I got a present!

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

Vintage 4th of July recipes and a crochet pattern.

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.

New information on an inspiration post and LOTS of updates!

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!

The return of Vinspiration! Jacques Griffe

Oh man oh man oh man! Vinspiration is back! Why did it stop you say? Well, mostly because it's a lot of work to find information on certain subjects. I love to research don't get me wrong, but with the ridiculous search for a wedding venue within our budget going on I had trouble justifying the 2-3 hours of research and photo finding time that were sometimes necessary for a vinspiration post.

I've found myself missing my vinspiration lately and I figure you all wouldn't hate me too much if I slacked off a wrote shorter posts every once in a while. So today's Vinspiration are pieces by Jacques Griffe.

The History Lesson (I'll be brief today): Jacques Griffe was born in France in 1917. He was apprenticed to a tailor at age 16, fought in World War II where he was eventually imprisoned for 18 months, was employed at the House of Vionnet, and later opened Jacques Griffe Evaluation, in rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré in 1947. He retired in 1968.

Jacques Griffe created some amazing structured designs in the 1950s-1960s. His runway gowns especially were structured to the point of wearable sculpture.

February 1951. 

Black Cocktail Dress with a very deep V in the front. Look at that thing, it goes almost to her belly button. A little more risky then anything I would wear, but I love the tight waist and structured bit above the pencil skirt. This is from the Paris Spring Fashion Show.

1952

Probably the most famous Griffe gown of all time. I have no idea how those scallops were made. Can anyone shine any light on this subject? I have to say this isn't my favorite evening gown of his... mostly it just reminds me of a pineapple.

Griffe very often used these Kimono sleeves in his dresses. Here combined with a belted waist and some seriously structured undergarments they make this model look like she has no waist at all. To me she looks like she's missing ribs. That's pretty darn skinny. I just love the draping on this garment. We can see the deep V neckline that Griffe favored here again, but this time the added ruffled collar and fur make it much more wearable.

Suzy Parker. October 1953. 

What can you say about this other than what a beautiful beautiful dress. Just looking at it gives me the warm fuzzies. The color, the shape, the outer wrap. This reminds me a lot of the Fortuny Gowns. The empire waist and that little bow are just too sweet.

 February 1956

Look at the structure of this mermaid dress. Can we say gravity defying? The cut is beautiful, the layers or skirt have such a great shape. This is one of my all time favorite Griffe gowns. Do you ever wonder if these pieces still exist somewhere? How much I would give to get my hands on this dress and figure out it's construction.

1965

Moving into the 1960s now. Again we have the V neckline, but it's softened with the high scarf like drape across the neck.  We also see more of Griffe's fantastic fabric draping. The shape here is much softer and much more 60s. Griffe was an interesting fellow. He very often had his hands in every part of a garments construction. Not only could be design, but he was an expert at draping and sewing as well.

Griffe later goes on to do several designs for Vogue patterns. I can tell you from experience that if you can find one of Griffe's patterns for sale they tend to be very expensive. I stumbled into this baby, but I don't think the seller really knew what they had... I'll admit that I didn't tell her either. It's missing one piece, but I'll take that over the $125 uncut pattern selling on etsy right now.  Don't you wish high end designers still designed for pattern companies today? Now don't get my wrong. I love Kay Unger, but she's no Vera and she's certainly no Griffe.

Woah.

So I'm like totally only a few posts away from 100 posts and that not including the very very very old college posts still attached to this blog in some fashion or another. When did this happen? Crazy talk! I'm going to have to think of some special way to celebrate this occasion. Anyone have any thoughts? Pattern give away was one thing, but... mmmm.... not really feeling it. I'm leaning more towards custom made 1940s blouse. Any objections to that?

It'll give me an excuse to get myself sewing again. This has been a crazy month at the house. Our roommate moved out leaving us with an entirely empty room. At first I thought I would take the room for myself as a sewing suite, but it's at the back of the house and there isn't much natural light. I wasn't really feeling it until Fiancé offered to take that room for his office and give me the room at the front of the house that had previously been a den/office. Bigger room? More natural light? Hello. I was so there.

So first step... move all my junk out of the room. So far so good. Next step spend two weeks obsessing over paint. I've had this problem before with our dining room. It takes a long time for us to finish a room, mostly because all of my lines have to be PERFECT and the fact that we have to figure out what to do with our tray ceilings which are a pain and a half to paint. I'm not going to deny that I may have possibly kind of gone over the walls with a half inch artists brush again...

I did manage to convince Fiance to let me use fancy VOC free hippy paint on his walls. We chose these colors.

I always love paint color names. The darker color was "Pinecone Hill" which we used for the wall and the lighter color was called "Shaded Path." We used that for part of the tray ceiling and a beige for the rest. The trim is standard bright white molding color. I think the name was something boring like "snow" so I didn't care to remember the name. These are not the colors I would have chosen for my sewing room, but they work very well for Fiance's home office. I'm a bright crazy colors kind of a gal and Fiance is a traditional, earth-tone, somber color type of a guy. He doesn't find bright colors very relaxing and this is a man-cave we're talking about after all. I hope to add some fabulous art to the walls for a little pop of color later on. We'll see if I can get away with that.

We also moved a mahogany colored desk we've been using as a table in the hall into the office. Imagine a desk being used as a desk instead of a place for me to pile things. Awesome! Next step was to move all the DVDs and our personal records over there. It's amazing to realize how much paper we actually have stored in our house. I felt like a tree murderer :\

I've also been doing some other projects that need doing around the house. Cleaning, winterizing, scrubbing the weird green algae off my back patio. My poor sewing machine is sitting with a giant pile of fabric scraps and notions, just waiting for the sewing room to go together so it can get some use again. Oh the joys of making a house into a home.

I have a few color combos in mind for my sewing room once we get Fiance all moved into his new office. I'd love to do a vintage look that says "this room belongs in your Grandmother's House.". Maybe a fabulous 1950s blue/pink combo.

Think wall colors rather than tile. Also no knick-knacks or weird fish. 

Or we all know how much I love avocado green and harvest gold!

Hotness.... utter yellow doored hotness.

I was leaning towards the pink and blue until Retro Renovation.com posted Benjamin Moore's 1969 paint pallet. Oh be still my beating heart.

I may be in retro heaven. Loving the Sea Foam greens and Powder blues. Yum. Oh the trials and tribulations of picking a darn decade to model my sewing room on.

The plastic home of the future.

Last Guys and Dolls Post I Swear!

The director of the show, Ms. Tammy Barton, sent me some great photos to post on the blog. So sweet of her to give me these for $25V. She must understand the troubles of New Old Camera. Luckily for me and all my future projects my NEW NEW CAMERA came in the mail today. Holy SLR Batman! I love it!

Now I can request fancy lenses for the next few holidays and not have to strain too hard to come up with gifts. I know that sounds weird, but very rarely need anything. I'm pretty content to make do with what we have so it's always difficult for me to come up with things I want for gifts. Luckily (well, unluckily actually) my camera broke this year so my birthday present was easy to choose. Happy Birthday to me! In case anyone is mildly curious I hit 24 at 2:15 this afternoon. Now I can rent cars! Sweet!

Anyways, enough chatting! Here are the last of the Guys and Dolls Photos compliments of our director.

Better picture of the Hotbox Gals. Love my awesome show-girl headpieces. Very fun, super easy. Anyone interested in a tutorial?

Oh! Em! Gee! feathers! You can also see Nathan's maroon pinstripe suit here. Gotta love interesting menswear.

A much clearer shot of the general cast costumes. You can see the hilariously ugly wedding dress I created for the show on the left there. Love it!

Hotbox girl and Nicely-Nicely Johnson. Blue Pinstripes = awesome sauce!

More of the ugly wedding dress. The dress was a great find at $25. It was actually quite pretty before I chopped it up and added some tacky "bling."

Benny South-street. Tell me you don't love the powder-blue sports coat. 

And another shot of the guys costumes. Really loved doing the guys for this show. I could go really crazy with this show so I did. Plaid, Blue, Old Man Coats, Purple Pin-stripe suits. So good.

Hope you all had a great labor day! Anyone do anything fun? I went to Dragon*Con, but you'll have to wait until tomorrow for that post.

Dress Rehersal Shots

Here are the promised photos from Dress Rehersal last night. New Old Camera isn't the greatest at taking photos of anything that's not in direct sunlight so please open these up to see the large images. I'm so happy with how the show turned out. If you're in the Atlanta Area the show opens tomorrow night at the Fred Ampitheatre in Peachtree City. Doors open at 7:30. 

The cast joking around before rehearsal.

Runyonland number in progress. Sarah is trying to get the drinking, gambling  citizens of NYC to stop their evil ways and come to the Save a Soul Mission

Mission Band Members.

Big Julie. I just love this guy! His name is Bob Grillo and he is a riot on stage! We rented that fabulous jacket and tie from Creative Costumes.

Another Crapshooter. My first attempt at dying a man's jacket. Somewhat successful. I think I need more soda ash next time. Also, I'm not denying the fat that he's wearing a Snoopy tie. 

Sarah, Mission Band Members and Lt. Brannigan in the back. The uniforms they're wearing are old Pyke County High School Marching Band uniforms. Bonnet in Sarah's hand is from Melanie and Creative Costumes.

Side view of the "Oldest Reliable" number. Love the backdrop! (I had nothing to do with it, just love it).

Bushel and a Peck Costumes! Can't take credit for these other than the headpieces. I was running low on time so two of the cast members made the costumes up. I gave them a basic idea and they just ran with it. I thought these came out fabulously. I made all the hats in our kitchen. Mr. Miller (fiance) was not too happy with the marabou feathers all over the floor. 

And I also made Miss Adelaide's headpiece. I love making showgirl headpieces! In fact I think it's one of the most fun things ever. She had to duck to get through to the stage door in the back there, but beauty requires effort! Actually, no one told me they were coming through a door. I assumed they were coming on from stage left. Oh well! She still looks hot!

Here they are going through the door. You can see that Amanda (Adelaide) had to squat a little, but that dramatic showgirl headpiece sure makes for a dramatic entrance!

A Frankensteined robe. Took a bunch of stuff from the costume vault and sewed it together. I'm totally in love with the fuzzy sleeves!

Sorry this is so dark. New Old Camera can't really handle dark scenes. This is the "Cafe Cubana" scene. Those cuban gals are totally wearing my dresses... The red dress on the left is my standard salsa/latin/dancing date dress.

Close up of Adelaide's "Take Back Your Mink" costume which I LOVE. Thanks creative costumes for letting us rent this baby. So cute!

Take Back Your Mink on Stage. The Hot Box Girls are wearing my best costume find ever. 10 MATCHING dresses in the RIGHT sizes at Kohls, on the clearance rack, for 12$ each! I was so happy that day! Perfect costumes, and 10 of the same thing from clearance!? Unheard of! That was a lucky lucky day. Afterward I took these home and installed Velcro to turn these into fabulous rip-away dresses. They work great!

After the rip away, black leotards underneath.

New Camera Request Approved!!

My birthday is just around the corner and my birthday gift has been approved!!! I requested a lovely new camera. My mother has approved my request! Mom, you are Awesome! I just can't wait to be able to upload photos again. Scratch that, I can't wait to be able to actually get photos off the camera again! Time for a happy dance!

Oh and that Vintage wedding dress shop I went to? It doesn't have vintage wedding dresses anymore so I totally lied about putting photos up. Now it's a somewhat alternative bridal boutique. We still had a really fun time, but we were not allowed to take photos because of designer copyright. I really enjoyed my first wedding dress shopping experience. If you are in Atlanta wedding dress shopping someday go there. The staff was wonderful! All the dresses were so unique and beautiful, but not vintage. Here are some real vintage wedding dresses to make up for it.

Albert & Vita Genco Wedding, Mid-1950s. Tell me you don't love that glorious full train. It's a bit much for me, but it is very elegant. I also love the bridesmaids's gowns. Love the sleeves. I wonder what color they were? Some sort of pastel. Pink and light blue were very popular colors of the time. I think my bridesmaids would be a little upset with me if I made them wear these today but I really do think those dresses are just so sweet and pretty. Perfect for the time.

This lady is such a doll. I really love her hat and veil. It's simple, elegant, and not overdone. This is more of a "me" look. I won't be having my wedding on a cold day (hopefully), but if I did I would love to have a coat like this to wear over it. I can certainly appreciate the more formal, long train dresses of the time, but my heart is in the simpler more elegant straight line dresses that would fit under a lovely coat like this.

Penn-De Hann wedding. August 1953. Look at all that lace! I have a love for lace. In fact at the bridal store the other day I ran straight for the lace dresses. So so beautiful. It is very unusual to see men in anything other than the white tuxedo jacket in the mid 1950s. Very formal weddings still had tuxes with the tails, striped pants, and glove combo. Some men still wore suits for more low key weddings, but these white tuxes were definitely very popular.

This is my absolute favorite dress of the bunch. Simple, elegant, not too much. And those buttons! Couldn't you just die? This is the Chorley-Lally wedding December 1954. I just love her shoes too. I want to build a time machine just so I can go back in time and get them. (Someday I might get over the white strappy shoe love, maybe..)

In the late 1950s we don't see many of the white coat tuxes anymore. I thought this photo was interesting because the men were wearing black tux jackets with white pants. The bridesmaids are so cute in their pink dresses. I love the daisy bouquets and of course the lovely hats. One of the groomsmen in the back doesn't seem to be having a very good day...

And finally this couple. Mendham-French wedding 1956. Men's formal tuxes still look the same. I really like her high necked wedding dress with eyelet fabric. It's so pretty! If you don't click on any others you have to click on this one to see the dress fabric. I wish they made attractive long sleeved wedding dresses today. I would be very tempted.

What do you think? Which dress is your favorite? Would you wear these dresses?