Happy Monday Makings #16

Hey-hey! It's Monday! After a lovely weekend and Mother's Day spent with my parents… My Monday turned out not to be so happy. I really don't want to get into it now because when Dave came home he brought chocolate and we had a very nice evening. I made Nachos, we watched Grimm(quite an interesting series) and now I'm here, writing to you guys. I do feel better although, after having struggled with a very evil old lady neighbour and watching a lot of Grimm episodes… I have come to the conclusion that we might be dealing with a Hexen Beast, a witch. There is just no end to her meanness and she is harassing a lot of the other tenants in our complex as well. What a sad case, that someone would spend all of their time and energy to make other people's lives miserable. Like I said, I don't want to get into it and upset myself all over again. Let me rather show you what I did…  

Friends of ours' daughter through out some of her old clothes but before it goes to charity, she thought my mom and I might find some items useful. After all, I love reusing, remaking, and creating new things from old cast aways, so to speak. I try not to buy new, if there is anything I need I always try the secondhand and charity shops. This way you also end up giving back to your society. If we have anything we can't use anymore, it goes to the charity shops, completing a never-ending circle.  

I found a few items that will be very useful and this little yellow number is one of them.

-a very cute little tank, but with an out-dated hem line- 

-showing the lacy detail and the elasticated hem above- 

A Quick DIY

- I started by removing the hem.

-Then, measuring from the cut edge to where you want the top to sit(above or below the bellybutton), cut straight, even strands.

-Take the strands in two's and knotting them together.

-Again, tie the strands together two by two and that's that!

-Now I have a very lovely boho fringe tank. I know our Winter is upon us but I think I'll wear this tomorrow.

I hope you guys had a better day than I did.

xxx

Project a Day: #19 Sunburst Granny Cardi

It's mid-week AGAIN! I'm counting not only days but hours till we leave for Pretoria! This Project took me about a year and a bit to finish. Half of that time it was sitting in a bag waiting to get done. It seems to have become a thing for me, I go into a project with all my might and energy and then it's like I'm no longer intrigued by it and find something better more interesting to do. Then, for some reason the project sticks it's head out and says: "I'm ready to be finished now" and then I finish it. During the time I started on this project, I couldn't find any reference or patterns for what I wanted to do. So, I made up my own pattern and it's a real show-stopper!

 -I'm so happy with how it turned out! It's warn and lovely and an instant "pick-me-up". The Colours are so bright eyed and bushy tailed... -

-in the above picture, you can see the awesome maroon yarn that I found at a local charity shop! It' Acrylic but oh so soft... The rest of the yarn are from my very first crochet blanket which I decided to frog. I know, crazy right? I couldn't really use the blanket because (being my very first) it was crocheted so tightly that it was a stiff block of a blanket. My tension is so much better now, having about 10 years of crocheting experience. Wow, that's a lot, never thought about it like that... Anyway, I know I should probably block this project but I kinda like the texture it's creating. Also, I'm still deciding whether or not to add edging and buttons. What do you think?

xxx

30 Skirts in 30 Days: Mini Denim

Today was a crazy windy, stormy, freezing day! This morning we had such gusty winds that I decided to wear my jean and then late this afternoon the sun came back out. So I did a wardrobe change just for you guys... hehehe. 

-this little mini denim is so awesome! It's versatile and comfy! Ah, how do you like my hand knit mohair sweater? I found this beauty at one of our local charity shops last summer and I couldn't wait to wear it when winter started. It's so warm and fuzzy and the colour is perfect-

-Enjoy whats left of your Sunday-

xxx

30 Skirst in 30 Days: Lovely Lilies

Ah....Tuesday is gone. We had a lovely bit of rain this morning. I must say, it's taking quite a while for me to feel myself again. I feel a bit lost... 

Thank you for following my blog and all my endeavours. It makes such a difference just knowing that I have friends out there that care and maybe I'm not the only one feeling under the weather.

To share with you todays skirt, I found this lovely pencil skirt at one of our local charity shops. The brand is Zara and it has illustrated St. Joseph Lilies printed on it.

 -I think I might just add a slit or two on this skirt, it's really difficult to walk in it. I love the illustration on it and the colours are soothing to me-

-be nice to strangers-

-everyone is fighting a hard battle-

~me& Plato~

xxx

30 Skirts in 30 Days: #2 - 1970's Flair

Happy Monday, friends! It was such a beautiful day today. The sun was shining, the birds were chirping and the gardens are filled with the most beautiful flowers. It was still quite freezing though. I've been so busy lately, doing a lot more freelance work for the company Dave works for and Dave is using the camera at work more often. So please bare with me during this time. I will still complete the 30 Projects as I continue with my 30 Skirts in 30 Days challenge.

I don't know if you can remember, last year, I did an Outfit Love post where I was showing off a re-fashioned vintage skirt I had found at one of our local charity shops, here. Well, today I wore that same skirt as a dress. Along with my Vintage Grandpa cardi, my vintage leather belt (all sourced from local charity shops) and my cute new Cotton On pumps.

 -I just love these 1970's colours! The Designers back then really seemed to have fun, with bold colour combinations and striking floral patterns... I have always wished I lived in a different era and the 70's has always been one of my favourite fashion era's. Speaking of different era's, have any of you  watched Midnight in Paris? It's about wanting to live in a different era and then magically doing just that. The movie was quite cute and very light to watch but it lacked visual creativity. I've never seen a movie, set in Paris, that was as bland and dull as this one. But, I liked the story and I like Owen Wilson so I hate to admit that I've already watched it three times-

-a close-up for you, so you can see the vintage prettiness! If you look closely, you can see that this pattern was hand drawn. I love the colours, they're so inspiring. They make me feel quite Groovy, Baby Yeah! Hahahaha-

What era do you like best, please share:)

xxx

A lucky find and a challenge

Oh my goodness! I do so apologize for my complete absence. My grandparents were visiting from Pretoria and I ended up playing chaperone. So for the full week I didn't even get to switch on my Mac. My parents just took my grandparents to the train station in Cape Town, where they'll be taking the train back to Pretoria. It was lovely having them here, we had them for the long weekend. I took my gran for a walk in our lovely area, unfortunately my grandad got the flue during his stay so he couldn't walk with us. Also it was my mom's 50th last week, so we had quite a crazy past ten days. 

Now I'm back! I would like to share this find with you. I was in town on business and a few minutes to burn. Off course I quickly ran into one of my favourite charity shops to have a look at what's new and there I found this bag with a massive crochet granny square blanket in it. As I was pressed for time, I didn't open it up or inspect it in any way. When I got home and opened it up to put it in the wash, this is what I found.

 

 -The blanket was riddled with holes. It was a bit of a bummer but it had only cost me R15(+/- $1,50) so I saw this as a challenge-

-I started Frogging (unraveling) the blanket with the intent of fixing it up. As I continued, I found that there were way more smaller holes and that simply fixing it wasn't an option. I then decided to Frog everything with holes, use the wool for something else and the blocks without holes I'll used for quick projects. I've still got quite a bit of frogging to do-

Have a lovely Wednesday

xxx

30 Days of Dresses: Dress #29

Oooooweeee! I'm almost done! Tomorrow is the last day of my dress challenge, save for the Grand Finale. I can't wait to be finished with this challenge! It's quite tiring to do an outfit post every single day, wow! How do you Fashion Bloggers do it? Anyway... Dress #29 is another Vintage number I snatched up from one of our local charity shops. It still needs to be sized but for the winter it's fine like it is, as I'll be wearing it with a coat or something over it. I was a bit skeptic about whether or not this dress wold suit me but now I quite like it.

 -everything about this outfit reminds me of my cousin Zandienne back in Pretoria. Purple is her colour! And as I'm wearing the owl pendant Zandienne and her family gave me for Christmas, it's no wander I'm missing them like crazy-

-Ah, my vintage leather belt, I found this at the SPCA shop in Pretoria. I've had it for about 5 years now, it goes with anything and stays updated-

Hope you had a lovely Wednesday!

xxx

30 Days of Dresses: Dress #28

Hi friends, can you believe it's midweek already? Well, today will be another double-header as I couldn't post on Saturday. This dress is an amazing find. Vintage and in it's original state and perfect for colder weather with it's thick fabric and long sleeves. I just can't get myself to wear it out. Maybe it's just a little too 1970's, I don't know what it is but I just don't feel comfortable wearing it in public. I thought to add this dress to the challenge to see what it really looks like on. Now I'm convinced, I'm gonna let this one go. It's slightly too big for me and I'm just too short to pull it off.

 -hehehe...I tried to do that "pose" you usually see on the packaging of those vintage patterns-

 -the detail on this dress is unbelievable! If you compare the quality of the work that went into making this dress with what you get in the shops today... This dress comes complete with an attached bow for you to tie in any which way you want-

-this dress comes complete with the most awesome belt and tiny chain. It even has a sewn in lining for the skirt part of the dress. Other than it missing a few eyelets on it's belt this dress is in perfect form for something more than 30 years old-

-I would keep this dress just to look at it now and again, I really love it! But I need to start letting go of things which are merely taking up space-

xxx

30 Days of Dresses: Dress #22

What a huge disappointment! I took some before photo's of this crochet dress I bought at the Hospice shop. It was cream with orange detail, it looks like the orange yarn wasn't colour fast when the original owner washed it. The cream part was full of orange stains. Naturally, I though, "awesome, I'll just dye it" and so I did. Now when I started editing my photo's for this post, every image I took on the day is there except the images of this dress! All this effort and now I can't even show you what the dress looked like before I dyed it! Sometimes technology really sucks!

 -above are the images of the dye I used, all the instructions are on the back of the container. Dying fabric is much easier than most people think.

1. soak the fabric that you want to dye in clean water, make sure that it is wet all over(this will insure that the dye will distribute more evenly). Squeeze out all the excess water and place in the prepared dye-bath.
2. follow instruction as to how long your fabric should be emerged in the dye-bath, stirring regularly.
3. drain dye-water, rinse thoroughly and hang out to dry. (I put my fabric in the washing machine with a cup of salt water and put it on the rinse&spin cycle)

 

 -it turned out so pretty, considering I'm now the only person who knows what it looked like before I dyed it-

 -The polka dotted pussy bow blouse is of pure silk and vintage in design, I found it at a charity shop-
-So this is the AFTER photo of the dyed crochet dress revamp-

 

xxx

 

30 Days of Dresses: Dress #21

What a day! It's seems our winter is a bit delayed this year, it was a lovely sunny day! I've been working on a few things that will be revealed soon. It is both challenging and exciting and should be ready to take flight in the beginning of June. So stay in touch for some mystery news! On another note, we were discussing blogs and so forth at Natasha and Martinus's house warming and someone dared me to put Dave in a dress as part of my Dress Challenge. Dave accepted that dare for me and as May has 31 days, Dave will be posing in a dress on the 31st. 

The dress I wore today, is quite a gem. It's probably from the 1960's, judging by the pattern. It is a handmade and on some places hand stitched dress. The fabric is a lovely soft, fine cotton it is quite thinly worn on places. Though it is slightly to big for me I don't have the heart to cut it in any way. I actually just want to frame this one. It just feels so authentically mysterious, like it should be preserved or something. Strange, I know.    

-I know, I know...I wearing the same shoes as yesterday. They just went so well with this outfit! Once again, how amazing that a pair of stockings can pull together a brand new outfit! I bought these Woolworths Fashion Tights when I got the black ones from yesterday's post. It say on the packaging: "The perfect solution to keep warm & cozy. Wear with boots, Flats and heels. NEW IMPROVED Yarn with Viscose." my favourite fiber! They're really lovely-

xxx

30 Days of Dresses: Dress #20

Ooooh... Happy Monday! You've probably noticed my written work has become a bit distant... I've been struggling with quite a bit of sadness. As most of you who read my blog know, I lost my Grandad last year and also our two family Dachshund doggies a year apart. There's been quite a lot of underlying sadness that I suppress and then it surfaces every now and again. Like today, we finally set up our old PC which has a working CD-Rom so now I can access all our backed-up photo's which I haven't even been able to blog since the move 5 months ago. So I was looking for some images and came across pictures of my Grandad with Vicky on his lap... naturally the tears started flowing. And than last week I had this terrible back pain that just wouldn't go away. Anyway, we are all fighting our own hard battles just like that pin says. I just hope you'll be kind to me as I am to you.

Today's dress was on it's way out but after seeing how this outfit turned out I think I might just keep it. I haven't warn this dress in over four years and just as I was ready to let it go it managed to grab hold of me once again.   

 -the colour combo is so different to anything I would normally put together but paired with this Grandpa cardi I found at the animal welfare shop last year... it's almost like the dress was just waiting for the right company. These stockings are so awesome, I bought them at Woolworths, they are Body Sensor Temperature Control stockings. They're perfect for the cooler weather and I love that they're vertically ribbed! It gives it a bit of a 1920's look-

-There is this really awesome bead shop in Pretoria called House Beads, I don't know if they're still there but I found these tiny buttons, purple crochet beads and purple shell Frangipani flower there when we were still staying there. I strung all the buttons onto some cotton thread and crocheted plain chain stitch till I felt it was thick enough. It's quite easy but took quite a while to finish-

xxx

 

30 Days of Dresses: Dress #13

Whoooo-hooooo! Lucky #13! Wow, I can't believe I'm almost halfway with this challenge. Today was another warm day here in Hermanus and I could'nt help but long for spring a little. So I thought that this floral print dress would be quite suited for my Spring mood.

 -I found this circle knit shrug at the Rotary Anne's Charity shop in town. It's lovely and soft and cuddly warm... It cost R10(1.09 US Dollars), just the kind of thrifty thrill I'm addicted to-

-just a quick piece of info on my heart locket, It was a present from Dave on our 3rd year of dating. It opens up to form a four-leaf-clover, it's quite something! Inside Dave put little pictures of us from when we just met which was 12years ago(crazy, huh?)-

xxx

30 Days of Dresses: Dress#12

Firstly, I would like to say HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY! To all Mothers, New Mothers and Mothers to be! I trust you all had an awesome day and that you were spoiled rotten! 

Now back to business... hehe! These DAMN DRESSES!!!! I went to the animal welfare Thursday past, to deliver some blankets we bought for the doggies. As it is almost winter and the shelter can get quite frosty, I imagine. Obviously, being inside one of my favourite charity shops I wasn't going to deliver the blankies and go without a quick browse. I couldn't believe my luck with this one(granny print dress) this dress has nothing at all wrong with it! It feels like heaven, it's a cotton/polyester blend but it looks and feels like silk. It also has a sewn in lining to keep it from being transparent.  

 -today was quite hot and although I love rainy weather, I'm enjoying the last few sunny day before our rainy winter starts. This outfit was perfect for today, I just added a cardigan when the chilly breeze picked up. The layered soft cotton tunic I found at a local thrift store named Ikaya Africa. They are slightly more expensive but you can find really nice things there-

-absolutely love my Topaz ring that my aunt Bernadette gave me for my 21st! She also gave me a matching pair of earrings which I will share with you some other time. The amazing thing about these Topaz stones is that they change from soft blue to bright pink depending on the light source-

xxx

Outfit Love: Re-fashioned Vintage Skirt

One day I was doing my charity shop run and I found this awesome late 60's early 70's skirt. Looking at it I thought to myself, this looks like it used to be a dress. I smiled all the way home having found this skirt with it's beautiful bold pattern. About two weeks later, I went on my charity shop run again, and guess what? In a totally different shop, I saw the top part of the skirt I had bought. I was right, it was a dress! The top didn't look too good so I left it behind, but to me that was quite a funny moment. Someone had taken a vintage dress, re-fashioned it into a skirt and the dumped it. Might I add that the stitching on the skirt is very beautifully done. So, thank you to who ever threw out the beauty!

-I do apologize for the bad image quality, my little camera doesn't like low-light-

xxx

 

Lucky Friday Finds #7

A very quick browse through our local Animal Welfare and I came home with this really lovely crochet blanket. I was just about to throw it in the was when I realized it was damaged. So I decided to trow it over the bed to inspect the extent of the damage... it was quite bad. A was would have been disastrous!

 -this poor blanky has been through quite an ordeal with what looks like a burn-hole and on other places someone tried to fix it, but not very successfully-

 

-so what I started doing, is to unravel the poor dear, take out the un-fixable blocks and put it back together again. Just like Humpty Dumpty, only I'm sure this one will have a happy ending-

xxx

Clearing space ...and my head

As most of you probably know, when you move house, you tend to sort things out and get rid of stuff you don't use anymore. Well, I have been sorting and when I packed out my boxes I found that I had accumulated a collection of yellow glass. I had found these at antique and charity shops all over Pretoria(when we used to live there) and a few pieces are from the local charity shops here in Hermanus. As Dave and I want to start clean and I've grown tired of warm colours in the house, I decided that this collection needs to move on. So if you're ever in the Hermanus area and love thrift shopping, visit Matchbox where you'll find my yellow glass collection for sale. You might have to hurry though, the stock in this little shop moves fast!

   -some of these are vintage, some Italian glass and some new-

-I do hope they find lovely homes where they are appreciated-

xxx

Outfit Love: Archive #4

Oh happy day! We now have an internet connection! Now I can get back to daily posting:) I haven't had the time to do a current Outfit Love post so here is another Archival Outfit. This was the very first time I wore this dress. I found it in one of my beloved local charity shops, I can't quite remember which one, as it was 3 years ago. I still have it and should really wear it more often. It seems to be a 1960's dress with pussy-bow detail and the belt is covered in the same fabric as the dress which is just adorable!

 -the silver heart locket from Silver Planet, was an anniversary gift from Dave for our third year of dating.

-the waterfall vest I got from Mr.Price, it has lovely lace detail on the back.

-my Vintage Dress was hand made by some vintage lady with killer sewing skills!

-my lovely beaded bow clip was given to me by my lovely Korean sister-in-law, Yuseon-

-at some stage I wore this clip every other day so I thought I'd give it a bit of a break when it started to become a bit fragile. 

xxx

Outfit Love: After the Rain

Don't you just love those hazy rainy days? When it seems like it's gonna pour any second but only a few drops make their way down to earth. Dave and I went for a walk around the block and this hedge made for the perfect Outfit Love photo shoot.

-It was a lovely cool but not cold kind of a day, perfect for layering-

• loose fit lumo orange tank - Mr. Price
• white silk collar shirt - Hospice
• vintage SissyBoy jeans - local Charity shop
• grey bow flats - Mr. Price

-Dave put flowers in my hair <3 i="i">top left.

When the wind blew the water droplets came a splashing down, bottom left. My lovely feathery earrings are also from Mr. Price, birdcage necklace from Skermunkil, gemstone pendant from my grandmother and you probably know my Nomilk Today ring, right-

xxx

 

Outfit Love: Nude and Neon

Gotta love the new colour and fashion trends! It's not every day I walk into a shop and want to buy one of everything. I'm more into interesting clothes, items that are different and fun and colourful. You know, the type of clothes that turns your mood into rays of sunshine when you just think of wearing it:) 

Any-hooo... this outfit makes me feel calm and comfortable. With my JFK wrap top from a charity shop. It makes me feel good having helped a charity and playing my part in reducing consumerism. My nude Chinos and my toe-capped pumps both from Mr.Price are perfect for a day in town, casual and pretty at the same time:)  

-we've been having some cold fronts, which makes it so hard when you want to start wearing those summer frocks and it's still raining outside-

xxx

Gillian, you made my day!

Last week sometime, I'd been sick and feeling icky and down in the dumps. It was just the worst of days... Then late Thursday afternoon my mom came to me with a bunch of bags, all excited! "just look at what Gillian sent you!" So many awesome pieces of fabric, bric-a-brac and, get this, a bag full of colourful zippers!!!! What a turn-around! Suddenly all the icky had gone and my head was filled with new ideas of what to make with all these treasures! Gillian gets all these things from our local chatity shops. She buys from them as to support their cause and then doesn't know what to do with it. Well I know just the thing! Just look at all these pretties... 

These doilies (above) are vintage paper and plastic doilies. Do you remember those plastic doilies? My great gran used to have quite a few of them, then I thought it was weird. Amazing how the things I thought were strange growing up, are the things I'm in love with now!

Thanx, again Gillian! I can't wait to make some pretties!

xxx