Healthy Living

Hello there!

It's completely gorgeous now. Today it was 80 degrees and sunny! I took some pictures by the creek near my house and I am so happy everything is turning green again!

Ok, so this post is going to be a little bit about health.

Recently my sister had started a new thing called Whole30. It's basically Paleo eating, only with more restrictions. No grains (not even corn or potatoes!), no dairy, no sweeteners (sugar, agave, stevia, honey) and essentially no processed foods. After my sister said she lost weight, felt better, and had more energy I was definitely interested!  Here is a great Paleo eating blog, NomNomPaleo.

After looking at it all day and considering it, I checked my blogs to see if any of my favorite Bloggers had posted anything new, and what do you know, Brittany of  Va-Voom Vintage had blogged about fitting into a snug dress. I took it as a sign. But the final push was reading Dita Von Teese's week long food journal. Just as soon as I finished reading it, I started planning meals for the Whole30.

I am only at the end of day 3, but let me tell you, this is different. I don't want to call it a diet because it's not. I am not counting calories, or worrying about points. I am eating real, delicious food and I don't feel deprived. I eat whenever I want and snack on veggies or fruit instead of chocolate or something with a ton of grains. I am drinking more water and tea. No soda pop and I really don't miss it (I wasn't a big soda drinker to begin with though). As far as weight loss, clearer skin, and an uptake in energy goes I don't know yet, but we will see at the end of 30 days. The call it a cleanse, and you are not supposed to weigh or measure yourself because it's not about losing weight, it's about being healthy. I highly suggest reading about it here.

A Modern(Ish) Maxi Dress

Why hello there! Want to see the dress I made? Here it is!

I am really excited because I actually made this dress entirely myself. I even drafted my own pattern!

I will tell you a little more about the process.

I decided yesterday that I wanted a maxi dress. The weather has been really warm and balmy...but not quite hot. Perfect maxi dress weather! Now, being freakishly tall (6'1"), I can never find maxi dresses that are long enough. Plus I wanted to make it myself because it would fit better.

So I consulted Pinterest, and while there were quite a few tutorials, they did not please me. Most of them were basically giant, shapeless sacks. Who the heck does that look good on? No one. Wait, I take the back, stick bugs could probably rock it. But any woman with a body fat percentage over 18% would not look great. So I knew that was no way to go. So I decided to draft my own pattern. I am no where near an experienced seamstress, but I just went for it. I actually didn't use a pattern for the skirt, I just took measurements. For the bodice I took a bunch of measurements, marked it on some interfacing and cut it out. I made it larger so I could add bust darts (which I didn't actually do until after I attached the skirt).

The skirt.

The skirt actually started out as a mistake. Me, forgetting that I wasn't a stick bug, forgot to make the skirt wider around my hips than it was around my waist. Hahah! It was terrible and I almost gave up, but I had enough scraps to make it better. Rather than just sew the panels back in, I was inspired to try something else. I sewed my two strips together and then pleated the top, basted them, and sewed it into the skirt. I really like how it turned out! Isn't it funny how mistakes work out and sometimes make things better?

I think the "bustle" adds a lot of interest to the dress where there would not have been. I certainly know that no other girl will be wearing my dress! I used a blue and white striped jersey fabric. It was also my first time using jersey. Even though I was yelling at my fabric every 5 seconds while I was making it, I actually didn't mind it too much, and after I was done I decided I didn't mind at all because the drape of jersey is so nice, yet it feels like pajamas.

It was really, really windy today and rained on and off.

Anyway, there you have it, a new dress!


Outfit

Dress ~ Made by me with a custom pattern
Shoes ~ Kohl's a few years ago
Butterfly Hair Piece ~ From my sisters Etsy shop, LoveYourQueen

Washer Woman

People must think I am a crazy person. "Look out world, here I come in a vintage house dress, ready to take you on!"

No, but really I went to the park in this to take pictures.

I was literally scurrying around the woods looking for good places to take photos because I didn't have anyone to take them for me. Plus, the lack of a tri-pod makes it even harder because I had to look for tree stumps and fallen logs the right height. I must have looked ridiculous. Good thing the only other people at the park were on the jungle gym and not taking nature walks crazy me.

The reason for this outfit is because I was getting things done! I had to do some laundry and I also thought I would tackle getting the stains out of the worst stained dress from the group of dresses I got yesterday.

I went about researching online for ways to get stains out of vintage clothing and saw that hydrogen peroxide might be a good place to start. I attempted that and it failed miserably. After scrubbing and scrubbing I just decided that maybe I should soak it. So I filled the tub with about 4" of water and left it in there for an hour. When I went back in to check on it, the water was dirty! I knew I was headed in the right direction, but when I picked up the beautiful pink dress, the stupid stains were all still there laughing at me. So I thought I would show them a thing or two.

I picked up a rag again and started at the stains with vigor, but to no avail. So after ten minutes or so I left it to soak again. Fast forward 2 more hours and the stains were still stuck on there like parasites. So I did what anyone else in my situation would do. I picked up the nearest cleaning thing and went at it. This just happened to be mild bar soap.And what do you know? It worked! Well, at least I think it did nearly all the stains came out. Now I just have to wait and see when it dries if I discolored those spots. I'm hoping I didn't.

This house dress is one of the ones from the estate sale. It's really great, but the print has a ton of color transfer and a few bad stains (which I will eventually work on).

 

 Cool tree from the park.

Outfit

Silk Scarf (worn in hair) ~ Antique Mall

House Dress ~ Estate Sale

Shoes ~ Keds

All In A Golden Afternoon

...You can learn a lot of things from the flowers

Oh now I want to watch Alice in Wonderland!...maybe later

Anyway, onto my post.

Today was a great day. The weather is finally starting to get nice!

I woke up really early this morning. Okay, 8 o'clock isn't that early for most people, but it is for me! The reason I woke up so early is because my brother woke me up and asked me to take him to work. After I got back home, I made cookies. Yes, that's right. I baked cookies at 8:30 in the morning.
 After that I got dressed for the day, and took some pictures.

 I originally had plans to go see an Indie music band with a friend, but they unexpectedly cancelled the night before, so all of a sudden I had a whole day free. I was pretty sure it was going to be spent talking to my sister, browsing the internet for pretty things, and drinking tea. Then I decided to check listings for estate/tag sales. Now usually, for me, estate sales hardly ever have clothes. Even though I hear or read about people finding fabulous outfits, I never have such luck.

However!

This one mentioned in the listing that it had vintage clothing. I was so excited I could hardly contain myself, so I grabbed some cash and headed out.

When I got there I was really worried because it was not a grand estate, but a small warehouse type building and I started thinking it was some sort of elaborate trap to ensnare girls who like vintage...but it was fine. Apparently the family didn't want a sale at the house or something, so the estate sale company took it to their home base.

The selection was actually good. There were a few of the typical clothing items. Hideous 80's pantsuits and all that rot. But they also had lots of good vintage, mostly from the 40's and 50's. I do think a few of the pieces were 30's but I was kind of in a hurry.

And you will NEVER GUESS my luck....Okay I will tell you. Basically all the clothes were MY SIZE!!!!! It's hard to find larger vintage sized clothing so I was thrilled. I ended up getting 6 dresses, and 1 blouse. I got a really good deal because nearly every item had some sort of damage. I see myself repairing and stain removing lots of clothing in the future!

But it was a good day!

 This is one of my favorite hats!

 My spoils

I will try to go from left to right starting at the top
1.) 50's/60's  Blue and Leopard wiggle dress 2.) 40's War Era swing dress with original belt and side button closure (the only thing that didn't fit me...it's going in the Etsy shop!) 3.)  50's Grey and red wooly dress with rhinestone buttons 4.) 40's/50's Pink acetate dress with buttons down the front and original belt (this dress, unfortunately has a lot of damage)  5.) 50's Brown and cream dress 6.) 50's Fabulous front-zip housecoat with full skirt.

And that thing at the top is the blouse!

After I got back and played dress up, I went for a run. And now I am showered and cozy and relaxing with a hot tea and a ginger cookie (or two!)


My outfit
Cardigan ~ Thrifted
Dress ~ Antique mall
Shoes ~ Kohl's a few years ago
Hat ~ Antique mall