Window Shopping

I'm not much of a car girl. In fact, I don't even drive. But there is still something about a classic car that makes my heart go pitter patter.

Maybe it's how cute they look with my vintage outfits.

Maybe I just love that someone has saved and cherished a little piece of history.




Maybe I just love the attention to detail and style that is often lacking in modern cars (to me anyways).

Whatever it is, I sure had a blast checking out old cars at a local car show.



One darling gentleman even offered to let me pose in his car for a photo!

Perhaps one day I'll get to own one of these lovelies but for now I'll just have to be content with window shopping!

More photos over on Flickr!

Youtube: Brushing out pin curls

Woot! Woot! Another pin curling video! Enjoy!

Falling in love with a novelty print

This weekend, I'm going to be a bridesmaid in a wedding. So like any good bridesmaid who's making her own dress, I made a test version first!

It's Simplicity 8398 c. 1950. The fabric I used is not particularly retro, but it's one I had my eye on at Jo-Ann's for quite a while.

Of course, it just happened to be $14/yd. There are some things I'm willing to pay $14/yd for, but not a basic cotton no matter how pretty the print.

Luckily, I spied it in the red tag section for $7/yd and even though I think that's still high for clearance fabric, I had to have it.

And I did actually need some more dresses I could wear while shooting weddings, like I did this past Saturday. The modern print keeps the whole dress from screaming vintage too much.

It's really bad form to steal the limelight from the bride on her big day so I like to tone down my retro-ness for work purposes.

I am really glad that I did make a wearable muslin of this dress because I did make a few changes to my actual bridesmaid's dress including raising the waist .5".

I'm really starting to think that I am ever so slightly short waisted but I still love this dress and know it'll get loads of wear!

And I love even more that I got my bridesmaid's dress finished last week so no panic sewing! :D

When in doubt, more bling!

I have issues with accessorizing. I never can decide if things go, especially brooches! Today, I threw caution to the wind and went with lots of bling. After all, the 50s were all about more, bigger and better.

I love the print of this dress because it can be paired with so many different colors.

I went with black as my neutral instead of white because I wanted to go very sophisticated. I would have preferred black shoes too but I didn't have any barn friendly black shoes to wear (to my church which is held in a riding arena.).

For bling, I went with a pair of silver confetti Lucite earrings which looked much smaller when I bought them and a sparkly rhinestone vintage brooch. In this case, I think the bold print really called for bold accessories that wouldn't get lost next to it.

Sparkly!

This is a me-made dress and it's the pattern I'll be making my Halloween dress from. You guys have about 95% convinced me that I really need another collared version but I do want to get my hands on the actual fabric first.

I really love this dress and I don't know why I don't wear it more often!

I actually have enough of this fabric leftover to squeeze out another dress which I may get to this fall/winter.

Hear ye, Hear ye!

It's that time of year again! Ohio Renaissance Festival opening weekend is upon us! Yours truly will be there this Monday as well as several other weekends this year.

 Depending on the weather, I'll probably be either my red peasant dress (left).

Or my leather corset. Or vintage if it's going to be 90+F. *fingerscrossedforniceweather*

If you are going to be there too (or another weekend) and would like to meet up, please shoot me an email at girlwiththestarspangledheart [at] gmail [dot] com.

Youtube: Pin Curls for Beginners Part 2

The next in the series! This week we learn how to actually make the curls!

It's a patio dress!

I'm sure that one time or another, all of us have drooled over a vintage patio dress set! Not wanting to shell out $100+ on one, I decided to make one!

I finished the skirt way back at the end of June and took it on vacation in July but I never got the blouse finished! I hate sewing up to the last minutes!

Fabric: more curtain fabric (free)
Pattern: Butterick 7328
Year: 1950s
Notions: Buttons ($1), ric rac ($5)
First worn: August '13
Wear again: Yes! This combo is so fun, plus I think the shirt is quite enough to wear with other things.

I'm trying to decide if I like this bob style with 50s things. I got a bob cut because I'm going to be in a wedding in September and I wanted to tone down the vintage a bit for the occasion. But it is nice to have an easy go to options when I don't feel like or can't pin curl my hair.

One thing I will say if you are going to be making one of these is that unless you can get the trim cheap somewhere (ie not Jo-Ann's), you can easily run yourself $50-75 in trim alone! I didn't add nearly as much trim as I would have liked because I just couldn't justify that much money on an outfit that used to be curtains.

I still love this outfit and am so happy I finished it! The skirt is super twirly and the bold yellow color makes everybody a bit perkier.

I've been playing around with wearing less make up and I really like it. So much easier plus my face feels so much nicer when I don't wear foundation. Now I just save foundation for fancy events.

Do you have a vintage or hand-made patio dress?