Friday, May 24, 2013

Thrift Stop - MadMen Women

So I found some vintage sewing patterns...and they came home with me because I'm a sucker for the cover art and always have been.  (If you were a midcentury teen girl in America you might remember the covers of all our novels had similar-style illustrations.)

Anywho, here's just a couple of the good ones:




1950s Girls' Coat in Two Lengths

Simplicity 4418


1960 Misses' and Junior Dress with Slim or Full Skirt and Dickey

McCall's 5737


1960s Misses' One-Piece Dress, Jacket and Belt

Simplicity 3842


1967 Misses' One-Piece Dress (princess line with bias roll collar)

Simplicity 7099




Did you see it?  




Wait...are you a Mad Men fan?




Because...






It's Joan Holloway!





And Betty Draper! (After all, she was a model...)





What do you think?  




Did it blow your mind?  




I've got many more Joan examples people!

    (She's on tons of them!!)


Wanna see?

Friday, May 17, 2013

I'm Shipping up to Boston

So I've mentioned this quilting bee I'm a part of on Flickr... (if you don't know about it, look to the right on this very page for an image of Tom Selleck.)  Now, not my hive, but another hive in the bee is making sewn flags for Boston - a project headed up by the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild.  I just love the idea of sending a little bit of quilty goodness their way after such a horrible thing happened and I love that a gal in my bee was selfless enough to suggest her blocks should go there and finally, as a member of a Minnesota Modern Quilt Guild - I thought I should represent - so I decided to make this:

My contribution (front and back)










First, I drew a boston terrier.  Hey, it's what popped into my head (that and also the Dropkick Murphys song I used to title this post.)  I've got these cats, see,  and no dog but I love dogs and though I know very little about them, boston terriers seem adorable and tough at the same time.  That's what I want for Boston - adorable and tough - so there you go.

Then I picked some cheery colors out of the scrap bin and for me, the cheeriest of colors is a nice, bright yellow.  (Back when I sold camping equipment for a living, I liked to relate to customers that winter and mountain tents are so often sun-hued as it's the color most likely to keep you from falling into depression when you're trapped inside it.)  But I digress.

I really like the way my pup turned out; I don't draw enough!  I was going to cut out the whites of her eyes too but thought she looked good this way.  It's raw-edge appliquéd with a hand-written label, heat-set on the back.

Only six by eight inches but I think it says what I want to say and that is:

"To Boston with Love from Minnesota."

& Chips


Here's a pic of the real colors - I just love filters!