. So I went over to the George Eastman House online archives to do a bit of hunting. There are probably at least a hundred of Mr. Zoller's autochromes in the Eastman House collection and I knew that a good portion of them were online. Well, with a bit of luck I was able to find this photo of the same couple (with some unknown man on the porch) among a bunch of Mr. Zoller's personal photos.

The photo is titled "Couple leaving for honeymoon" and dated to the same time as the first photo. To me it is very likely that these people were part of Mr. Zoller's personal life, though I cannot say how. It's highly unlikely that this lady is wearing a maternity dress if they are leaving for their honeymoon so my first reaction was to go back to my original thought that this photo was snapped in the late teens. Of course than I noticed their shoes and now I'm not so sure of my original estimation.

The moral of this story is that I really have no idea when this photo was taken. I'm still trying to find the answer so if any of you have any wisdom you'd like to impart that might help me out here, please do so!

Autochromes!

2010-12-14T16:53:00.003-05:00

So today is the day that I have been looking forward to for a loooooooooong time. Autochromes!

Anna Stocká by Josef Jindřich Šechtl ca 1909. This photo is the earliest known autochrome of Šechtl's. The lady in the photograph is his future wife Anna. This is my favorite autochrome of all time and it is currently in the collection of the Šechtl & Voseček Museum of Photography. I am especially fond of the soft pale blue color of her dress and her beautiful wide brimmed hat.

I'll start with an explanation of what an autochrome is. An autochrome is a color photo printed on glass using potato starch. Crazy right? The process was invited by Auguste and Louis Lumière (the same Lumière brothers who invented the motion picture camera the cinématographe). The process was patented in 1903 and was used as late as the 1930s.

The process used a screen of tiny potato starch grains dyed orange-red, green and violet. The grains were dusted onto a glass plate and then covered with a layer of panchromatic silver bromide emulsion. As light entered the camera it was filtered by the dyed grains before it reached the emulsion. The exposure time for one of these images was very very long, but the result was a semi opaque positive color image on glass that required no further printing.

Close up of Autochrome approx 1911

While working at the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film I was very fortunate to get to look at some autochromes up close. They need to be viewed on a light table to be seen properly, but I can tell you that the colors are even more vivid and stunning than the images in this post. It is very difficult to reproduce autochromes as digital files true to color because of the nature in which they are printed.

Autochromes are composed of a series of tri-colored dots (as you can see in the image above) that work like a video screen. Because the dots are so small and so closely packed together the colors of adjacent dots blend together in our eyes. Light from neighboring red and green dots will create a yellow color and like from violet and green dots will make a light blue. Neat, right?

I've included some of my favorite autochromes here, but I strongly encourage you to do a quick search online for others. It's amazing how well these images have held up over time and I just love getting to see the actual colors of frocks from the 1900s and teens!

Couple ca. 1910 by Mrs. Benjamin F. Russell.

This lady is subscribing to a more relaxed fashion than the lady at the top of his post even though the photos were taken at relatively the same time. She's equally stunning in my opinion. I love the color of her frock, the simple cut, her matching pink scarf, and her cute hat. What do you think, Readers? Is that an engagement ring on her finger there?

Woman wearing red dress with houses in background ca. 1915.

I find her up-do to be very lovely and her shoes to be very charming. It's a little hard to see but she is wearing a high lace collar and sleeves with lace cuffs. There are a ton of little button details up and down the front and sides of her dress that remind me of traveling coats from this era. I'm not sure what this frock is made out of, but the fabric is obviously quite thick and heavy. Canvas maybe? The way the fabric wrinkles around the skirt hem makes me lean more towards a heavy plant based fabric than an animal fabric.

Dancer wearing Egyptian-look costume with wings reaching to the floor ca. 1915

This would have been at the height of Egyptian fever, though still previous to the discovery of King Tutankhamun's tomb. As with most images from this period I could find out very little information about the woman in the photo and why she might be wearing this getup. Perhaps she is a dancer, though for what type of production I couldn't say.

Cowgirl by Mrs. Benjamin F. Russell ca. 1910.

I love her! I love this image! This autochrome is in the George Eastman House collection, Rochester, NY. I love her big hat and giant rodeo pants. I suspect this is more of a masquerade outfit or show outfit than actual work clothes, but I'm totally cool with that.

Lady Helen Vincent by Lionel de Rothschild ca 1910.

Lady Helen was apparently a society beauty and wife of the diplomat Sir Edgar Vincent. I am swooning over her beautiful pale pink dress with the lace sleeves. Just look at the lacy detail down the front of her skirt and the black belt around her waist is so classy.

Man and women carrying suitcases by Charles C. Zoller ca 1907 - 1932.

I'm going to go ahead and guess that this print comes from 1918-1922 based on her dress and his sweater and tie. The only thing that keeps me from pinning this a few years later is the lack of make-up on her face. The early 1920s saw a huge swell in make-up usage with the widespread post-war availably of cosmetics. What do you think, Dear Readers? What time might this couple have lived in?

Unknown photographer, subject, and date... but wow. Just wow. Look at that dress! And look at those plumes on that hat! Look at that lace on her blouse! If this lady's attire doesn't scream fashion I don't know what does. Makes a girl want to start making Edwardian clothing doesn't it?

Seneca Pool 1924 ca. 1924

I really love these cute 1920s bathers. This pool was actually located not too far from where I went to college, but it has since been filled in. Look at how the ladies are mostly in dark wool swimsuits, but they wear brightly colored swim caps. I didn't realize that there were so many different cap color options when I wrote my 1920s swimsuit post. You learn something new every day.

Mending Mens Clothing: A Hole in the Front Pocket

2010-12-10T14:26:00.001-05:00

Welcome to the second installment in my Mending Men's Clothing series.

Today's culpret is the same pair of pants as my last mending post, but this time we're dealing with the right pocket.

This time not only has the leg seam come apart, but the pocket has developed a nice little hole. To note, the last time the seam came apart above the pocket reenforcement. This time it came apart below it.

This is the inside of the pants. You can see where the pocket lining has worn and come apart from the pocket. The pocket is on the left and has the brown boarder. The side seam of the pants has the serged edges in the upper right corner.

There are a couple of ways to deal with a hole in a pocket. I tried to refer to the 1946 edition of Mending Men's Suits by Clarice Scott and Anne Hagood. Unfortunatly they didn't really have much to say about this particular problem so I totally winged it.

This first step is the same as with the left pocket. You need to remove the stitches holding the pocket to the seam allowance of the side seam of the trousers. In the photo above the side seam has been removed and the two serged edges belong to the front and back pieces of the right leg of the trousers.

Next trim off the frayed bit of pocket lining. You'll need to rip out a few stitches on either side of the tear to get the cut as straight as possible.

Afterward you can do one of to do one of two things. You can remove the brown pocket edging, align your pocket pieces, reseam the side of the pocket and then resew the pocket edging around the outside. That would be the right way to do it.

The wrong and lazy way (i.e. the way I did it) is to fold the newly trimmed pocket under and whip stitch or back stitch it into the pocket seam binding to hide the fact that you didn't take the above steps. (Hey, it was late okay! And I wanted some sleeping time... don't judge me.)

To finish up you just need to resew your side seam. Again it would be better to do this with a machine as far as looks, but this time I hand-stitched. You can be a little less exact when doing repairs on the inside of your trousers, but I do recommend using a back stitch if hand-stitching so it hides better among the machine stitches. Over lap the stitches that have not come apart by about half an inch to keep the seam from coming apart again.

Complete your repair by reattaching the pocket to the seam allowance of the trousers.

And you are done, my friend. Congratulations. Press your seam to get it flat and you'll never know that there was a problem.

Mending Mens Clothing: Pocket Wear

2010-12-08T22:19:00.004-05:00

So I was thinking just this morning that there seems to be a distinct lack in the amount of information out there on mending clothing and there is less information on mending men's clothing-- particularly things like men's suits.

Well Fiance is an Attorney and so he spends most of his time in one suit or another. Considering they are his Monday through Friday work wear (and then his Sunday wear too) they get a lot of bumps and scrapes along the way and often need mending for one reason or another. I've had to learn a lot about suit repair in the last two years.

I know a lot of us have special men in our lives and they are often a little rough on their clothing. Though daily suit wear is much less common for the male persuasion than it was even 30 years ago I think more than one of us will have an occasion to mend a pocket or a worn knee at some point. Getting a tailor to do the repairs can get awfully costly.

I always seem to be mending Fiance's clothes so I thought that as I find things to fix I'll share the repairs with you. Most of what I've learned has been from studying clothing, reading old mending pamplets from the 1940s, and guess work. I may not have the best or the prettiest way to repair men's clothing, but I hope you all find these helpful.

Today's Culprit, a pair of suit slacks with two worn pockets.

Today's pocket was the left hand pocket.

This is pretty standard suit pocket wear. It eventually happens to all pockets and arises from general pocket use. The stitching has just popped at the bottom of the pocket there (I'm holding the pants up-side-down) and the side seam has pulled apart. There are no holes in the pocket and the outer fabric has not frayed so this is a pretty easy repair.

It's a little hard to see and I probably should have drawn some arrows on this picture, but the side seam of the pants is the long seam running from the top to the bottom of the picture. To the right of the side seam is the pocket opening and the reinforcement. So, how do we go about fixing this issue?

The easiest thing to do is stitch up the seam from the outside like you would when you're finishing a pillow, but the results are not the nicest looking. It's hard to get the seam flat and it doesn't hold well.

So I recommend that you flip the suit pants inside out and find where the pocket has been attached to the seam allowance of the side seam. This is if you are fixing a front pocket. Back pockets on men's suits tend to be free floating. The brown in this photo is the edging of the pocket. The serged bit attached to it is the side seam.

In my experience there will almost always be a separate row of stitching where the pocket has been sewn down to the seam allowance. Take the time to figure out what row of stitching it is. Trust me, it's a pain if you start ripping the wrong ones. On this suit it was the row of stitching between the top row of stitching (which is from the pocket facing) and the stitches holding on the brown binding,

Get your seam ripper in there and start ripping out just the stitches attaching the pocket to the inside of the suit.

Be careful not to catch any of the serger threads if your suit has them. It can get a little hairy since you're going to have to rip around the pocket stitches, reinforcement stitches, serger stitches, and then of course the seam itself.

Okay so here I've got the pocket pulled away from the side seam and seam allowance. After you've pulled the pocket back you should be able to see where the seam has pulled apart from the inside.

Next bust out your thread and 1940s sewing needle (which are awesomely sharp, but really hurt when you poke yourself with them). I don't like to use beeswax on my thread, but it's certainly an option.

Stitch up the seam making sure to reinforce around the top and the bottom of the opening. I like to use the back stitch for this, but the blanket stitch works pretty well too.

When you've got the seam all sewed up reattach the pocket to the seam allowance.

Make sure to overlap the stitches you didn't rip by about half an inch. It looks best if you use your machine for this, but I didn't really feel like changing my bobbin today so I did it by hand. I used the back stitch again so I could hide the stitches in the machine stitches that were already there. All you have to do here is keep the pocket from moving so you're stitches don't have to be super strong. They just have to be able to keep the pocket in place. Even plain old straight stitch would work here.

New line of stitches on the pants-front side. I hid it in the bottom line of the serger stitches.

And here they are on the pocket side. You shouldn't really notice the repair, although honestly this is the inside of a pair of pants so who really cares right?

And you're done! Pretty simple right? Who needs a tailor? Not my man.

"Logan Costume!" or "Halloween in December..."

2010-12-05T15:04:00.000-05:00

Alright! The long awaited (at least on my part, maybe not on yours) Logan shirt post. I know this is a month over due, but I hope you'll forgive me.

The overall steps were pretty easy. I started with this pattern for the undershirt.

Which I'll note is just about the easiest darn pattern that there ever was. In fact, I'll share with you all the complete construction instructions.

Sweet right? The first step was to cut out the pattern pieces. If you've ever used a stretch-and-sew pattern you'll know that the pattern is double sided and you always have to trace the pattern pieces onto pattern paper. I was sort of out of pattern paper at the time so I used some parchment paper, but halfway through the torso pieces I ran out of that so I switched to wax paper. I wouldn't really recommend wax paper for this job unless you get in a pinch like I did. It's not the easiest thing to work with, but it gets the job done.

There's nothing quite like jury-rigging. Yup. I have mad taping wax paper together skills.

The second step as you'll note from the pattern above was the sew up the shoulder seams. Since this was the undershirt and I was working with jersey knit I wanted to add some seam stabilization.

I do not buy store bought seam stabilizing tape for my knits. The tape is expensive and I find that a little bit of interfacing cut into strips does the job better than tape ever has. Plus it's a good way to get rid of all those interfacing scraps you inevitably have left over and it STRETCHES. Heck. Yeah.

I used fusible interfacing for this shirt because it was the only thing I had in black, but non fusible works pretty well as long as it's stretchy. Just stick it on top of whatever seam your sewing and proceed as normal.

After all the seams were sewn I ran a hot iron over the seam stabilizer/leftover interfacing to secure it a little better. As you can see in the above picture to save on fabric I cut the back piece of the shirt out of two pieces of fabric and sewed them together (top left). I left about five inches unsewn so I could add a closure later. My gray fabric was not very stretchy and would never have fit over Fiancé's head. Thus, velcro was a must.

I forgot to take pictures of the mock-turtleneck collar installation, but it was pretty straight forward. I cut a strip of gray fabric to 17 inches (the measurement of fiancé's neck plus one inch for overlap) by 4 inches. I folded it in half, sewed the ends closed, snipped off the corners, turned it right-side-out and pressed. After that I turned inside out again and sewed the right sides of the shirt and collar together. I turned the shirt right side out, folded the collar over and top-stitched the collar to secure it to the shirt.

And Presto! A mock turtle neck for your viewing pleasure. I hemmed the sleeves and added a velcro closure to the back of the shirt to finish it up.

The next step was to create the outer tunic. I started off by graphing all the triangle details into the front of the shirt with a ruler and some tailors chalk. When I had it the way that I liked it I went ahead and top stitched over all the lines. This took for-eeevvvv-eeeerrr, but was totally worth it.

For the tunic itself I took one of Fiance's teeshirts and traced it onto my black jersey. I added a 1/2 inch seam allowance on all sides and cut it out.

After I had all my tunic pieces ready I decided where I wanted the gray bar to go.

I subtracted a 1/4 inch seam allowance on the top and the bottom and cut out the black panel.

I used the cut out as a stencil for for the gray fabric and added an additional 1/2inch to the top and bottom of the panel to make up the difference.

I sewed the panel onto the front of the tunic and then attached the back of the tunic. To finish it up I hemmed the neck, armholes and bottom of the tunic.

I'm pretty happy with the outcome of the costume. There are a few things I'll go back and change before we wear these again.

1. Take in tunic arm holes a little more. I wasn't happy with how far they were poking out.
2. Adjust neck line on tunic so it doesn't cover up the bottom of mock-turtleneck. It's the wrong shape.
3. Finish the 70's pants that were suppose to go with this thing.

But otherwise I was quite happy. Our social circle is full of geeks and they certainly embraced our costumes.

I'd also like to note, Dear Readers, that I was just rehired to my old company! Hurray! And just in time for the Holidays. I'm thankful to my friends, readers, and especially my parents for helping us through the layoff period. E-hugs to all of you!

New York Trip Part 2

2010-12-01T15:44:00.001-05:00

Part 1

Friday we hopped in the car and drove up to Albany for Bradlea and Mike's wedding.

Fiance enjoyed snapping some photos of the city as we drove in. He's only been to New York a handful of times and this was his first trip to the Capitol. Albany is an old city and has some awesome architecture. I think the building above is an administrative building at SUNY Albany.

We arrived at the church about an hour early. I've gotten to used to the Atlanta traffic. I expect any trip undertaken during rush hour to take an additional hour to complete. This isn't really the case in Albany, NY. It's a small city and it's pretty easy to navigate. So my excellently executed leave-early-because-of-traffic plan was a bust.

We putzed around outside for a bit, but went inside once we started to get cold. Not that it was blisteringly cold by any stretch. It was actually in the 50s that day, but there was a lot of wind. That and I am southern folk now.

The inside of the church was cute. Bradlea only had a few of these simple bouquets hung around the church, but they really gave the place a nice feel. Bradlea is a classy lady with classy tastes.

About 20 minutes later my bridesmaid and ex-college roommate Tiffany showed up. (She came to visit a few months ago you may recall). It was awesome to see her twice in one year and it was also great to see her boyfriend Kern who I hadn't seen in over two years. I like this photo of Kern. I call this look his "lecturing a bunch of bored college students" face.

The wedding kicked off at 4:30pm and was beautiful. Bradlea went for a long sheath dress with an empire waist. She looked absolutely beautiful.

Bradlea roomed with Tiffany and myself back in art school. Her Fiance Mike didn't technically live with us, but he slept at our place way more often than he slept at his own place. Their wedding took place on their 7th anniversary of dating. The ceremony was very sweet and I was able to hold in the tears, though my eyelashes did get stuck together with mascara. Wet eyes and all that.

After the ceremony we headed over to the reception hall. It was dark when we arrived, but we went back the next morning to snap a picture of the outside of the building. The reception venue is an old converted bank. It was built in 1927. Can we say vintage geek out? The walls and floor are marble and there were these great deco carvings and light fixtures inside. I'm pretty sure someone had to remind me not to stare more than once that evening.

We partook in some of the libations and then went to find the crew. We spent most of the night with our table mates Tiffany and the beautiful Jen. Jen was an honorary member of the old apartment crew. She even put up with our crazy Spice Girls Halloween costume idea.

Halloween 2006, the Riverknoll 35 crew. Renata as Baby Spice, Tiffany as Sporty Spice, yours truly as Ginger Spice, Bradlea (the bride) as Scary Spice and Jen as Posh Spice. Good times, good embarrassing times.

After some awesome food and cocktails the bride and groom arrived and had their first dance. There may or may not have been more wet eyes and sticky mascara on my part.

This picture gives you some idea of the inside of the old building. It was gorgeous. We danced and partied way too long into the night.

The Mrs

and the Mr.

And yes I totally made them stop their wedding rounds and snap a few pictures with me. I'm like that. How do you all like my 1950s red satin wiggle dress with pearls? It's one of my favorites.

New York Trip Part 1

2010-11-29T19:08:00.000-05:00

Hey all! How have you been? I've been fantastic. Today was a great day and it looks like things are turning around for the better. Hurray!

I want to thank you guys for sticking with me these last few weeks while I was off job hunting, gallivanting, and wedding attending. The last few weeks have been busy and a bit of a ride, but I promise to give you all my pre-mentioned blog posts on the Logan costume's construction, secret surprise presents, and autocromes this week. I also vow to give you a sneak preview of the Holiday Dress and to show off my very first real Christmas Tree. Stay tuned!

And now back to your regularly scheduled blog. Fiance and I had a lovely holiday and we hope you did too! This was one of those great years when we got to spend Thanksgiving with both sides of the family. With his parents in Georgia and my parents in New York we normally have to choose who to spend what holiday with, but thanks to my good friend/ex-roomate/bridesmaid now bridesmatron's wedding and my family members putting up with thanksgiving dinner happening 5 days early everything worked out.

We started the trip late Wednesday night. Our flight left at 5:30pm from Atlanta and thanks to some strong tail winds we made the trip in about one hour and forty minutes. Only problem was that we had to land in a 45mph crosswinds at a teeny-tiny airport in Newburgh, NY. I knew things were going to be rough when the flight attendant started holding his arms up in the air and pretending we were all on a rollercoaster.

Neither of us ended up loosing our lunches, but several people in the back of the plane didn't make it. I'll also note that there was a real shortage of vomit-bags on this trip, probably because they had already made the same landing in the same wind earlier that day. We did eventually make it to the ground where I promptly rushed to the terminal bathroom and washed my face for about 15 minutes, trying not to lose my cookies and also trying to curb the nausea. Fiance fared much better than I did during the landing.

Thankfully the rest of the trip to my parent's house was on land and it was quite enjoyable. We hung out with my parents for a little bit that night and then hit-the-hay.

The next morning we went in search of a Bridal gift for Miss Bradlea (the aforementioned bridesmaid/matron/roomate/etc) and enjoyed lunch at a great little place called Crew. The food was fantastic, though I'll admit that I was less than impressed with their Iced Tea. I guess after living in Georgia for two years now I've become a tea snob and only like brewed ice tea. Crew's tea was powdered, but other than that I have no complaints. The atmosphere was great and the food was delicious. If you're ever in Poughkeepsie, NY go try it out.

After lunch we decided to take a walk over the Hudson.

The Walkway over the Hudson is a neat little state park that was built over an old train bridge that had burned in the 1970s. For most of my life the railway bridge just sat rotting away, but a few years ago the state turned the decaying bridge into a public walkway. It's really quite neat.

It was great to see the FDR bridge from the walkway. I can't tell you how many times I've driven across that bridge in the past, looked at the railroad bridge and wished they'd do something with it. Now they have!

Totally drove across that bridge at least 5 times a week for most of my life. No bridges near me in GA, unless you count traffic bridges like spaghetti junction.

We stopped for photo ops as well. Mom and Dad were good sports about posing with me for 20 something photos. Anyone like my new hair? It was a present from my Mom.

Grabbed a few with Fiance as well.

Then we contemplated the river, unsolvable equations and the meaning of life.

But only for about five seconds.

After that we snapped a few more photos before it got too dark and a little too cold.

Then it was back to my parent's house where my mother made us delicious delicious lasagna. I ate too much.

How did your Holiday's go? Tell me all about them :)

Camping Shenanigans

2010-11-16T10:32:00.002-05:00

Hey readers! Thanks for all your well wishes after reading my last post. I really appreciate it. We're doing just fine and I've got some small jobs here and there to hold us over for a while.

As I mentioned in the last post we snuck in one last camping trip of the year last weekend in Helen, GA. A few friends came along and we had a pretty awesome time, though I'll admit it was a bit cold. It was exactly what I needed for some serious stress relief. I'd forgotten how exhausting job hunting can be!

Our first stop on our little weekend getaway was at an awesome Granary and Mill right outside of Helen.

They're an old fashion granary that stone-grinds everything. I'm one of those weird health and nutrition nuts so of course I had to buy some flours. We also bought hushpuppy mix and my southern man bought a ten pound bag of stone ground grits. Stone ground flour fresh from a mill is more nutritious that what you get in a grocery store and it tastes awesome. It's not over processed and keeps most of the germ in tact so it's much better for you. The only downsize is that it goes bad much faster than regular big-box store bought flours so I keep ours in mason jars in the freezer. Yum.

I of course stopped for a photo-op right outside the mill. I have to express my Nora Mill love whenever the opportunity arises. I don't know what kind of face I'm making there, but I guess we'll call it Sun-stare-squinty-face.

Next we headed into downtown Helen which happens to be just about the cutest little town there ever was. They already had everything all decked out for the holidays. I typically don't like to see Christmas decor before Thanksgiving, but Helen is so cute that I had to excuse them.

We also stopped into Fiance's uncle's Cigar Shop for a visit. I don't smoke cigars, but I will admit that I love the smell of them.

I was having so much fun during our visit that I forgot to take pictures of the smoking parlor. I pulled this image off their website so you could get a feel for the place. The smoking parlor is set up like an English cigar shop and is filled with antique chairs and sofas. It's really neat.

Next step was a hike into the woods for about an eight of a mile and scout out a good campsite. We didn't want to be too far from the parking lot when we knew it would be below freezing in the evenings.

Then we pitched the tent. I use "we" lightly. I pretty much just watched while Fiancé put the whole thing together. Fiancé is so woodsy. I guess it's all that Eagle Scout in him. Besides men are better at tent construction anyway.

As it got dark we waited for our friends to arrive. They started to show up after dark and we somehow managed to get everyone's tents up without too much trouble despite it being awfully chilly and very very dark.

After a night of good conversation and general campfire revelry we all turned in.

Fiancé and I snapped a photo in the middle of the night to commemorate our first camp out at 25 degrees. Don't we just look lovely at 3 am? He was not as excited to take this picture as I was.

We had brought plenty of blankets and extra sleeping bags so we were nice and cozy all night long. We had also found a nice spot that was free of roots so we were quite comfortable. The only real hardship of the evening was a late night bathroom run. I swear my unmentionables were frozen solid by the time I returned to the tent, but I guess I've still got some northern blood left in me because even that didn't seem like such a big deal. I think some of the other members of our camping party were less impressed by the weather.

I was up a little before Fiancé the next morning. I had to hike down to the car to get some breakfast for us. As a general policy we don't like to keep food in the camp particularly since there have been a few bear attacks in the North Georgia Mountains recently. We did bring a bear bag with us, but we didn't end up using it since we weren't very far in. It snowed a little over night, but not enough to really do anything but dust our chairs.

Bringing lots of warm clothes also helped with the cold. I wore this hat and scarf that I made back in my knitting days. I also brought along my super warm Rochester, NY snow mitten/glove things that keep your hands awesomely warm. Let me take a moment to gush about these gloves. They are the warmest pair of gloves I have ever had. My hands barely get cold and you can seriously use these things as pot holders. I took our hot water pot right out of the fire using these things and couldn't even feel it. They're awesome.

We cooked some breakfast over the fire and then I enjoyed this delicious sweet potato while the menfolk chopped some wood and searched for kindling.

After breakfast we geared up for a short hike to the mountain top. Here is Lauren getting very excited about the trip. I won't bore you with pictures of the hike since it was pretty much just trees and a pretty stream, but it was a good hike. Nice and easy and very scenic. I was surprised by how crowded the trail was, but with the park being so close to Helen it makes the hike a good day trip. Fiancé stayed behind to mind the camp. We all thought it was best that he stay at the campsite since he was recovering from a knee injury.

And here I am at the end of the trail. It ends in a pretty waterfall coming down through the rocks. The water was so clear and I wanted to go swimming very badly. Unfortunately it only warmed up to the low 50s during the day so that wasn't really possible. That and the water was FREEZING. I washed my hands in the water instead.

Nancy, where have you been?

2010-11-12T13:42:00.002-05:00

Yes, where have I been. It's been almost two weeks since my last post. So, where have I gone you say? Well nowhere really. I was laid off last week and have been spending the last two weeks job hunting. Fiance and I took a camping vacation over the weekend which really helped to relieve some stress, but now the search continues.

Let me tell you a little something about job hunting in the art world. It makes you feel very dirty on the inside. Basically you scour the newspaper looking for something that you are remotely qualified for and then you call all your art buddies who could possibly have a connection with the company offering said job and see if they can get you an interview. Fun right?

To hold me over until another opportunity job arises I'll be picking up a little PA (read: bottomfeeder) work this coming week in the city. There are several documentary shoots going on currently and those DPs need someone to go on coffee runs and wrangle cables. I envision that this will be a lot like film school which means it could either be good or bad. Pray that I am able to survive the 16 hour work days again.

But what about sewing you say? Don't worry, there's been plenty of that to go around. I've got several secret gift projects in the works that I'll be revealing once the intended recipients receive their mysterious gifts. In the mean time here's a preview of an upcoming Vinspiration post. Enjoy these full color autocromes from the 1900s-1910s. These awesome images are full color, not hand tinted. Very cool. I'll be giving you plenty of information on who created them and how so look out for that.

Halloweeeeen!

2010-11-01T14:04:00.003-04:00

So we had all kinds of fun this weekend. Here are the final results. I was actually shocked by how many people knew who we were. I was expecting maybe one person or so to recognize us, but ten people must have stopped us to snap our photo. Fiancé even got stopped in the parking lot with a "hey Sandman!"

Once upon a time in the year 2116 a person's age is strictly legislated. 30 years to the day of your birth, Lastday, you must "renew". Those who don't renew are called Runners. They are hunted down by the elite police force called Sandmen.

Aaaaaaaaaannnnd the big reveal. We took this in a dark warehouse party so the flash did all sorts of stuff to our faces, but just pretend it's not so bad. I had to switch the Jessica belt up a bit, the o-rings I ordered came in too large. They were more like 3.75 inch rings than 3 inch rings. I'll be redoing the belt at some point, but I'm definitely going to have to get some smaller rings. Maybe 2 inch or 2.5 inch. Also had a little costume malfunction. One of those rings decided it did not want to be attached any longer and flopped halfway off about 30 minutes into the night. It was my own fault for rushing the belt.

You can see the ridiculous quilting I did for the gray panel on the Sandman costume. Yes all those lines are stitched, not drawn. That was definitely the most tedious part of this whole endeavor. Fiancé really liked his costume and I have to say I'm quite happy with the results. The lifeclocks we bought looked awesome. I had to pull mine off at some point during the night because the Spirit Gum we used to attach them was really aggravating my skin and starting to hurt. (Curse you pasty white skin and your extreme sensitivity to everything). I solved the braless issue with pasties which also irritated my skin. Lame. Next time I wear a nude camisole like I was going to do from the beginning.

I'll be posting how I made the Logan costume later this week. Hope you all had a great Halloween and have a happy All Saints Day!

Glorious Halloweens of Ol': The Bride

2010-10-28T22:40:00.001-04:00

Today I take you back in time to the year oh, lets say 1992 or 1993. I'm guessing on the year, but I do remember that I wanted to be a bride for Halloween. Mom whipped up this cute little dress and even let me borrow her wedding veil! I loved this costume so much. I felt like a bride princess. A princess bride?

And for an added bonus I give you my first Halloween. This should be Halloween 1987 and I believe I'm dressed as a ballerina. My cousin (right) is a surgeon.

Have a safe and happy holiday everyone.

A 1930s Trousseau

2010-10-28T11:46:00.000-04:00

This is a cross post from my Wedding Blog over at Wedspace.com, but I thought you all might get a kick out of it. I guess I've got 30s on the brain again. I hope you enjoy!

Delineator Cover ca. 1932 (I think)

Trousseau. Not a term we tend to use very often anymore. I'm sure there are plenty of Brides who have never even heard of the term "trousseau." So what is it and why was it important?

Lets think back to the days before feminism. Back to the days when women were not expected to work more than part time outside the home. The American Heritage Dictionary defines the word trousseau as:

trous·seau, n. [French, from Old French, diminutive of trousse, bundle. See truss.] The possessions, such as clothing and linens, that a bride assembles for her marriage.

In short it was those items such as bed linens, napkins, clothing, crocheted doilies, candlesticks and anything else that a woman was going to take with her into her husband's home. The concept is similar to that of a Hope Chest. You fill a box with all those things you'll need to for married life.

This isn't a very popular practice anymore. Most women today work full time and we simply purchase what we need when we need it. Our culture is also not one that focuses on preserving items long term. How many of us buy a dress at Express or Kohls with the expectation of carefully storing it, always wearing a smock or apron over it when working in it, carefully altering it by hand when size adjustments must be made, and with the intent to wear said dress for the next 15 years? Certainly not me.

In the 1930s the Trousseau was a very common practice and many magazines for young women had lists suggesting what one should include. Here is a list from the April 1930 Good Housekeeping magazine.

Trousseau Budget 1930
White Satin Wedding Gown - $39.50 (about $496 today)
Tulle Veil (3 yards at $3.25per yard) - $9.75 (about $122)
Going away 3-piece suit - $16.95 (about $214)
Afternoon Dress for Formal Parties - $29.50 (about $375)
Street Dress of Silk or Wool - $25.00 (about $314)
Coat in Tweed or cloth - $39.50 (about $496)
Sweater, Cardigan, and Skirt Costume - $16.75 (about $210)
Washable Silk Sports Frock - $6.95 (about $87)
Sleeveless picque Dress with Jacket - $10.75 (about $135)
Lacy Diner Dress with Jacket - $25.00 (about $314)
Evening Wrap (to be made at home) - $15.00 (about $188)
Two Hats, One of Felt, One of Straw - $18.00 (about $226)
Shoes: Street, Afternoon, Evening Slippers, and One Pair of Bedroom Slippers or One Pair of Mules - $33.50 (about $420)
Negligee in Satin or Silk - $15.00 (about $188)
Lingerie, Girdles, and Stockings - $65.00 (about 816.00)
Accessories: Bag, 4 Pairs of Gloves, and 1 Dozen Handkerchiefs - $20.00 (about $251)
____________
Grand Total: $386.15 or about $4,848 in today's money.

Note that this was published in April 1930, about 7 months after the great stock market crash that started the Great Depression in the United States.

The September 1933 issue of the Delineator Magazine suggests a similar Trousseau, but one that's slightly more affordable. The magazine focused on needle work, dressmaking, and millinery. They were know for providing images of the latest fashions with just enough information to recreate a similar look at home. Making your own Trousseau was often much more reasonable pricewise. The September 1933 Delineator gives us this illustration and description.

A 1933 Trousseau
"The going-away outfit. She chooses a suit for a dramatic get-away. Or, if she is marrying simply, at the City Hall, she wears this for the ceremony, too. It is eel brown ribbed wool and the fur is flattering blue fox." "Her wool gadabout frock. For this backbone-f-the-trousseau frock she hits on olive green, with the touch of satin that is inevitable on smart wool frocks. The beret and the gloves are sating too." "Her dress-up frock. It's satin-and she uses the dull side for the dress itself, the shiny side for the small touches. It would be marvelous in rosy red, but every bit as smart in black or eel brown.

"A go-with-everything wrap. It's a wager one-the smartest wrap of the year. It belongs to her white frock but it's worn with the dinner dress, too. If she prefers a contrasting fabric, we suggest velvet or bengaline." "Her 'grand' evening frock. To look grandest, this season, white satin is the thing at night. That's why we urge it for this frock with the Vionnetish neckline. The wrap belonging to this dress is the black one." "And this for small evenings. A dress that can take dinners, dancing, the theatre, or any other kind of 'don't dress' evening in its stride. It's black satin and the coat of the white satin frock will go perfectly with it."

So if one were so inclined what would one include in their modern day trousseau? Susan Breslow Sardone recommends new clothes, sports wear, vacation wear, and luggage. She suggests that you keep your trousseau true to your personal style. Don't think of it like an image make-over, you're just collecting things that you will need.

I can tell you that my "trousseau" consists of several mismatched dish sets from college, banged up clothing from high school and art school (mostly covered in paint), and two pairs of twin sheets. Oh, and about 3 bath towels.

-Nancy

Logan Costume - Logan 5 References

2010-10-26T11:57:00.000-04:00

Last night I began work on the Logan costume. I did not take any photos as last night consisted of opening patterns, washing fabric, changing out thread on the machine, and lots of pattern tracing. Generally pretty boring stuff.

Just two pieces to cut and sew make this pattern a popular and versatile answer to the knit top and sweater wardrobe for the men in the family. Try it with a crew neck, turtleneck, or buttons down the front. Pattern number 100 was designed especially for knit and stretch fabrics. You will enjoy its versatility and the simplicity of construction.

I must say that this 1967 Stretch and Sew pattern is just about the greatest pattern I've ever used. Four pieces. FOUR. Well, five if you add the turtle neck as I will. You also have an option of adding a ribbed knit collar should you so desire. I didn't have enough pattern paper so I traced the pattern onto parchment paper.

And then I ran out of parchment paper so I traced it onto some wax paper.

Yeah, it was a little jury rigged. Don't judge.

Next step was to round up all my reference photos and get a good last look.

Velco in the collar.

This costume is going up for auction in December. Starting bid? $4,000.

Quilted Triangle chest detail.

After that I rounded up my reference photos and discovered something that had somehow escaped me before. That gray bar on the sandman uniform doesn't go around the back. Glad I was able to figure that out. Less work for me!

Tonight is make the shirt and tunic night. Totally doable if I don't run into any mechanical problems. Yay!

Logan's Run: The Jessica Dress

2010-10-25T10:21:00.003-04:00

A Jessica dress in 20 easy steps.

Step 1: Trace muslin onto fabric, adjust accordingly.

Step 2: Fray-check the heck out of everything.

Step 3: Sew shoulder seams together. Check neck line.

Step 4: Apologize to blog readers for ugly no makeup face and wet hair.

Step 5: Decide you hate neck line and that the fray-check itches like woah. Have miner freak out. Do what any person would do in this situation and run crying to Mother. She takes approximately 0.2 seconds to solve all neck line issues. She also suggests sewing in a facing to the collar.

Step 6: Tell your mother she is awesome. Rip out shoulder seams. Install facing.

Step 7: More fray-check.

Step 8: Resew shoulder seams with a larger seam allowance. Press flat. More fray-check.

Step 9: Test new neck line. Approve. Do happy dance.

Step 10: Sew and press side seams.

Step 11: Figure out where elastic waist will go.

Step 12: Sew on casing (not shown)

Step 13: Grab the GREATEST sewing tool EVER and thread elastic through waistband in 6 seconds.

Step 14: even out elastic and scrunching.

Step 15: Close casing, sew down elastic so it doesn't move around on you.

Step 16: Compare costume to original. Approve of costume.

Step 17: Take costume for a test drive and decide on hem length.

Step 18: Install pretty lace hem tape.

Step 19: Sew Blind Hem by hand for the first time since Highschool. Decide it wasn't as bad as you thought it would be.

Step 20: Pat yourself on the back.