Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Excitement in Bedsheets

I'm 99% certain this dress began as a bed-sheet. It is a very light muslin with the sort of wear consistent with something that was laundered regularly. I like easy-care fabrics, so of course this dress was coming home with me. There's a metal zipper at the back, but it is hard to say if that dates the dress as older, or if the zipper was sitting around in a sewing box. Not that it matters, I love it just the same.

The material is quite sheer, and requires a full-length slip. The swing of the skirt could easily accommodate a crinoline, which I might try next time I wear it, As you can see, the waist is a bit large, but I decided against a belt given the construction of the bodice. Sometimes it is nice to have a bit of room in your clothes.
 Outfit Particulars:
Vintage home-sewn dress-Fairytale Costumes
Vintage 60's Air Step handbag-Hand-Me-Ups
Shoes-K Mart (these have memory foam in the insoles, and they are the most comfortable shoes I've owned in some time).
Vintage gloves-Hand-Me-Ups
50's hat-Hand-Me-Ups
Vintage ceramic bracelet and earrings set-Hand-Me-Ups
Necklace-Birthday gift from my parents at 13
Vintage Avon brooch-Hand-Me-Ups
Lippy-Revlon Love That Pink
Fragrance-Mademoiselle Guerlain

 Yeah, I know white shoes are kinda naff, but summer is so short, and these are so comfortable I don't care! If I look like Minnie Mouse, so be it. Time to slap some polish on the tootsies again, I see. Sigh, I wish I'd seen it before posting.
Would you look at that blue sky behind me? That's not retouched. It was a gloriously sunny day, without any clouds. Last evening we went to look at the meteor shower (no, I didn't show the Triffid movie beforehand) but between us we only spotted three as the sky was cloudy. Tonight should be better if the skies stay clear.

The Omaha public schools went back this week, and it is so quiet here you really could hear a pin drop. Danny has a bit of time before he's back as we run on a year-round schedule with most of August off. The Fair inches closer, our time at the pool is drawing short, and the tomato harvest has commenced. We've had fewer fruit this year, but what we've grown have been enormous. If they had a contest for the largest tomato at the fair, we might well win. I did a large cutting of the various herbs for drying today, and they're all hanging in the kitchen which gives me a great sense of satisfaction seeing all those bunches of my hard work. The winner by far was Sage of Bath (which we've affectionately nicknamed, "Mim"* ) which has provided us, and everyone we know with more sage than we ever imagined possible from one small plant. If you're looking for a
heat-tolerant, easy-to-grow variety of sage, this is the one. What to do with it beyond roasting corn is another story.


I'll leave you with a photo of a fungus we found growing in the mulch yesterday. Maybe it will grow stronger from the meteor shower and try to kill us. Do you hear tapping? Anyone?
I hope mid-week is treating you well.

*Which I hope she accepts as a compliment, because it was intended as such.

9 comments:

Connie said...

Oh that really is a pretty dress. What is it with vintage sheet dresses? I see so many of them on blogs and they are so pretty. Every vintage sheet I've ever encountered was so um uh "used" that I would never want to wear it let alone sleep on it.

Sue said...

Sheets make the best frocks, it has been called Sheet Couture before you know and you may well have a piece of your own. That blue sky is such a welcome sight, ours has been blue but a paler colour, lets call it Winter Blue.

Propagatrix said...

I never wear pink, but I would sell my cats for a pink version of that dress. I would wear it for church every Sunday until it fell apart.

Bibi said...

That dress kind of reminds me of the Depression era dresses that were carefully pieced together out of flour sacks. Very summery & pretty.
I can't believe KMart makes comfortable shoes that look like that!
Perhaps you could make a smudge stick out of excess sage & exorcise your house?
I have mint, lemongrass, & papayas if you'd like to trade?

Mim said...

Hehehe, I don't mind being immortalised in plant form. I went through a brief period of being called 'grass' at school, after the marram grass planted on sand dunes to prevent erosion. Sage definitely beats marram grass.

That is a jolly nice bag, I like all the colours in the embroidery.

Schools go back early where you are, they don't go back here till September. Maybe yours break up earlier; the summer break is six weeks here.

Goody said...

@Connie
Ewww. Yeah, stay away from waterbed sheets-they tend to see a bit more action ;)

@Sue
So long as you don't have "Winter blues".

@Propagatrix
I'm trying to picture it with a mantilla. You know, that could work.

@Bibi
We had a downstairs neighbour in Boston that liked to burn sage for her Wicca stuff It made the entire house smell like cat pee. I don't think it kept the evil at bay either, we still got broken into.

@Mim
I guess that's better than calling someone "Grass" after a police informant.
The kids are out early in June unless they lost days to snowstorms and have to make them up. Some years are worse than others. Two and a half-ish months is too much for most children, and they spend the first part of the year reviewing all they forgot. It is a terrible system. There are short breaks at Christmas and Easter (a week each) but that's about it. With homeschooling, we need to meet a certain number of hours per year, and it is up to us how we arrange it. We're over by a considerable amount each year, but it does give us flexibility building the extra hours into the calendar. I try to give Danny breaks around the same time as other children so that he isn't out of sync with them, but the summer is far too long to go without classwork.

Propagatrix said...

I'd probably stick with a hat, but one of my small round white doily-type mantillas would be nice. (Traditionally, married women wear black mantillas and young girls or single ladies wear white, but I tend to wear white/pastel mantillas in spring and summer and black when it's cooler. Yes, I have more than five mantillas.)

KB said...

The whole look is gorgeous.

Goody said...

@KB
Thank you.