Stolen Heirlooms, Secret Lovers, Homeschooled moms, and birds in my hair.

Dress- vintage, Shoes- Target, Yellow brooch- Magpie vintage in Portland Or., Rhinestone Brooch- Pilgrim's Place Festival, Cameo- My Great-Great Grandmother's, Locket- Stolen from my nana.

I bought this dress at my favourite thrift store yesterday for four dollars. I was very happy. My mother hates it and said it looked like an 80's home-school mom dress. It's actually an 50's cotton day dress with almost tiki-ish geometric print and very large pockets. I think if I shorten it about three inches it will look less disagreeable though I still love it.

I don't usually show off my jewelry, which is odd since I really love jewelry. I've wanted to try doing this multiple brooch thing for a while and was quite happy with the result. My mom called me out for stealing her cameo, but I'm thinking a may steal it from her permanently. My mom has had this for as long as I can remember and it wasn't until a year or so ago that I learned it belonged to my great-great grandma. My mom got it from my great-grandma when she was going through jewelry once. My mom also has a really beautiful gold wedding band that my great grandma threw away and my mom rescued from the trash can. When my mom asked my grandma about it and why she was throwing it away, my grandma wouldn't say a word, and still won't. So being the imaginative one I have concocted about six stories of how it could have come into my grandmother's possession. My grandma is one of my heroes and is a very interesting woman. She and my great grandpa got married in 1940 and she was a Rosie the Riveter while my grandpa was in the Navy during WWII (he was stationed Idaho, go figure). She was only 20 or 21 when she got married (on New Years Day), so my theory is she had a lover before my grandpa and he gave her the ring as a promise, but for some reason they could never be together. Then she met my grandpa (and trust me they were very much in love. They were married for 65 years before my grandpa died, and were the funniest couple ever.) and forgot all about Reginald, or Edwin, or Bartholomew, but always kept his beautiful ring. I figure she threw it away when she heard he died. But that is just my theory...

I've tried to steal that from my mom too, but always get caught. I did not get caught stealing this locket from my nana (my mom's mom). Of course she had it buried under a pile of old broken jewelry for years before I rescued it, so she probably didn't even know it was there. when I was little Bri and I would sneak into my nana's room and try on all her jewelry. There's a black pearl ring she has that I am determined to get my hands on at some point. She won't tell me the story of that either, though I think my papa got it for her when he was stationed in Hawaii in the 60's and had it set. But who knows, she could have had a secret lover too.
Dress-me, shoes-random NYC shoe store, Necklace- F21, Lolita glasses- F21

I wasn't going to show this dress yet since it needs to be remade, but here it is anyways. I like the idea behind it, but it needs tweaking. I started making this dress nearly two years ago from my own pattern, with barely knowing how to sew a straight stitch. I finally put in the zipper and hemmed it only to look over it and sigh at all the flaws that I now know how to correct. So that's my next project.

Speaking of projects (and apologizing for lengthy post), I made these two hair pieces today and am very proud of them. I've wanted a facinator for a long time and they're always stupidly expensive in stores. This one cost me probably all of $2.

I made a tutorial for it that I may post tomorrow if anyone is interested. It's not very detailed as this is not exactly brain surgery. I also made this hair piece, which was a bit of an indulgence. I have always wanted to wear a bird's nest on my head an now I can. This ended up coting me around $2 as well. the leaves and flowers were free due to my horrible flirting skills working on the lone guy worker at Joanns. While I love this silly thing to bit, I am a little weary of birds flying around my head now...