• 1940s Floral Evening Gown •

This is probably one of my favorite posts of the whole year!  This gown was another one of my projects for Remembering WWII, and I absolutely love it.  But then, I love evening gowns, so........ :)

I purchased this pattern from Lady Marlowe Patterns on Etsy last year, with the intent of turning it into a fabulous little rayon day dress, and eventually an evening gown.  It took a while to come to fruition (as always), but I finally did make the evening gown, and it really worked out well!  The pattern is for a day length dress, obviously, but with just flaring and lengthening the skirt (by about 12.7 feet, you know....), it turned into a very fun evening length dress.

Oh, and you really can't see them, but I promise I am wearing my Royal Vintage Marilyn pumps with this dress.  ;)  I can't wait to add to my RVS collection, they are all by far my favorite shoes ever!

The dress features an asymmetrical design with a right shoulder yoke and gathers, echoed by a "midriff panel" on the left bodice that also extends into the skirt.  I did not make a mockup of this pattern at all (hello, time squeeze), so I was super leery of how it would turn out, but it really did work well!  I just love the sleeves on here as well; the ruching adds such a fun detail!

I had been saving this rhinestone belt buckle for years, and it finally found its perfect home.  :)

I also discovered that belting works so well for rayon fabric-covered belts!  I have made a rayon belt just using my interfacing method (see post here) in the past, but being it was made of rayon, it ended up stretching/wrinkling a bit.  I am definitely a fan of belting, especially if you can find the webbed sort as opposed to the commonly available solid, very stiff variety. 

Not only did my "V" brooch match the belt buckle, but it seemed quite appropriate for the USO show at RWWII.  :)  That whole event was SUCH a blast, and it was just an amazing experience to be able to have a small part in it.  I met so many amazing veterans, I wish I could spend so much more time with them!

Among other highlights, I was able to catch a ride in this tank as the belly gunner after one of the battles, and that may or may not be one of the highlights of my entire life from now on.  ;D

As for the location for these pictures, my mom and I were headed to opening night at our local philharmonic when we passed this glorious line of trees on both sides of the street.  We pulled in, parked, and took pictures on what ended up being the sidewalk in a local park!  It made a gorgeous backdrop, and I was thrilled that the one-way street it was on was facing the same direction I was, so I did not have to see any gawkers.  ;)  I really, really feel uncomfortable when there are an abundance of people looking on when we are taking pictures, but it is often unavoidable unless we are in our own backyard!  The leaves are gone off of these pretty little trees now, but it was a perfect location at the time.  And we made it back to the car right as some horrendous winds and rain started!  Score!  :)

Thanks for visiting, and for all your sweet comments of late on all my blog posts!  Contrary to what one might think, I have not had time to blog (or sew, or......anything) for the past month; I had one free day last month in which I penned them all and scheduled them to automatically post.  It has, in fact, been one of the most incredibly hectic and emotional months in a long time; the week that we got back from Remembering WWII, our church had revival meetings each night, so that meant racing straight from work to church every night.  A day and a half later we received news that my grandma had passed away, so we immediately headed to Minnesota for a week to spend time with my dear grandpa and of course to be there for the funeral.  As we pulled back into town from that trip, we got a call letting us know that my sister had passed away that very afternoon, very unexpectedly and very suddenly.  She was not in good health, but the reason for her passing was not stemming from her health problems, so it was a huge shock.  Needless to say, the next two weeks were very hectic and full of emotion with planning of her funeral and so forth.  So all in all, October has come and gone right before our eyes, in a very different way than we had planned it!  We were to have been at a couple of reenactments and an out-of-state antique meet having a grand old time, but the Lord had other plans.  He knew my grandma was going to pass when she did, and had me schedule time off of work for another event during that week, which was a huge blessing.

All that to say, thank you again for your sweet words!  :)  I'm hoping to get back to some sewing soon, along with a busy work schedule, trying to practice the piano more than I have been, reorganizing the sewing areas in our house, and just everyday life.  We'll see how it goes!

• 1940s in the Forest •

A couple of weeks ago my mom and I had the honor of attending Remembering WWII down in Linden, TN.  It was an absolutely amazing event that I will never, ever forget.  This was the second time we have attended, but the first time that we were actually able to participate.  What an amazing time!  I hope to have some more pictures to share with you of that soon, but for now, here is one of my outfits that I made for the Sunday after RWWII.

We rented a house out in the boondocks, and nearly became permanent residents there due to the a nearly impassable road that led to the house.  A lot of prayers, a lot of mud and a slightly scraped up undercarriage later, we made it!  Aside from the interesting surroundings, it was a nice house, and the land around it was gorgeous.  It was situated right on a river, so there was a nice little stairway leading down to the riverside that made for a nice backdrop.

A few months back, we found a cute little '40s dress pattern on Ebay for just a few dollars, and it has turned out to be one of our top favorite patterns ever.  It's a fairly simple style, but with those quintessential 1940s details that make it *so* fun.

As an aside, I'm pretty sure I'm putting ties in every single dress I make from now on.  I love the freedom from wearing a belt, while still getting the nice fit!  :)

The dress features a slit-and-gather detail on the front bodice, making it almost appear like it has a yoke.  The collar and facing is cut in one, and the skirt features about 8 or so slim, flared panels that give it a very swingy effect in the front.

The back skirt is a simple 3-panel style.  I used some vintage '40s yardage that we had in the stash ($9 or so at an antique shop - for a little over 4 yards!!), and squeezed the dress out of that.  It would not have been a "squeeze" if it were not for the fact that I am 6' tall - that does make a difference when cutting out skirts!  In any case, the dress fit in that amount of fabric perfectly, and I got a nice little hem as well, finished with my favorite vintage Hug Snug.

I paired the dress with my favorite shoes of all time - Royal Vintage Ritas (if some benevolent stranger ever wants to buy me something, just get me about 7 more pairs of these so that I will have them 'til my dying day.)  Hahaha!!!  They are seriously that good though, I wear them while standing on my feet all day long at work, and my feet aren't even tired at the end of the day.  Love them!!

I'd been hoarding these cute little green buttons for years, and they finally found their perfect home.  They were a little grungy looking at first, but after a quick wash, they looked like new again!

Hope you enjoyed this post!  Thanks for reading!

• Vintage Shoe Dreams •

Hello ladies!  I just wanted to write a post in case any of you did not yet see the new shoes that the fabulous Lauren and Abby of Royal Vintage Shoes have just introduced!  The new styles are just amazing, I'm pretty sure I want all of them, haha!  

One of my top favorites of the new collection are the Ginger 1930s shoes - they are seriously adorable and really do scream Ginger Rogers!  They are available in blue or red colorways.

The Rita sandals are the bomb, and are the one style that I already know I'm buying.  Versatile, wearable, and they even feature a street sole for everyday wear!  I can't wait to get them!  These are also available in black.

Okay. Cute shoe alert.  These Hepburn oxfords are pretty much the cutest, most quintessential 1930s shoe ever.  The tassels are removable in order to give the shoe two completely different looks!

Styled after golfing shoes from the '30s, these are a fabulous shoe that would look great with any outfit, from casual to dressy.

The green colorway is just as amazing!! 

And last, but not least, are the fabulous Gatsby T-straps.  These are so perfect for 1920s and even 1930s outfits, they would make a great closet staple.  These lovelies are also available in red and white.

Have fun shopping, ladies!  I can't wait to get my shoes - Royal Vintage shoes are always wonderfully comfortable and amazing quality.

*This post contains affiliate links*

• Fall in the Wintertime •

Back in mid-September or so, when fall was beginning to make its appearance, I happily started getting my fall/winter garments out.  One of the ones I was most excited about wearing was my fall dress, made two years ago.  I ironed it up with glee and hung it up to wear for the next day, only to try it on then and remember just how much I didn't like it.  There was something about the fit/style that just never agreed with me; the fact that I made the sleeves far too big probably didn't help that at all, but in any case, I just didn't like my dress anymore.  I thought of making it into a skirt, but never got around to doing so until I saw Lily's post in which she did just that with her fall dress!  :)  Hers was so gorgeous that it inspired me to finally remake my version!

One of the things that also inspired me to get it done was my gorgeous '50s sweater from Paper Luna Vintage.  I never get tired of wearing it!

Last year I made this long-sleeved cream blouse out of some rayon-blend fabric.  The sleeve pattern I used was dreadfully tight in the forearm though, so I could hardly wear the blouse as it was.  I finally snipped off the sleeves and hemmed them up into short ones at the same time as I made the skirt so I could finally wear it.  I actually like the silhouette better with short sleeves!  It has quickly become a staple in my wardrobe what with the versatile color and style.

Naturally I had to pair it with my ever-versatile Victoria Carriage boots.  :)  I just love those things!!

Since I hadn't liked the gathered skirt on my fall dress, and also have a deep love for pleated '50s skirts, I decided to do just that; pleat it.  What was fun was having the pleats come out the perfect size on the very first try.  :D  That is always fun!!!

I used a big cream-colored vintage button from my stash for the waistband. 

I'm beginning to wonder if I'll ever wear another hat again other than this wondrous gray beret.  It has become somewhat of a landmark atop my head these days.  ;)

I love brooches, but never remember to wear them!  I was so excited to wear this pretty one from Emily with this outfit, and I just love how it looks!  :)  Thanks, Emily!!

I really like the skirt from Simplicity 1459; it had been so long since I used it that I was remembering it being fairly straight-cut, but it is in fact quite flared!  It gives a really nice shape, and offers marvelous twirliness, which is downright vital.  ;)

Thanks for stopping by!!

1950s • Winter Woolens

First off, thank you all so very much for your overwhelmingly kind comments from last week's post.  You don't know how much that meant to my mom and I!!  You all are the best, and I'll never forget your kindness.  <3

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Last year I had a total of 2 winter-friendly garments, those being a wool dress and a flannel skirt.  This year, although I'm not exactly rolling in woolen garments, there has been a great increase in them, which makes me soooo happy!  I have been planning a fall/winter wardrobe for ages, but in the past, whenever the time came to actually sew it up, I either got busy, catastrophe struck, or I just felt like making fruit-covered sundresses.  ;)

I found this grey fabric at JoAnn a couple of months ago in their Famous Maker line.  I ended up getting it for something like $3 per yard because of the coupons we had, and it is not only 100% wool, but also made in Japan and 60" wide!!  Can't beat that!!

I used Simplicity 8250 for the skirt, but simply cut the front on the fold and omitted that extra seaming/foldover/topstitching business.  Somehow it seemed like that would have been terribly bulky in a heavier-weight fabric like this.  I also omitted the gigantic circuitous pockets....and skipped that wacky waistband.  So I guess you could say I based it off of S8250.  ;)

This sweater is so much fun.  I purchased it from Paper Luna Vintage at the same time as my mustard sweater, but this one had numerous moth chews on it, so I got it for an extra-good deal.  I set it aside when it arrived, though, because I really had no idea how to mend the holes.  I finally buckled down and decided to tackle it one day (the same day as I remade my fall skirt and cream blouse, incidentally; that was one awfully productive day in the mending realm!), using some cream colored yarn I found in our stash, a small embroidery needle, and our needle felter.  First I weaved the yarn in and out, catching the loose stitches, and kind of weaving it closed, and then I took that mended spot, laid it on the needle-felting pad, and felted it a bit, just to kind of blend the stitches and secure it together.  It worked quite amazingly well, and the spots are not really even noticeable anymore!!

This spot on the arm was the worst one; it was literally a gaping hole with a good 1/2"-5/8" of knit missing.  I weaved it shut and felted it though, and it came out pret-ty good!  ;)

The beading details on this thing are downright incredible.  I just can't imagine having the patience to do all that!!  The brand is "Broadway, Suburbanite Sportswear," dating from the 1950s.  The fun part is, while working on it I found a paper tag sewn inside the lining with the original price of $2.98 on it.  Hahaha!  Hard to even imagine such a thing these days!!

In the last few posts featuring '50s skirts, I've been wearing both my regular Malco Modes petticoat and a tiered flannel petticoat, and I'm really enjoying the fullness it lends!  On top of that fact is how wonderfully warm it is, as compared to nothing but a nylon net petticoat.  Big difference!!  I'll have to do a post on it sometime soon just so you can see the design of it and all.

Thanks for stopping by!  :)

• Plaid in the Snow •

Ever since getting my marvelous boots, I've kind of been wanting to retake pictures with any and all outfits that they could possibly match.  Fortunately for you, that hasn't happened with all of them, but it did with this vintage '40s dress.  ;)  Back when I first blogged about it, we (of course) had no snow, so it made for about the lousiest Christmas dress pictures possible.  But this year we have snow, I have new boots, and therefore a new photo session was absolutely imperative.  ;)

This dress is such a pretty one, both because of the fabric and the design.  You can tell at a glance that it is vintage fabric, and it also has that "aged cotton," if I may call it that- feel to it.  There's nothing softer!  :)

My mom let me borrow her pretty black coat for these pictures, and I sort of stole her mittens for it too.  ;)   I still want to make a vintage coat, but have not happened upon any mountains of free wool coating with which to make one just yet.  And somehow it's way more fun to spend money on pretty dress fabrics........and boots.  ;)

This past summer I found this pretty velvet hat at an antique store; I can't even remember if it was local or out-of-town, but in any case, I really like the hat.  It didn't want to stay on in the frigid wind, but other than that it seems to do so quite well.  And since it is velvet, it matches my boots super-good!!  ;)

I've been on the hunt lately for some good cream-colored sweater tights; so far all the pairs I've tried have been dreadfully short and therefore totally unwearable.  They always say that they'll fit a 6' tall person, but when you try them on?  Hehe, let's just say that they don't.  At all.  So the hunt goes on.  In any case, these gray ones are my absolute favorite because, well, obviously, they're GRAY, and they also fit very well!  ;)

It's so much fun to be able to wear colored tights now that I have these boots; none of my other vintage shoes seemed to look decent when paired with them.

That pose doesn't look familiar or anything, now does it?  *cough*

My hands and pretty much my whole body was freezing while we took these pictures, but my feet sure weren't!  :)  Hurrah for warm boots!!

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• Pictures by my wonderful mom, as always.  <3 •

Thank you so much for stopping by!!

• It's All About the Boots •

It's time for the big, exciting, amazing, and long-awaited shoe post.  :D

In short, I have new boots.  And to say that I love them is a definite understatement.

Last month, Royal Vintage Shoes announced that the Victoria Carriage Boots were no longer going to be available on the RVS website, and therefore were on sale.  Well, I have been mourning the lack of any winter-appropriate footwear in my "shoe wardrobe" for a long time, and these were so utterly tempting, I couldn't resist.

The boots are made of velveteen on the outside, with genuine mouton (soooo soft) fur trim, grosgrain ribbon ties, and a quilted sateen lining.  In short, they are the fuzziest, wuzziest, most wonderful boots I've ever owned, or will ever own.  And on top of that, they are gorgeous and oh-so-vintage, instead of looking like bedroom slippers!  ;)

Since the soles are made of leather, I took them in to our (amazing) local cobbler and had him put some thin rubber soles on the bottoms for both durability and traction.  He did an excellent job, and they are now ready for anything winter throws my direction!  I also gave them 4(!) coats of waterproofing/stain-repellant spray, which has worked wonders so far.  All the crunching through snow that I did in this and two other consecutive photo shoots left them dry as a bone; the snow didn't stick to them, and any moisture just beaded off.  Amazing!!!!!!!  :D

The boots are still available on the American Duchess website HERE, but only until the remaining sizes sell out, then they'll be gone forever.

As for the outfit, this skirt is a recent make of mine.  My dear sis Sarah sent me a "just because" package back in January, consisting of a vintage pattern and two different wools, one of them being this plaid and the other a solid brown, which I also recently made into a skirt.  I love wool fabric, plaid, and the color gray, so this was a total winner.  It is so good that I waited practically a year to make it into *just* the right garment!  ;)

I've been making quite a few skirts lately, and am having a blast wearing them.  Before I started making my own clothing, my wardrobe consisted of about 97% skirts and blouses with only about 3% dresses.  Now that I do sew my own clothing, however, the situation has just about reversed for whatever reason!  I am really enjoying adding more skirts and blouses to the mix though; they are so comfortable and very easy to customize for a dressier or more casual look.

For this one, I used a vintage '50s pattern in our stash for a medium-fullness, flared skirt.  I definitely wanted that chevron effect at the front and back seams, and shockingly enough, none of our modern repro patterns seemed to have that!  The pattern I used had the centers front and back directly on the bias, with the side seams being on the straight grain.  It was the perfect pattern for the fabric, because it fit on to the 2 yard piece just right!  :) 

The blouse is a make from earlier this year; you can read about the construction of it here.  

Although I love plaid, I tend to avoid making garments out of it like the plague, because I have so little faith in my matching skills (and rightly so!).  This one was a real confidence-booster though!!  It's always so fun when something comes out just the way you want it to.

Have I mentioned it yet?  I love these boots.  --->SO MUCH<---

Another super-exciting aspect about them is, they not only work great with my everyday vintage wardrobe, but also will work (even more so, if that's possible) beautifully with my historical dresses as well, since the original design dated from the 1860s-1920s.  I can't wait to pair them with a big, fluffy dress.  ;)

This is a pretty good photo to end with; it pretty much sums up the way I feel about my new shoes, and this skirt.  ;D

A big thank you to Sarah (<3) for my gorgeous wool, and also to Lauren and the crew at AD and RVS for the stunning boots!!  I would highly, highly recommend them to anyone looking for wintry vintage footwear; comfortable, incredibly high quality, and downright gorgeous.

****ALSO****

My Etsy shop is having a Christmas sale right now!!  Save 20% off your purchase when you use the coupon code MERRYCHRISTMAS20, valid through Sunday, December 25th.  Stop by the shop and check it out!  :)