Upcoming Events

At last online again after an unfortunate hiatus - I was ill and had to give up all of my extra-curriculars and get myself well.

The latest projects have been - a black and silver jacket (lined in apple green satin!) for daughter Bridgie, 'elvish' curtains (with a Morris type leaf print) for son Gawain, and part of a superhero costume, also for Gawain (a red fringed stretch velvet rebozo with a tear-drop motif). I did make a fabulous patchwork version of the Bolivian Milkmaid's jacket from Folkwear in blues greens and purples - with a pieced kaleidoscope on the back and beading on the front. I am in the middle of making a 'Marie Aen' bunad for myself - the dress is done, I just need to do the embroidery. My Vikings are from Skuterud, a tiny farming hamlet northeast of Oslo, and this is one of the Hedmark bunads from that region, bottle green wool with bright green trim and cream coloured piping. The embroidery is in corals and green. I'm not vain at all...

Upcoming I have a green and gold long jacket for Bridgie (lined in teracotta), and a charcoal grey 1930s tulip skirt for myself, from leftovers of a skirt Bridgie made for herself. I was very impressed at her first sewing attempt, zip and all. It was a simple pencil skirt, but with a cute seaming in front, well done.

I have a new pattern for a panel skirt (read' hippie skirt') that I can put up on my Etsy shop, along with early Gunne Sax style dresses, for women, girls and dolls (yes I bought an old Holly Hobbie pattern to do the dolls.) I also got a bunch of hippie casual clothes and baby patterns at a $1 sale, so that should keep me busy for ten minutes or so.

Because of a crop of babies at work and elsewhere it occurred to me that I should have a stash of little frocks and baby carriers, both to give as gifts and to sell on Etsy. I searched all over 'good' department stores for a white frilly dress for a wee baby, and found nothing outside of christening gowns. Every baby needs a little white dress. My daughter had several, but I'm saving those for grandchildren, whenever they happen to come around. As to the baby carriers, I have made up several patterns for slings, rebozo and maitai types, in assorted patterns for the funky to sophisticated parent.

For myself, I just missed out on having to make a girdle - I managed to find one on eBay from 1949. Now I don't creak, as I did with my 1910s corset, and can bend. And still have that lovely wiggle. I may make a 'ballet pink' cotton and lycra girdle some time for the heck of it, but it's no longer a necessity. Look out 'Mad Men'! (and I am a Jackie, not a Marilyn, for those keeping score.)

I do have a plan to make a wearable version of my mother's wedding suit, one of those early '60s waisted 'wiggle dresses' with a waist length jacket and three-quarter length sleeves. Very chic. My mother's ivory faille beauty fit me before I had babies, many hip sizes ago. It was amazing, with bound seams and organdy lining. No one in my family will be wearing this again! Bridgie is much too tall and it's not her style anyway. So the reproduction can be for a ladies' lunch or some other semi-formal daytime occasion. Do people still do semi-formal day wear? Does anyone know what this is?

So I have divided my wardrobe into work (chic, vintagey, and tailored) and play (folky, hippie, vintage, and kitsch) and am quote happy with the result. It does make a difference in how one is treated at work to dress up a bit more, unless you're a dispatcher or nurse, but it drove me spare to have plain things in the time I did only that. My soul was crying out for colour, pattern, texture, flowers, embroidery, beads. Now I have the best of both worlds. My play clothes work well when out at English country dancing or down on the suburban farm,  and I have a literal and clear demarcation of one part of my life from another, so long as that is necessary.