Slipping from vintage to antique

I have to admit that I watched the entire first season of Downton Abbey today..... It was on Netflix so I couldn't resist. I did clean and do laundry and take apart a dress while watching. Now I'm going to dream about beautiful 1910s fashion.

I love the hats! So big! So bold! When are hats going to make a come back!

Isn't this divine! Gold embroidery and fur!

The jacket looks like silk. An Asian influence perhaps?

I adore the blue and white dress.

I love the plaid number with the red details. Wish I could see the frong!

This lady is just gorgeous.

I did have a difficult time finding pictures from the show of the outfits I actually liked, but here are a few.

Lady Mary's blue shirt with the cute collar. I must find a pattern I can turn into this!

Cora's coat- I do have a pattern for this, but as it is already almost March, it'll have to wait until next year. :(

Lady Sybil's purple dress. I love the collar details and the buttons.

What eras have been inspiring you lately? Have you caught the Downton Abbey bug?

Scrap Happy!

Today was my monthly scrapbooking day at a coffee shop. A bunch of ladies get together and scrapbook all day. It's super fun and I love it. I was going to be sitting and crafting all day so I needed to be cute and comfy.

Sweater and cami: New York and Company
Pants: The Limited
Shoes: I've had forever
Belt: Cassie Stephens

I also curled my hair last night and it came out ok this morning. The far side is pulled back and I just did a little curl with my bangs.

Hope you all had a good Saturday!

Snoods, Belts and .... Prom Dresses????

So I promised photos of my two new belts from Cassie Stephens! I was so excited to get this package in the mail! Then I opened it and was even more excited.

EEK! Is this not the most darling packaging you've ever seen! I felt like it was my birthday or something. So, I opened my presents.

I choose two belts from Cassie's store. After seeing Solanah sporting a kitty belt, I had to get one of those. I chose a classy black and white one. I loved the lace and the fact that the kitty itself was reversible too! I also loved the bird belt too! The buckle is a gorgeous gray color with a great texture. The belt is red velvet on one side and a cute "learning to write cursive" print on the back.

I got snoods from Arthelia's Attic in the mail today. It just must be my week for mail! (Or last week was my week for shopping....) They came wrapped in pretty tissue paper just like my last one. I opted for a navy and a black one this go around as my purple one is a bit hard to match to things. I love these snoods as they are hand crocheted and just so much nicer quality than other snoods I've seen.

I love that Naomi adds bows! So 40s!

I also signed up for a local sewing challenge hosted by my school. It's a fashion makeover/unconventional material challenge. Here's what I picked up tonight to use as my building materials.

I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to make yet, but I'm thinking separates, hence the bringing home three dresses.

The off white dress is the one I grabbed first. I loved the lace and pearl details. I figured I could salvage it. Guess I'll have to do some sketching a la Project Runway. I'm pretty excited. I'm hoping to make a vintage inspired something but we'll see. The fashion show is March 19th.

Swing Dress Sew-along Progress

I am a bit behind on the Swing Dress, but that's ok. Here's what I got finished this weekend:

The back of the dress is attached!

Pocket under construction!

Hmmm.... my poor dress looks a bit sad on the hanger. I got supplies to make a duct tape dress form, but have yet to get around to it. Must get on that.

I have one more panel to attach to the front of the skirt and then I can attach it to the dress. Overall, the project is going very well. Working with the fabric has made me realize that it's a lot thinner than I thought it was... I think I should have underlined it. Guess I can always get a slip.

The reason I am behind on the sew-along is because I worked furiously over the weekend on my secret project. Alas, I ran out of the color thread I was using. This project has a lot of decorative stitching. Nothing too complicated, but it does go through a lot of thread. I was hoping to have it finished for Monday night's dinner out with the in-laws. Oh, well.

Here's sneak peak #2.


I'm hoping to have another youtube video up by the end of the week. (But I also have a paper to write....) I've also been doing some of the administrative paperwork type stuff to get my etsy shop set up. Hopefully that will be up soon as well!

Swing Dress Sew-along and what else I've been up to

Here is my swing dress so far:

I just adore this fabric! I decided to go for a contrasting waistband and ties to mimic a sash.

Top stitching! I'm not usually too good at this, but I've been practicing.

Wednesday, I went over to my friend Amy's house and we dug into her crafting gooddies and got crafting. I made two headbands, two hair clips and one broach. She had a lovely collection of ribbons and vintage buttons.

I also got a new toy last week!

Yup, it's an iPhone. :) I love my technology.

I also picked up this stylish plaid case for it. I figure if it gets too dirty, I can always recover it with some other fabric.

And here's a sneak peak of a project I've been up too. I hope to get it finished soon!

Looks yummy, doesn't it?

I also did a bit of shopping and should have some goodies to show you as soon as they arrive in the mail. :D

Have you been sewing or crafting or thrifting lately?

The Faux Button Dress

Yay! I finished the faux button dress just in time for warm(er) weather! This is the last of my winter sewing projects so I'll be moving on to spring sewing soon! Anyways, here it is.

Dress: McCalls 5438 made by me
Shoes: DSW

I love that the buttons on this dress are purely decorative. It actually closes with snaps! So no pesky button holes to do.

I made these darling little buttons using Casey's tutorial. They were super easy and really cute. I did have a bit of difficultly with the small inside, but that's because I was using felt and it's pretty bulky. I also used Casey's tutorial for fixing sleeve ease, which was great! I have nice smooth sleeves instead of awkwardly poofy sleeves.

Pretty Baby: Fashion and Film

Twice a year, for Valentine's Day and Sweetest Day, my church has a dinner and a movie date night. It always features a black and white film and lots of yummy food. Now, I'm not usually a girl who gets into b&w films. Usually, I give up after just a few minutes, but who ever picks out the movies for our date nights always does a great job. This year we watched the hilarious Pretty Baby (1950) starring Dennis Morgan and Betsy Drake.


A lowly worker at a marketing company, Patsy Douglas (Drake) dreams of writing her own slogans and her hunky boss, Sam Morley (Morgan). One evening, she adopts a doll from a demolished baby display at work. The display was to impress Cyrus Baxter, a grouchy baby food giant, but had failed. Patsy wraps the doll up and uses it to get a seat on the subway as she'd seen a man give up his seat on the subway to a lady with a baby only that morning. On the way home, she explains to her neighbor that she named her "baby" Cyrus Baxter Douglas, after the baby food giant. Mr. Baxter, through his own series of mishaps, happens to be on the subway and over hears the conversation. Touched, he sets out to improve her station in life and give his advertising contract to Patsy's marketing company. But baby Cyrus is, after all, a doll. What ensues is a comic series of events that attempts to keep Mr. Baxter in the dark until the all important advertising contract is signed.

Besides being terribly funny, there are tons of hats in this film, particularly in the subway scenes. It's not in color, but that means you get to use your imagination.

The wardrobe has some jewels too. Patsy has lovely work wear and even gets to wear a nice evening dress, which I picture to be pink. I wasn't able to find a picture of it though.

Check out these darling promotion posters. See the second one from the bottom on the left? There's a peak of the elusive pink dress.

Anyways, I adored this film. It's full of great clean humor. Usually, I'm the only one in the room laugh at vintage humor, but this film had the whole room roaring through out. This is one I really have to track down somewhere.

Pants!

Yay! I finished the Wearing History Smooth Sailing pants! I did most of the fixes on Saturday and finished up the hem and add the hook and eye. And I wore them today. So, here they are:

Shirt: Ann Taylor Loft
Pants: Wearing History Smooth Sailing made by me!
Shoes: bought them at Macy's
Hair flower: Belle Blossoms

I was pleasantly surprised how good they made my butt look.

I'm also putting this as my first Hepburn Hepburn Project project. I feel like these are very Katherine.

I haven't made the belt, as I don't have a belt buckle yet, but I plan on it.

So I bought some shoes....

....but not the $300 pair! I got a $50 gift card to Macy's for Christmas, but with the Wardrobe Refashion, clothes were out. Shoes were a go though! I found these adorable ones on sale, too. And I still have some money left on my card!

Spring Sewing Ideas

I've been trying to organize my plans for spring sewing projects as a trip to the fabric store is in my near future and I need to think through the Spring Palette Challenge some more. So here are my options. Comments are, of course, appreciated.

1. 1940s Swing Dress

This is a no brainer as I'm doing the sew along.

2. Sew Serendipity Skirts

I got the book Sew Serendipity for Christmas and I've been dying to make something from it, but it is definitely a Spring/Summer sewing book!

Option a)

I bought some fabric for this skirt already. I just have to hunt down some contrast and ruffle material. This is going to be a Spring Palette Challenge item.

Option b)

I love love love the skirt on the front of the book! I will make it eventually.

PS Just found Kay Whitt's blog!

3. Shirtwaist dress a la The Notebook

I want to make this dress:


by adapting this pattern:

Pros: Just need to add cuffs and do a different collar.
Cons: Not in the color palette of my Spring Palette Challenge.

4. Simplicity Blouse 2501 View C

I want to add more separates to my wardrobe and I'm particularly smitten with view c (although view b is nice too).

5. Simplicity Blouse 4978

I like views D, E and F for spring.

6. Wrap dress with bow

I like the dress in the bottom right corner, view a. Love the little bow detail.

7. Sew Serendipity Coat

Option a)

Love the idea of a fun spring trench! I've never made a coat before though...

Option b)

This one would work great for a less busy print.

8. Bags!

Remember when I made this?

Well, I'm planning on making this vintage style bag and an evening vintage style bag to sell on etsy. But first I have to make some! Any thoughts on prints or fabrics you think would be nice?

Hmmmm.... That's an awfully long list..... Maybe I'm a bit crazy.... Plus I still have to take in my Wearing History pants (on my to do list for this weekend!)... and do the faux button dress (which is on hold until I get tracing paper, as it is an uncut vintage pattern and I'm sure someone would kill me if it became un-uncut. Not to mention I'm sure I'll have to add more to the hip area.).

So, yeah, any help in the prioritizing are would be most appreciated! I get terrible decision anxiety over such things.