Outfit Love: My Very Own

Oh my! I don't wish to complain the whole time… It's just sooo difficult when there is sooooo much to complain about. For one, I couldn't publish my Outfit Love post yesterday nor today due to some rather  irritating technical problems regarding my Mac and the internet constantly quitting for no reason. Ever since we upgrade to Mountain Lion, I experienced some misbehaviour. I really hope we don't have one of those very rare Apple viruses. As soon as I can find the time to do a system clean-up, we'll upgrade to Mavericks, hopefully that will sort our problems out.

Back to a happier, prettier topic now… You have probably all seen my HMM post on Monday, well this outfit is all about that post. About three years ago, I started to really LOVE rose prints. I searched for rose prints everywhere (locally) but couldn't find anything! Then to make matters worse, the internet and my favourite magazines were covered in roses, rose prints…roses everywhere! Everywhere but here! Eventually, I found a really nice pair of rose print jeggings at our local PnP Clothing outlet but that was it… Two years ago I found a hand sewn vintage blouse at Hospice with the most beautiful rose print, then that was it! So on my trip to Pretoria last year I hit the jackpot when I walked into Metro  (one of my favourite fabric stores). They had so many rose printed fabrics, I didn't know how to choose. The worst part was that I could only take a few pieces, as I was flying back, don't you just hate that? So I decided to take half meters of fabric so I'd have more of a variety of prints…okay, I did sneak in some large pieces as well, I just couldn't resist! The first rose print item I made was The Rose Swift dress which featured in my Outfit Love post A Rose Garden. Without further a due, here is my ultimate favourite, my very own, very first, rose printed pencil skirt! 

-Oh happiness! This skirt was such an achievement for me! My next challenge will be to actually work from a pattern, I'v never done that before. So wish me luck! The amazing thing about this skirt is how the outfits just put themselves together. It goes with so many the clothes that I have, it's the perfect game-changer! To tell you the truth, I've been so lost in "myself", not knowing who I am anymore. And as I said in another post, I find myself liking too many styles it feels I got lost somewhere in a vast forrest. Though this might seem a bit shallow, this skirt has become a symbol, a first step to finding myself again. I'm so excited! If this skirt turned out so great, I can't imagine what the future will be like-

-the cute lacey design necklace was a gift from my mom.

-my favourite polka dotty top I bought at Mr. Price years ago

-vintage leather belt is from our Animal Welfare shop

…and the rest (as they say) is history!

Hope you guys had an amazing day…

xxx

Outfit Love: Summer Wrap… and a Happy Birthday, Blog!

I cannot believe I almost missed it, again! There is just so much going on… some of you might have noticed that I haven't quite been myself this year. For some reason I just cannot get myself to wright posts and when I do they seem to come out rather depressing. I would rather refrain from blogging to keep this my "happy place", than force myself to blog when I'm under a dark cloud.

Today's outfit precedes the Happy Monday Makings post which was supposed to be yesterday, instead it will be posted the following Monday. I hope that's alright with you gals…

-This skirt was made from thrifted T-shirt fabric. I'm wearing my new favourite vintage-leather belt again. My handmade goldfish earrings and a beaded necklace I made years ago-

Except for my shoes and belt, my outfit is all handmade!

  

-Originally I tried out the Side Braid, but as I still have a lot of layers it didn't look too good. I decided to just make the braid into a bun and it work perfectly! What do you think?-

Hope you had an Amazing Tuesday!

xxx

30 Skirts in 30 Days: #21 Navaho High-low

Happy Thursday, Friends! It's almost weekend! I am devouring a Caramel Aero as we speak, so to say, ha! With NCIS playing in the background, man I love this series! So, back to business…

Skirt #21, I shared this skirt with you quite a while ago already here. It's just such an awesome skirt, I just had to include it in my challenge. I must say, I like this outfit better than the old one.

 -my pretty skirt is from Ackermans, it so flowy and light. I love everything about this skirt-

-I'm crazy for anything Vintage. I don't think a day goes by that I don't have something Vintage added to my outfit. The belt I'm wearing is a genuine leather, Vintage belt my Aunt gave me. She wore it back in the 1970's. What style or era do you like to add or base your outfits on?

-leave a comment below, I'd love to know your thoughts-

Outfit Love: The perfect dress for a High Tea

Ah, I used to share my Outfit Love on Tuesdays before I started with all my 30's challenges (of which two of them I still need to complete). This one was taken on the day we had our High Tea at Delau Wellness Centre.

-I found this dress mid-winter, at one of our local charity shops, Rotary Ann's. It seems to be a 1950's style dress with a bit of a sailor theme to it. The fabric still looks brand new, like it's never been worn and stored well. The brand is Manhattan and it is my size! I couldn't believe it! I know I should probably take the hem in, I just thought it looked more vintage to leave it the was it is. What do you think? To hem or not to hem…that is the question-

Well, my Tuesday is gone now, hope you had a good one!

30 Skirts in 30 Days: #16 My Mom's Skirt and a Wolf

Okay, it's Tuesday! Three day to go then we are off (I mean up) to Pretoria! We're taking a road trip with my parents and little brother... I can't wait anymore! I'm getting ideas ready to make prezzies for everyone and I might even be there for the birth of my best friend's baby! Crazy exciting!

Now for the skirt... Today's skirt, is quite special. It was my mom's, she wore it when I was about 8, I think. She threw out a bunch of her old clothes when I started studying and of course I got the first pick. I took a few of her vintage items (1989-1995), that count as vintage, right? I wore them proudly throughout my studies at the Tshwane University of Technology. Knowing that I was wearing authentic 1980's to 1990's fashion when the trend made a comeback in the 21st Century.

Here I'm wearing my mom's office skirt, it's a wrap pencil skirt design. Oh, I'm also wearing my Wolfy that Dave got me in January and hid from me up until a month ago... I woke up one morning (he'd already gone to work) when I turned to his side of the bed, there was a wolf on his pillow staring back at me. It was quite fitting to wear him on my head today as there is a full moon tonight, hahaha.

 -The skirt is from Woolworths, it's a 100% Linen with a Viscose/Polyester lining. I might even use this skirt to draw a pattern, it's such a simple design. You hold it outstreched behind you, then your left hand folds the one edge over to your right and fastens with a hidden button. Then your right hand folds the other edge around and over to you left where it fastens with a show-off button-

  

-see? this would be so easy to make, I might just do one-

Do you have any sentimental vintage items that you still have or wear today? I'd love to see, leave me a link in the comments below if you have picture of it on the interweb.

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

Project a Day: #12 Fillet Crochet Cowl

Wow, what a day! My Aunt Charmaine and her son Reynier are visiting with my parents from Pretoria for a few days, so I've been out and about with them. It's so wonderful to see them! They leave again on Sunday so our time together is very short.

This morning I had a few thing to do in town so of course I did my charity rounds. I found some lovely things which I will be sharing with you later. I also saw the first whale of the season! And tomorrow I'm going out on the Whale Charter with my family! Poor Dave has to be at work...I love having flexi hours! Only problem is, the last time I was on a deep sea boat I got sea-sick. I sure hope I'll be okay tomorrow, I would like to be able to enjoy it and take loads of photo's.

Okay... back to the project. Last year my aunt Leiro, gave me this awesome vintage crochet book. I've tried out a few of the patterns already. Then I found a lost skein of blue acrylic wool in a bag of thrifted goodies and thought to make a one-skein-project. Flipping through my vintage chrochet book, I came across a fillet crochet pattern chart. I started with it immediately and worked until the wool was finished. I added buttons and my cowl neck scarf was done. Easy as pie!

 -It looks quite interesting when it's on and it's such a soft acrylic too. Unfortunately, most thrifted wool don't have they're labels on anymore, so I don't know what it is if I wanted to get more-

 

 -What a lovely book this is. Above, you can see the chart I used was actually meant to be a bedspread. I only used a small section of the chart to make my scarf more appealing to the eye-

 

  -I love how it's casual and stylish at the same time. I added vintage wooden buttons which gives it a real nice touch. I hope that my shenanigans are at least a tiny bit inspiring to you and that you can see that things don't always have to be what someone said they should be-

Have a lovely Friday and then it's weekend!

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 #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 #16

okay... so I cheated a little. It was just too cold this morning for just a dress, so I put on my jeans and added my vintage coat. It can go through as a dress if I button it up, don't you think? Well at least I was warm.

 -man, I love this coat! It was one of my first thrifty finds back when I was still in high school.

It's a perfect fit, like it was tailor made for me. The brand is Riastar Tailored and the style seems 

to fit the 1950's era-

-As the weather grows colder, I'll probably be wearing this coat a lot more. Oh, it looks even better when I wear it with boots-

xxx

30 Days of Dresses: Dress #14

This is a quick one... I've been in pain all day. I need to take some pain killers and go sleep now. I did manage a smile for the photo though...

 -I'm in love with these colours-

-something about this fine detailed collar, the dainty rose pattern and the lovely cotton that forms a nostalgia that goes deep into my memory almost like a dream-

 

xxx

30 Days of Dresses: Dress #2

Okay, here is the dress you've all been waiting to see... the After of my Revamp post of earlier. I must say that I think that the outfit was mostly inspired by the adorable style of Kate from Scathingly Brilliant...

 -I am quite happy with how this dress turned out, it's crazy comfy-

 -Oh, that breeze... 

1. My lovely butterfly earrings are from my lovely Sister-in-law, Yuseon
2. My pretty deer brooch is from Tamarillo Designs 
3. My awesome vintage belt is from Hospice
4. My Minty butterfly ring is also from Yuseon
5. Minty flats from Mr.Price 

 -Mmmm, and that's why I mostly wear jeans nowadays-

xxx

My very first Vintage dress revamp

From time to time my grandmother would send a bag full of stuff with my mom with these instructions "give this bag to Chane', tell her that she can take what she can use and the rest must go to HOSPICE". Mostly such a bag would contain clothes that someone gave her that she can't use or doesn't like. Sometimes it's a whole lot of nonsense that she bought from her local animal welfare shop that she doesn't want anymore. But now and then she would send me something that she thought I would enjoy.

In this case, however, the bag was meant for the charity shop alone. Off course I'm first going to look through the bag before I hand it over... So in between a bunch of old men's work jeans, I found this over sized printed cotton dress. At first I thought I'd use the fabric to make something else but like all things handed down to me, it started growing on me. It's been almost two years since I found this dress and with inspiration from my new peachy cardi, Natasha's post on her first fashion remake.  Here is my first attempt.

-Okay, first step would be to try on the dress. Now you can see...lots of fabric-

-Next step, I turned the dress inside out (and upside down)

-Now I can start pinning where I would like it smaller and see, I raised the hem too(as indicated with blue above)

-Then take it off, run it though the sewing machine, trim where needed, turn right side out, iron and there you have it

PS. This was so much easier than I thought it would be... to see the end result, you have to wait for my 30 Days of Dresses: Dress #2 post, a little later...

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

 

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

Lucky Friday Finds #5

Yay, it's Friday! Gillian found all these really cool stuff at our local charity shops here in Hermanus. How amazing that one of my reader friends not only loves thrifting but loves sharing too?! I can't thank you enough, Gillian! This is such a nice package, with the vintage lampshades, fabric and buttons. I know just what to do with those cute lampshades... I have a friend who makes the most awesome lamps from vintage books, doilies and crockery. I'll post you some pictures when I get them done:)

 -Oh what a nice surprise this was-

xxx

Outfit Love: Archive #3

This has to be a favourite outfit! Dressed completely by Mr.Price, the 100% pure cotton blouse I've had for about 6years now and it is still perfect. I'm in love with Viscose at the moment and "was out of my mind" thrilled when I came across this lovely vintage polka-dot flair skirt, last year. It came with this cute little faux leather belt (you can see it sticking out from under my blouse, there). My denim heels are also Mr.Price, I just removed the floral bows they had on, as it restricted my wardrobe quite a bit. I love the way way this outfit makes me feel... 

- I'm walking on sunshine -

xxx

a floor full of vintage beauties

I had a bit of a mad, crazy and crappy week.... so please forgive my absence. As it's my birthday tomorrow, I'm starting to feel a bit better:) I just stumbled upon this pic I took of my small collection of vintage, retro goodies and felt like sharing something quite random with you guys...

  -i love digging these awesome finds out of the most unlikely places-

xxx

So, I tried my hand at knitting...

Okay, so I didn't only start knitting now... my first try was when I was 7. We had to knit squares and sew them into a stuffed animal. I made it halfway through the first square(which was riddled with big gaps) and then I handed it over to my mom who basically did the whole project by herself. I tried and failed a few years later and then just left it.

Around 15 years old, I fell in love with crochet with the combined help of my mom, dad and my granny. When I started my Textile Design course at the T.U.T. in Pretoria, one of my projects involved me having to knit. So for the first time in years I had to pick up those dreaded knitting needles. I didn't really know how to cast on stitches and my mom wasn't home at the time so I took a chance and asked my dad. His mom used to give him and his brothers crochet work to do when they were home sick as children. So, I though he might know something about knitting too. Do you know, I was right, he showed me how to cast on and off I went from there. 

Knowing almost nothing about knitting, I thought the way that I knit was the only way. Later I found that I was knitting something called the garter stitch. Daves mom showed me some fancy stitches earlier this year, but only the pearl stitch stuck. Then while visiting my gran the other day I took out my pearl knit test piece and we got to talking about all things knitting and she took out this awesome vintage knitting book. She said that I could borrow it to try out some of the stitches and patterns. Woah! Luckily this book is so amazing that it explains everything! So now here is my first ever try at knitting from a pattern:)

 -man! i was so impressed with myself! love it-

 -how do you like my sample scarf so far? it's coming on pretty good, if i don't say so my self-

xxx