Mini vacation, I thought Memorial Day would never get here!
So I've decided to use my round suitcase for my weekend travels and here you can see me packing for the weekend in my cute little suitcase. I really like the peach lining inside.
The hat isn't for me. It's from my collection but it will be on display in the Strathmere library along with some of Rita Schiavo's other items. It was the wish of Rita to have her estate fund a private library in Strathmere. It is due to open on June 6th. I also provided photos from my Strathmere website that are being framed to hang on display in the library. Very cool.
Anyway, enjoying my extended weekend. My neck and back hurt though from checking the email on my laptop. I have to put it in the bathroom window to pick up a signal, and I have to kind of hunch over to look at it. Serves me right, on vacation you shouldn't be doing work (or 'borrow' other people's internet signal)


I had my little lady Harlow here with me Friday & Saturday night. I don't think she gets the concept of vacation, or how enjoyable a walk is. She did start to enjoy the walks after we ran into people to make a fuss over her and doggies to bark at. She barely drank or ate while she was here though. She enjoyed sleeping on the little couch though. My dad said Boris at home was moping around, missing Harlow and he wasn't eating or drinking either. Daddy came to take her home Sunday morning and she and Boris reunited with kissing and sniffing, and went back the their normal eating and drinking.
Someone here in town just got a bulldog pup, who I wanted to try to squeeze into my bag and take home!

Snoozing in Strathmere -

Packing to go to the Shore for Memorial Day Weekend-Plus!
Finally, it's here! 'It's been a long cold lonely Winter'

This weekend I'll be taking Harlow with me. My aunt will also be down with some friends and Moose, Sid and Aspen will be down for Harlow to play with.
I'm leaving this afternoon and I'll be back Tuesday night.

Check it out - History of Women's Golf Attire ~ by FuzzieLizzie

Fellow vintage clothing seller Fuzzy Lizzie was asked by Women's Golf Apparel to write an article on the history of women's golf wear.
She gave them a very informative article and found some great vintage photos of ladies golfing apparel to include in her article for their website -
Women’s golf fashion: a peek into the past - I think you should check it out.

Then check out her own website for more photos and info - History of Women's Golf Attire ~ A Photo Essay - which traces the history of women's golf clothing, and shows how chic and stylish the pieces were.

You'll even see a photo of a golf themed blouse of mine that I was very happy Lizzie decided to include in her essay -

Cute for Baby - Retro Print Baby Bibs

I've been invited to a baby shower in June. It's for the daughter of a lady that I am friends with. I've only met her daughter once or twice and I won't be going to the shower (you know that I'm a hermit, plus it's in Phila.) but I want to send along a present, because it's my friend's first grandchild.
So I've been seeking out some handmade baby items on etsy. This morning I came across Colby Lane Designs . They make baby bibs with chenille backing, in over 200 designs.
They have a bunch of great retro prints that are really cool, plus some unusual geekery prints, dots, stripes, animals, food etc.
An example of a few designs I'm showing here are Hula girls, sock monkeys, paper dolls, comic strip, faces, vintage Valentines and retro kids on a rollercoaster.
Really cute, only $8.00 each, low shipping cost ($2.75 for 3 bibs)
If you need some cool bibs for your baby, or for a gift, go check out Colby Lane Designs .



Also, the daughter is using the Christening dress that my friend made from her wedding gown. She made it for her children's Christenings, now her first grandchild will wear it too. I made a few repairs on the gown for her so that she could get it cleaned. I was glad to be able to help her with such a special item.

Happy Mother's Day - Hydrangeas and Victorian Boots

Happy Mother's Day. I bought my Mom a huge hydrangea plant (which, to be honest, will end up in my garden, but she will be enjoying them inside for awhile) and a pair of Brocade Victorian Boots that I just picked up this week. I've never seen a pair like this in person.
Both pieces are setting on the little table in the livingroom just like this. The boots are just about doggie level and Harlow keeps sniffing at them and putting her paw up on the table. No! Bad Dog! Those are not shoes that you can chew on.







Gratuitous sleepy puppy photo -

Project Fashion Runway Show

'The Fashion Show' premiered last night.
In case you haven't heard, the creators of Project Runway are moving the show from Bravo to the Lifetime network. So Bravo came up with 'The Fashion Show' to replace PR.
It's basically the same, hosted by Isaac Mizrahi and Kelly Rowland. Challenges are slightly different and the runway show has a large crowd watching.
First there is a mini challenge, which this week was to create a little black dress out of a t-shirt in an hour. The 3 top designers became team leaders in the main challenge. Each team had to choose a 'Must Have Item'. What I liked about this challenge was that instead of each team creating one look for the runway, each member on the team created their own look around the Must Have Item. I liked this because you could see the individuality of each designer and how they worked around the common item.
The items from the 3 teams were a tube skirt, a bolero and grey satin harem pants. What? aren't tube skirts and harem pants 'Must Have' items in your wardrobe?
The runway show was in front of the judges and a crowd of 'Fashion Experts'. During the elimintation, the bottom two were told all the snippy things that the 'Fashion Experts' said about their 'terrible' creations. It was pretty harsh. Instead of Heidi's - 'You're Out' the booting phrase is 'We're not buying your design'
The winning design above was by James-Paul from the bolero team. It was my favorite too. Bravo's online photos suck as usual and I think this dress is hard to capture in a photo anyway. The draping was really good. I could have done without the boots.

OK, so Merlin is the big drama queen designer in this show. He claims 'The world is ruled by bitches' and wears odd clothing. Isaac Mizrahi was surprisingly subdued in the episode. Even he was surprised by some of the things that Merlin said. Isaac and Kelly seemed to get along really well. They talked smack about the designs in the hallway after checking them out in the workroom, the way Tim usually does.
No Mood fabrics! I love when the designers go to Mood to buy their fabrics. But in this series, they just walk down the hall to a room full of fabrics. I guess that means they have no budget for their creations?
Of course I miss Tim very much. He is such a great part of PR. I even missed Nina and Michael as judges. Didn't miss Heidi one bit though!
I'll be watching again next week. I won't be posting about it every week though. I just wanted people who maybe didn't know what was going on to know about the show. I haven't seen much promotions for it myself.
The real Project Runway will air on Lifetime in July.

'After the flood, all the colors came out'

So. 2 Saturdays ago, I went to Strathmere, planning on spending an hour or two in the cottage. The water had been turned on earlier in the week, so I wanted to pick up the mothballs, open the windows, clean out the fridge and turn it on. The cottage is Winterized for cold weather so basically I wanted to 'unWinterize' it. My plans for a happy time daydreaming about the awesome Summer to come were cut short though, when I discovered the water pipe running thru the livingroom had a tiny little leak. A leak that soaked the livingroom carpet and the bathroom carpet so much that the carpet squished water when you stepped on it.

The next 4 hours were spent trying to save the carpet. The bathroom carpet is small and I wanted to get it out of there anyway, so I just pulled that out and trashed it.
My aunt was down planting flowers around the house, so she helped me move all the livingroom furniture into the kitchen. The bed blocked the doorway, so her doggie Moose had to crawl under the bed from the other side to get to us in the livingroom! I soon discovered that the old carpet was still under the current carpet, and it was soaking wet too. The lining under it was mostly powder now, and under it was 60 year old linoleum, which was also soaking wet. Pulling that all back, we saw that the wood floor was wet too. Major panic. So we pulled out the old carpet and the linoleum. I borrowed a wet-vac and soaked up alot of the water from the carpet. Then we draped the current carpet over the kitchen chairs so that the wood floors and the underside of the carpet could dry. It was hard, miserable work. Opened the windows and turned on the window and ceiling fans.

I came back the next day to close the windows and turn off the fans, and then I didn't go back again until today. I was kinda afraid to. But thankfully I found the rug all dry and no musty smells (I had dumped a box of baking soda and carpet fresh all over the rug and sprayed it down with a ton of Lysol, which apparently worked)
This is what the livingroom looked like today with the carpet draped over the chairs -



I wanted to rearrange the furniture anyway, so now I can start with an empty room! I put the rug back in place and plan on going back Saturday to play with the furniture.

Before I went into the cottage today, I was greeted by these very bright and pretty flowers in the windowbox (my aunt had planted them on that terrible Saturday) They were a happy sign that the carpet was going to be alright, and that the awesome Summer is still on it's way.