Catch up posts!

I had a lovely day out at another Lindy Charm School for Girls workshop today, this time in Melbourne with the fabulous Ms Belle as my companion in charm. It reminded me that I haven't actually gotten around to doing a number of vintage blog posts! I'd finally gotten around to taking some photos, and have talked about them with friends, but had forgotten to actually post.

So shortly I will post about:

• The completed cherry print apron (which I wore over my frock tonight while making lamb roast post-charm school)
• The two gorgeous late 1940's suit jackets I picked up at the Love Vintage Fair earlier this year.
• The fabulous vintage (1950s?) swimsuit I bought from a friend recently that fits beautifully and has interesting construction.
• A vintage frock from bought from the same friend as the swimsuit that is lovely, but a little big and I'm debating to alter or not to alter.

Stay tuned.

Minimalism and thriftiness - partners in lean living

In the lead up to the great leap south, I took to a very minimalist living philosophy. Aside from the therapeutic affects of a good cull of "stuff", it also meant there was much less to pack. It's also re-affirmed a desire to live free of unnecessary clutter. I've enjoyed posts from The Everyday Minimalist, though she's far more minimalist than me!

The other thing that I've taken to a further extreme than usual lately is being thrifty. I've always been a firm believer in living within your means. At the moment, we're in the rather annoying position of having to pay both mortgage and rent while we wait for the house to sell. Add to this mix the fact that I've changed work from regular salary to consulting and invoicing so our income is a little wacky. As soon as the house sells, we'll be back on very good financial footing, but until then we're keeping a tight reign on things.

First things first, all discretionary spending is either on hold or significantly reduced. Getting back to the minimalist philosophy, everything comes down to whether we really NEED something. If it isn't essential, we don't buy it. In the majority of cases, it will still be there later when the budget is more healthy.

Now everyone varies in what they consider necessary or discretionary spending. Something that is very definitely in our necessary category is health care, which in my case is expensive. By cutting out as much discretionary spending as possible, I can do everything I need to do to keep me healthy without feeling any guilt for blowing the budget.

Next, we've changed the way we use the credit cards. Normally we pay the credit card off in full each month. This is great as it means no interest charges. Now though, it actually makes more sense to pay the minimum and incur the interest instead of pay it in full. We won't end up that much out of pocket from the interest by the time we're back to being able to pay it in full. We already use the credit card as much as possible. Partly for the Frequent Flyer points, but also because it's easier to track where our spending is going.

I've always enjoyed thrifty shopping. I've been making use of websites like Gumtree to source things cheaply. We managed to get a second-hand desk and office chair for the home office so the CPD could work from home relatively cheaply. Our thrifty gardening adventures are over at Greening Our Life. I think the trick is to only buy what you need and not get sucked into something that is a bargain, but isn't essential.

I'm enjoying the challenge at the moment, though I'll admit the list of "things to buy once the house sells" is starting to get long!

Bonjour Brunswick!

We're here! The move from Figtree to Brunswick went very smoothly, though as the Cunning Plans Dept commented, what would you expect with two project managers running the show :)

We headed off on Thursday morning, stopping a number of times along the way to swap drivers and give the dogs a stretch and toilet break. After having gone to the effort to get sedatives from the vet, I then managed to misplace them in the packing madness on Wednesday and couldn't find them. As it turned out the dogs were fine (except for the bit where they ate a bag of blood & bone that was in Mum & Dad's garden shed). Hudson was only car sick once. Otherwise they handled the drive pretty well. We arrived in Brunswick around 8:45pm and stayed at a friend's place around the corner from our new digs.

Friday was moving in day and it also went pretty smoothly. The new fridge I'd ordered a couple of weeks ago arrived with impeccable timing on Friday morning, followed by the removalists and the electricity guy, so it was all systems go! Basically I stationed myself in the kitchen by the front door and the CPD was on dog/shed duty and we just directed the removalists where to put things.

By Friday night we'd unpacked the essentials and had our first meal (granted it was Indian home delivery) with the wonderful Dr Krys. Saturday saw some grocery shopping, more unpacking and a visit from Sam & Belle, who introduced us to Apple Cakes, which are apparently a very Victorian treat (they are effectively an individual size apple pie, dome side up, which is coated in a thick layer of icing). Sunday the unpacking continued with a quick diversion out to CERES to meet Dr Krys for lunch after her Sunday radio show. We had hoped to make use of the famous Melbourne public transport system, only to be thwarted by the fact that the 503 bus does not run on Sundays. At all. Which is a bit lame if you ask me. More unpacking, then a lovely dinner with Miss Bethany (home delivery again).

Monday was back to work for both myself and the CPD. I'd managed to set up enough of the new home office to be functional. Ironically, the first main work task for the CPD in our new location was to fly to Sydney for a meeting. It will be interesting to see how we settle in to having both of us working from home. We are definitely going to have to acquire another desk.

There are still a few boxes left to unpack, but we're mostly moved in. The new place has the footprint of one floor of our old place, so we've downsized a reasonable amount. Thank goodness we were fairly ruthless with the cull before moving. The new house has pretty good storage options. Both bedrooms have large floor-to-ceiling built in wardrobes (and the ceilings are tall, so that's extra space). The kitchen has amazing storage space. I am in serious kitchen storage heaven. I've unpacked all the kitchen items and I still have an empty drawer and a few empty shelves.

More tales of settling into Melbourne to come. So far, c'est magnifique!

Farewell Figtree

Today we packed up all our belongings and said farewell to Figtree. The removalists spent the day packing most of our stuff into the containers. And of course today it decided to absolutely bucket with rain, just to make the moving experience that much more of a challenge.

While packing for the move, I commented to friends that I reckoned I could get all of our clothes into two suitcases. It turned out to be 1 large suitcase, 1 medium suitcase, 1 medium box, and one "portarobe" box (for the suit jackets and coats). So I think I can safely say both the Cunning Plans Dept and I have a rather minimalist wardrobe. However, as the removalists were packing the kitchen, I realised that where I may save space in the wardrobe, I more than make up for it with baking stuff. I have a LOT of kitchen stuff. However, as the CPD commented - a naked lady who can bake is better than a fashionista who can't cook.

After a long day, we're now at my parent's place, where we're staying tonight before driving us and the pups south of the border to Melbourne. Next stop, Brunswick West!

Colour my world

The are posts to come featuring the fabulous vintage jackets from the Love Vintage fair and the completed vintage-inspired cherry print apron, however as I type my house is being invaded by various tradespeople doing renovations and I had to pack up the study, including my computer, over the weekend and it has all my photos.

Instead, a post about colour. My colours, to be exact. After years of reading various articles from fashion folk, friends and fellow bloggers, I have learnt that finding one's colours is an important part of developing one's overall style. I don't think I thought much about colours growing up. Once I hit teenage years I liked black, black, and black. I did have other colours in the wardrobe, but they were things that I thought I "should" wear, rather than things I loved. I loathed pastels and bright colours. In Year 12 I went Goth, possibly because it justified wearing black almost exclusively.

Over the years as I've matured, I've tried a lot of different colours. I've made the mistake of buying things in colours that look great on a friend, but awful on me. I've been sucked in to colours that are "now" or "in", but awful on me. After many years, I think I've finally settled into what I consider to be colours that work for me. They look good and more importantly, I feel good wearing them.

And guess what number one is? Black! Seriously, after all these years, there was obviously a reason I was drawn to black. I love black and it loves me. I think one of the reasons I love black is that it is a great palette to play with textural and sculptural elements. I have a lot of black in my wardrobe, but in different fabrics, weights, weaves, textures, and shapes. Black is my "background" that I use to showcase my figure, a striking accessory, or my favourite lippy.

Grey - For very much the same reasons as I love black. I have dark, charcoal greys, mid-greys with pinstripes or textured weaves. I often pair grey with black, or different tones of grey together.

Red - But it has to be the right red. I have a penchant for red things the way bower birds have a penchant for blue things. It's a colour that makes me feel vibrant and happy. My red is a dark, slightly earthy red. Muted clarets also work if they're not too purple. I can't do reds that are too pink, orange, or purple. I have a couple of red dresses and one striking red top, but otherwise, red appears mainly in my accessories. Red shoes, two favourite strings of beads in a dark and a bright red, claret wool scarf and of course, my favourite dark red lipstick that I wear almost every day. And red goes fabulously with black and grey.

Green - Not one I have a lot of in my wardrobe as it is hard to find shades I like. My green is usually an olive green or slightly grey-green. I have green eyes, which probably explains my liking of green. Generally muted greens rather than bright greens. I think my tendency towards the muted greens is that I struggle to pull off either yellow or blue, and the brighter the green, the more it will lean to one of those. I have an olive green linen skirt suit that I love. I also have a couple of green necklaces that work nicely to highlight my eyes.

Brown - This one depends a bit on my hair colour. I have a reasonable amount of dark chocolate brown and brown-ish tweeds in my wardrobe. I love them when I'm blonde, but less so when I'm red. When I'm red, I go more for grey. As with black and grey, I like the relatively neutral palette to play with texture. I love tweeds and similar fabrics that have multiple tones and a slight pattern to the weave, without it being overwhelming. Both brown and green make me feel very relaxed and grounded. Probably because they're hues found in the natural world. I often wear brown and green together when I'm feeling very laid back.

Colours I really can't wear:
Pink - Have loathed it from an early age. It looks awful on me as it clashes horribly with my skin tone and eyes.
Blue - I wish I could wear blue, but it rarely looks good on me. Navy makes me look completely washed out. I can sometimes get away with a greenish blue.
Yellow - Urgh, makes me look like I'm on death's door.
Orange - See yellow.
Purple - Another one I wish I could wear, but it suffers from similar problems to blue. I can get away with it on an accessory level and usually paired with grey.
White - Only if it is the only colour. Seriously. White plus another colour just doesn't seem to work for me. I have pale olive skin, so it goes okay with my skin, but it doesn't make me "sing". The only time I've liked white was a simple white linen dress I wore for my graduation. I don't mind white as a small accessory, like white flowers in my hair, white pearl jewellery etc..
Pastels - A long standing aversion. They make me look like I'm either 5 years old or 80 years old. I think I have the wrong personality for pastels.

So there are the colours that make up my personal style. It's taken me a while to learn what works and embrace them as my own. I was reading another blog today where someone commented that having a small range of colours that are your own isn't restrictive, it's liberating! It allows you to zoom in on those colours, knowing they will work for you, and not be distracted by the latest "in" colour. Like knowing your shape, knowing your colours helps you focus on what suits YOU.

A day at the Love Vintage Fair

Last Sunday I went to the Love Vintage Fair with a friend. I've been a few times in previous years and I think each time I have a better time because I know what to expect. I've gotten better at being a more discerning shopper so I'm not sucked in by the prettiness and ignore things like fit, quality, price etc..

I think this year was the best time I've had. It was greatly helped by going with a friend and we'd booked into the Lindy Charm School for Girls workshop in the afternoon, which gave us the morning to browse the stands, then have lunch and do the workshop. I also dressed up, which I haven't done in previous years.

Betty Page pencil dress, black seamed stocking and the black and white patent leather heels I got for my birthday.

The shopping
This year I decided I was not going to buy anything unless it really ticked all the boxes for me. I was fortunate to find three items that fit that criteria. The very first stall we went to I was browsing through some jackets and the shape of one caught my eye. Late 1940s, wasp waist. I tried it on and while the fit was exceptionally good, it was missing a button and the fabric was a black brocade that I felt was a bit "much" for my tastes. As I was putting it back on the hanger, the stall holder mentioned that if the fit was good, I should try the jackets on the rack next to it, as they all came from the same consignment. I had found my 1940s doppelganger! Whoever she was, she had good taste.

I found two jackets that I fell in love with, one black, one grey. First of all, the fit was incredible. The waist of the jacket was perfectly lined up with my waist, instead of being too long in the torso, which is a common problem I have with jackets. The jackets were well constructed and the wasp waist felt like it was hugging my body, rather than straining. They fit well over the bust and hips and the sleeve length was dead on. Both are worsted wool and in excellent condition. I will have to post photos in a follow up post. The price was quite reasonable for the quality. Indeed, I've paid more for a modern suit jacket at DJs and the quality was no where near as good as these vintage jackets.

The other item was a pair of red vintage Nina Ricci sunglasses. I've been after a decent pair of sunglasses for a while now. These caught my eye and I tried them on and first thought they were a bit too bold. However, as I tried on other sunglasses, I kept coming back to them. Talking to the stall holder and my friend, they made me realise that I've been shopping for sunglasses all wrong. I've been leaning towards small delicate frames, which tend to get swamped by the rest of my "look", which is more bold. I tend to wear and lot of black, charcoal and grey and have red hair and wear dark red lipstick, which really needs a bold pair of sunglasses to fit the look. So I bought the red ones. I must admit, I feel very glamorous when I wear them.

The vintage Nina Ricci sunglasses with my hair done from the workshop

The Lindy Charm School for Girls workshop
I saw this on the program and immediately signed up myself and a friend. I first came across the lovely ladies from the Lindy Charm School for Girls at last year's fair when I got them to do my hair in a vintage hairstyle. The workshop was lovely and focused on how to incorporate some vintage glamour and style into our own personal look. It was really nice to see ladies from a wide age range participating. The Lindy Ladies talked us through the various underpinnings that make up vintage styles. We did a lot of work on hairstyles. I finally know how to pin curls and an up sweep. I've read books, web articles, seem YouTube videos, but it seriously doesn't beat having a real person in front of you to tell you that you're turning your hand the wrong way when trying to do an up sweep. The only unfortunate thing was that the Love Vintage website had advertised the workshop as running from 1-3pm, when it was actually running from 1-4pm. My friend had a hockey match to get to across town by 3:45pm, so we had to leave early, which meant we missed out on the section on make-up, but I feel a bit more confident about tackling that so I wasn't too disappointed. The most useful part was the stuff on hair styles. I've already emailed the Lindy Charm School to get some of their nifty products.

One thing the Lindy Ladies impressed upon us was to always tell a lady when you like her "do" or think her frock is fabulous. Those little compliments really do make the difference from feeling just okay to feeling like a million bucks. I got a lot of little compliments over the day at the fair, including plenty from the Cunning Plans Dept afterwards and they really did lift my mood and make me feel gorgeous.

On the whole, a fabulous day out. Watch this space for detailed photos of those jackets when I can get the camera to talk to the computer.

Ready. Set. Sew!

Fabric and notions at the ready - check
Sewing machine and overlocker just back from service and working smoothly - check
House to myself for the entire Easter long weekend - check

Let the sewing commence!

This Easter the projects are:

1. The vintage-inspired cherry print apron

2. The skirt from Simplicity 4885

And if I have time, perhaps some more wardrobe refashions. Now, where did I put my scissors...

Vegetarian Chilli Recipe

Another Friendsmas recipe. This vegetarian chilli is very economical to make and tastes great.

Vegetarian Chilli

2 tsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2 tsp minced garlic
2 tsp ground cumin
2 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp chilli powder (I substitute paprika if I'm making it for chilli-sensitive folk)
400g canned crushed tomatoes
1 cup vegetable stock
250g pumpkin, peeled and cut into 1cm cubes
400g canned chickpeas, rinsed and drained
400g canned red kidney beans, rinsed and drained
310g canned corn kernels, drained

Heat the oil in a large pain and add the onion. Cook until soft and lightly golder, then add the garlic, spices and cook, stirring, for about 30 seconds. Add the tomatoes and stock.

Add the pumpkin, chickpeas, beans and corn. Bring the to boil, reduce heat and simmer, partially covered, until the pumpkin in tender. Stir occasionally while cooking. Uncover and cook a little longer to thicken.

If you're serving this with pasta or rice, leave the chilli as is. If you're serving it as a vegetarian filling for burritos (like I did for Friendsmas), place a few big ladle fulls of the chilli into the blender, whizz to a paste, then mix it back into the rest of the chilli and simmer uncovered to thicken. This gives you a thicker chilli that is a big easier to handle in burritos.

Gin and Tonic Jelly

As requested, the recipe for the Friendsmas 2009 dessert, courtesy of the Prima Domestica Goddess herself, Nigella Lawson.

Gin and Tonic Jelly

300ml plus 50ml water
300g caster sugar
zest and juice of 2 lemons
400ml tonic water (not slimline!) (that's Nigella's comment, I assume she means diet)
250ml gin
8 sheets of leaf gelatine
2 punnets of whitecurrants or 3-4 punnets raspberries, optional (I used blueberries as that's what was in season and looking good)
1 teaspoon icing sugar if using raspberries
1.25 litre jelly mould, lightly greased with almond or vegetable oil

Put the water and sugar into a wide, thick-bottomed saucepan and bring to the boil. Let boil for 5 minutes, take off the heat, add the lemon zest and leave to steep for 15 minutes. Strain into a measuring jug, then add the lemon juice, the tonic water and the gin; you should have reached the 1200ml mark; if not, add more tonic water, gin or lemon juice to taste.

Soak the gelatine leaves in a dish of cold water for 5 minutes to soften. Meanwhile, put 50ml of water into a small saucepan and bring to the boil. Remove from the heat, squeeze out the gelatine leaves and whisk them in. Pour some of the gin and lemon syrup mixture into the saucepan and then pour everything back into the jug. Pour into the mould and, when cold, put in the fridge to set. This should take about 6 hours.

When you are ready to unmould, half-fill a sink with warm water and stand the jelly mould in it for 30 seconds or so. Clamp a big flat plate over the jelly and invert to unmould, shaking it as you do so. If it doesn't work, stand it in the warm water for another half-minute or so and try again. If you've used a dome mould, surround the jelly with whitecurrants or fill the hole with them if you've used a ring mould. Raspberries are just as good, but dust these with icing sugar - it sounds poncey, but it makes the pale-jade glimmer of the jelly and the otherwise-too-vibrant red of the fruit come together on the plate. The whitecurrants should be left to glimmer, opal-like, without interference.

Serves 8.

Variation: To make a vodka and lime jelly, simply substitute 6 limes for the lemons and use vodka in place of the gin.

My notes: This is definitely a "make the day before" dessert. Also don't stand the mould in warm water for too long as this is a very soft wobbly jelly. It is also quite alcoholic as the gin is never heated so doesn't lose any alcohol.

Wardrobe refashion - #1 T-shirt to singlet

A while ago I was inspired by my more crafty friends who have taken items from thrift shops or those languishing at the back of their wardrobe and refashioned them into contemporary, wearable items of clothing.

Now my wardrobe is very lean to start with. Several years ago I went through it ruthlessly and many bags of wearable, just not by me, items went to friends or charity. These days, I tend to have the reverse problem in that I have a small selection of clothes that get such high rotation that I rarely have more than a weeks worth of clothes. And then there is the growing pile of clothes that are deemed "gym" or "gardening". These are items that probably started life as work or casual clothes, but due to wear, fading, stains or tears are now only fit to be sweated in or covered in dirt.

Where I've been looking for refashion candidates are the clothes that I don't wear at all, but still have for some reason. I have a few T-shirts that have sentimental value to me, mostly because they are attached to events and have various images and words screen printed on them. Unfortunately, like many "event" t-shirts, they are very boxy, straight cut "mens" style T-shirts. I find them too big and too high necked to be comfortable to exercise or garden in, but I don't want to part with them. My solution - refashion them into singlets, taking care to keep the screen-printing as a central feature. This will allow me to bring some function to a piece of nostalgia.

T-shirt to singlet refashion #1 - The College War t-shirt*I forgot to take a photo of the t-shirt before cutting it up. Fortunately the Cunning Plans Dept has one of the same size in green. Just in case anyone gets confused when it turns purple in the subsequent photos.

This t-shirt is probably the most worn and faded in the pile, mainly because I used to wear it for fighter training many years ago. I picked it to start with as it I was less likely to be upset if I failed miserably and ended up with an unwearable pile of rags.

First step was to unpick the t-shirt pieces and iron them flat. This was when I discovered that other feature of cheap t-shirts, which is that they aren't cut very straight. It's a pet peeve of mine as I hate how the side seams migrate around your body with garments that aren't cut straight. Fortunately, it looked like I probably had enough room to cut the singlet pieces straight.

I used one of my singlets to trace a pattern onto the t-shirt fabric. I ran into a bit of a challenge with placing the print on the front piece. I like a deep scoop-neck on my singlets. However, due to where the print was place on the t-shirt, it meant that to have enough fabric to reach the shoulder seam and still have a deep scoop, I wasn't going to be able to leave enough fabric to do a rolled edge on the neckline. No problem, I figured I could do a slim bound edge like most commercial singlets have.

I cut out the singlet pieces and sewed up the sides. I then cut lengths from t-shirt sleeve pieces to make binding for the neck and arm holes. I haven't worked much with stretch fabric before and I must admit I found it's tendency to curl up very annoying.
The end result of the edging I'm generally pleased with. Above is a good section with neat double row of top-stitching.
This shows both the raw edges on the inside and the bit of a wobble I had with the front neckline (it isn't meant to have that bulgy bit in the middle), which isn't as noticable when I'm wearing the singlet, but still it could have been neater.
I also had some trouble with the inside curve and need to make a note to stretch the binding a bit more so I don't get the little fold shown above.
And here is the end result - a singlet that I actually wear - even if it is mostly at the gym or in the garden. One garment that was languishing in a drawer is now back in wardrobe circulation.