Blessings, Part 2

“Wonder of wonders,

Miracle of miracles....”

That song has been running through my head since Saturday because of the continued blessings the Lord has showered on me this weekend.

Friday, Mom and I did a little shopping, visiting some of the local thrift stores along the way. Which cheered me up greatly after being sick in bed most of the previous Thursday (stupid choke-cherries!). So we stopped at Hospice for a bit, where these lovelies were waiting for me:

Now that I've finally accepted that I feel more “at home” in shirtwaist-type blouses (I used to think them too plain and mannish), I seem to be finding ones I like everywhere! This loverly Hawaiian print was too pretty to resist. ;-) And it has mother-of-pearl buttons!

That said (about feeling more comfortable in shirtwaists), I still do love “pretties”... especially comfy-looking tunics with feminine lace. 

Since white isn't the best on me, I plan to dye it a better color—pink or aqua, methinks. Probably aqua, as I have a lot of pink stuff already. :-P It's a bit too see-through for comfort, so once it's dyed I'll need a matching tank-top to wear under it.

A trip to the Post Falls Goodwill ended up being the best of all. Three years ago, Mom bought me this dress for my birthday during a thrift shopping trip (now you know what I do on my birthdays!):

(A close-up of the lace--the color is off.)

I hardly wore it because the neckline felt too low, even though it really wasn't. I tend to be a little paranoid. :-P Anyway, long-story-short, I gained some (healthy!) weight and outgrew my beloved dress. *tear* Then I found this one at Goodwill:

Same style, different color, bigger size. I tried it on, and it fit perfectly! And Mom says the color is pretty good, too. I'd been wishing for a red dress (even though I knew head-to-toe red probably wasn't good for my coloring), and God provided one! To be sure, it's not a true red; it's more of a maroon or berry-red, which is probably better than a true red on me, anyhow.

(Same lace! And the color is washed out from the flash.)

Saturday Mom and I attended a recital for a leading music academy in the area. Two of Mom's choir students from school (twins! :-D) were in it and had invited her to come. Their mother was so happy she did.

Anyway, since we were right around Thrift Shop Row (otherwise known as 4^th Street), we stopped by a few places, just for fun.

Here's what was waiting for me at the Women's Center (?) Thrift Store:

Normally orange and yellow don't agree with me, but every so often I get a hankering for them. And since this shirt is mostly blues and aquas (my best colors), I figured, hey, why not? I can wear it on days when I'm feeling kinda wild and crazy! ;-)

Having picked out that rather wild Hawaiian shirt, I looked over at the toys and saw him sitting on a shelf!

In a nutshell, I had a bear like this when I was ten, gave him away a few years later, regretted it afterwards, and have wanted him back off and on ever since. While this probably isn't >my< Freckles, he's so much like him, I just had to buy him, and hang my age and what other people might think. I've missed that bear, and by God's grace, there he was—or rather, his clone—and only a couple bucks. Tom was one happy little wench. :-) The reason he's posed separate from my other bears is because he hasn't had his bath yet, but will come Washday (just pray that his felt freckles don't fall off!). Then he'll take an honored place with the rest of The Menagerie. ;-)

Y'all remember Miss Honey Bear? The little porcelain bear who looked just like one I broke when I was five and eventually had to throw away? Which I found on eBay for under ten dollars last month?

Look who (whom?) I found at the CdA Hospice for 25 cents!!!

Meet Annabelle, Miss Honey's sister. With the bow in her hair that I remember my Tina having. Miss Honey must have lost hers along the way (there's a glue-spot on her head, I discovered). Go figure—fifteen years (or so) of fruitless searching for a replacement for the late Tina Bear, then BOOM! God gives me two in the space of a month! :-D Here's a picture with the two of them together:

As you can see, Annabelle's fur is more detailed than Miss Honey's, and her dress seems not to have faded one iota in thirty years! She's stuffed more firmly than Miss Honey, so that's why she's sitting kinda funny. Am I sorry now that I bought Miss Honey, since God had Annabelle waiting for me? Not really. They're both different enough from each other that it's like having two separate bears, rather than two clones.

And now, ladies and gentlemen, it gives me great pleasure to introduce to you a member of the Comedia d'el Arte...monsieur Pierrot!

Found hanging from a pegboard wall inside a plastic baggie, not five minutes after the discovery of Annabelle, and for only $1.25. I mention the price because his clone is on eBay at this moment for $11. 99, plus $7.50 shipping. Score! :-D (And Mom thought dolls were half off that day, so he may only have been 75 cents. Double score!) They had one in a red costume, too, but I didn't figure I needed both. Besides—purple! ;-)

How could I resist that sweet little face? ^_^

I also found Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. PTL! Another favorite book for less than a dollar. >Sigh< I love thrift shops. :-D

Then yesterday afternoon, I bought this pattern from Etsy. I'd had one in a size 8, but eventually got rid of it because it was too small, and my attempt to make it bigger was disastrous. But I loved the style and have been looking for it in my size...and there it was on Etsy! OK, so I paid a lot more than I would have if I'd gotten it at the thrift shop, but hey, $6 isn't bad for a vintage pattern.

And this morning, after some concentrated prayer and hard thinking, I took the plunge and bought this fabric for a current project. I had a tiny strip of this adorable print left over from another project over a decade ago, but of course it wasn't enough for a Summer blouse! I was very happy to find more of it on eBay and have been drooling over it ever since. Originally I thought the listing was for ½ yard, but when I checked it this morning, it was for 1 3/8! PTL! Methinks I can squeeze out a bit more of a blouse with that (I plan to combine it with another fabric anyhow).

It's just amazing how God has blessed me of late. Humbling, too, especially when I get in one of my moods (which is more often than I care to admit). But mostly just plain AWESOME! But then, God is Awesome. :-D

Until Next time, Gentle Readers,

God bless,

~“Tom”~

Three Steps Forward, Two Steps Back

Well, I went to put the sleeves in my Wood Violet blouse, and it turns out the armholes are too high! We checked them against the ones in Mom's blouse and one of our new patterns (which is basically the same design), and both were 1” or so lower than mine. So tomorrow I get to rip the shoulder seams and re-cut and -zigzag the armholes. Hopefully they won't be so tight then.

Speaking of new patterns, Mom and I bought several at Hancock Fabrics the other day during a Spring sale. Five Butterick patterns for $5! So here are the ones we bought (and I'll put the pictures in later; for now I'll just link to Sewing Patterns.com):

4659: A princess-seamed blouse pattern for Mom. She'll probably put a different collar on it, and definitely some different cuffs—she's not hip on the ones in the pattern. We've tried making princess-line blouses before, but we used a size 16 dress pattern, and ugh! Both blouses were very nearly disasters. It made up fine as dresses, but for some reason it turned nasty when shortened to blouse-length. Eesh. So perhaps this one will work better. :-)

4732: A formal dress and princess-lined coat. I mainly got this for the coat, for use as a dress or over-dress. I like the standing collar that's cut in one piece with the coat/dress!

4827: Another princess-seamed pattern. OK, so it's a costume. :-P But hey, it's essentially your basic "under-the-arm" princess-seamed dress—I figured it'd be a good jumping-off point. Just switch out the lacing in back for a zipper, shorten the hem to a length that won't get dragged in the mud or trodden on, and voila! Change the sleeves and/or neckline, and you have all sorts of possibilities. (Oh, yeah, and make it up in more becoming colors, too. :-P) Plus it's normally over $15, so how could I resist getting it for only a dollar?? ;-)

4985: A cute blouse pattern very like some Inspiration pictures I'd cut out of an old Penney's catalog some years ago. I normally shy away from Empire-waisted blouses—they look like maternity tops!—but this pattern (and my clippings) looks like they're tailored enough that they'll just look pretty.

 5284: Another blouse pattern. It's similar to the vintage-ish one I'm using for “Wood Violet,” only this one has some cute ruffle options, too. We mainly got this one for Mom, so that, hopefully, the blouses she makes from it won't be too tight across the shoulders like her green one (made from the “Wood Violet” pattern) did! :-( And like I said earlier, I'll need to use it to re-cut the armholes on WV.

5348: Another dress pattern with potential. :-D The waistline, being neither an Empire nor a regular one, isn't my favorite feature, but I liked the round “yoke” and the cute sleeves. Leave off the skirt, lengthen the bodice, and you have a peasant-type blouse. Or the waistline could be raised or lowered easily enough for the dress option, depending on what you want.

5471: A really cute dress pattern with an upward-pointing waist. I have a vintage pattern with this feature, but the skirt has a seam up the front, and the bodice has these pleats in the shoulders and a high standing collar. Which are kinda cute, but with my wide shoulders, the pleats would probably look a bit like military epaulets, LOL, and as I plan to make a Summer dress from this pattern (or rather, part of one ;-)), the high neck is OUT. The new pattern will make it easier to get the design I have in mind without noodling with the old pattern and pickling my brain. :-P

Only a few weeks ago, everything was silent. No birds save the occasional quail flock or the random starling. Now all of a sudden there are bird-calls everywhere, robins all over the yard, and I heard a flock of red-winged blackbirds chattering across the tracks this afternoon! It's been trying to snow for nearly two days, and a couple times it even began to stick...then promptly melted in the 40-degree weather. Yesterday it was snowing, but not accumulating, prompting my brother to quip, “At this point it's just fluffy rain.” LOL!

I think of all this as Old Man Winter throwing a little tantrum again. :-P He knows his time is almost up, and soon he'll have to step down and let Lady Spring take the throne...but hanged if he'll go peaceably, it seems!
Twomoreweeks...twomoreweeks....

Until next time, Gentle Readers,
God bless,
~“Tom”~