Monday Inspiration Station #2/ I can't believe I actually just did that

Item 1: You should be thankful I had a voice lesson today because the inspiration photos would have been on something like cemeteries or something horrifically gloomy. I am now in a less woe is me mood. "Maybe you should try Prozac, Ashley." "No thanks, Bitch (not her real name, but pretty accurate), I take voice lessons."

Item 2: I left early for my lesson so I could go look in the antique store a block away that I never get to look at. I found my wedding dress there last summer. It was still there. It's from the 40's, and brings tears to my eyes, it's so beautiful. It was on a new rack today. The rack of "if these things don't sell by Saturday we're going to use them in the Seniors (and not they high school or college variety) Fashion Show Auction." The lady told me she was starting the bid for that dress at $200. It was $49.00 in the store. I bought it. <----- I can't believe I did this. But hey my wedding dress only cost me fifty bucks.

Item 3: People, or more specifically musicians, or more specifically musicians at RCC, or more specifically the RCC music dept. and all participants, need to get over themselves. That is all. And yes Miss Whitchy-poo, I do fancy myself a guitarist now. And no Mr. Stupid-ass, I am not abandoning one thing, just to abandon another. Get over the fact that you don't own my soul anymore. P.S. This does not apply to Steve The Voice Teacher from Heaven.

Item 4: This salad is horrid, but I am eating it, cuz I've got a tiny wedding dress to fit into now. Just FYI. Why did I buy that dress???

Item 5: I just got suuuuuuper giddy. I think the four cups of coffee I had this morning have finally kicked in.

And with today's business:

Spring Break = ridiculous fun with my sisters! Except for the zoo. I hate zoos. But we are going to dress up like Ladies Who Lunch, and go to lunch. This is our inspiration!

I LOVE this photo! It's like Pipi Longstockings and Goldilocks on a play date. I wish I had the guts to pull off severe hair colours like that. Also I love the Steampunk-ishness of this photo.

Clearly I am not a "Pipi virgin." Please tell me you know that refference!

From Gibbous Fashions.

If I ever have kids their bedrooms will all be decorated in the theme of these old-timey prints of children. I love nursery pictures from the 20's and 30's. I also love all the outfit possibilities based on these pictures. I need red and white stripped socks!

I can't for the live of me remember where I found this at. No I lied I just remembered. It was featured on Retro To Go. It's a brooch. It also came in green, pink, and red. I like the blue best though.

As of late I have become obsessed with silhouettes. I love them! There is some sort of fairytale quality to them, that I can't get enough of. I've always wanted to get one done at Disneyland. Someday... This one reminds me of Peter Pan. I love the little girl in the plant.

What is inspiring you this week?

Polling is closed.

Everyone liked the same name so polling is closed!

Welcome to Absinthe and Old Lace Vintage!

A rose by any other name

Okay guys, I've almost got my online shop running. The problem? I need a name! So here's the name ideas that I have come up with. If you read this blog/occasionally pass through here please vote! You have until Wednesday to vote on a name. Please limit to one vote per person.

Here's the Ballot options:

Absinthe and Old Lace Vintage

Second Hand Dreams Vintage

March Showers, August Flowers Vintage

Just leave a comment with your vote and I'll tally them up on Thursday.

Thanks!

Love, Polio, and a Corpse.

Here's what I looked like on today's adventure:

Sweater- Thrifted

Dress- Thrifted

Belt- Thrifted

Shoes- hand-me-down from my grandma

Bag- Forever 21

For some reason when I was getting lunch today all these people were staring at my outfit. I didn't think it was that weird. My mom said it was because I look like I walked out of 1973.

The high school girls who were all wearing the exact same outfit (uggs, jeans, and Holister hoodies), kept pointing and snickering. I assume this is because they weren't aware of the existence of originality

Here's what my mom looked like:

Shirt- Target

Jeans- Macy's

Shoe's- Vans (she stepped on a nail in these shoes and the foam from them went into her foot and had to be rinsed out in the ER. She tells me it was as fun as child birth)

Bag- (not the shopping bag) Macy's

My mom has always (aside from a very sad time that ranged from 1989-2004, but can you blame a woman who has 7 kids, home schooled them all, and thought that crazy shenanigans should be daily occurrences (can you see who I take after?) for dressing badly? Especially since it was, like, y'know, the 90's) been very stylish. She had some friend from college looking for her, and somehow this friend found me via my blog (I know random), and she was all, "omg Ashley, you're so old now (cuz I haven't seen the woman since I was like six. crazy how you grow up in like 15 years), and so much like your mom!" Then she went on about how my mom must have passed on her love of fashion to me. I never really thought about mom having a huge love of fashion, but then I realized that the one class from college that she talks about more than anything is the "history of Fashion" class she took as like some Home Ec thing. Of course my mom has a far more sophisticated (a less psychopathic) dressing pattern than me, but yeah, I like to think I inherited her sense of style. I also inherited her abilities to be easily amused, not take crap from people, and to be totally intolerant to stupid women. She also passed on (most) of her crazy ideas, like home/un-schooling, anti-medical procedures, and verging on hippie-ish beliefs in health and medicine. She did not pass on her obsessive love of animals, blood, science, and bugs. Thanks for that mom.

My mom and I went to an estate sale today. I really love estate sales. It's probably the morbid "I wish I could believe in spectral things and haunted houses" part of me. I really love old houses. This is the Victorian house we went to today.

We've both always wanted to see the inside of this house, so we went and got in line for the sale.

Well she stood in line. I took pictures.

It's three stories (3rd floor is servant's quarters complete with servant access stair) but we couldn't get up to the third floor. So on Saturday I'm going to break in up there. I love servant's quarters. probably because every time we've lived in an old house, or looked at old houses, my room was always going to be the servant's room.

I was hoping for some kind of magical secret passage way that I accidentally found. It would be filled with old things, long forgotten. Or a skeleton. It would be of a young woman, my age, who was seduced by the man who lived there (he would have had one of those skinny mustaches). She was a poor girl, who worked as a servant here to help provide for her family: three young brothers and a sister, a mother with cholera, and a drunkard father. And though she knew it was wrong to be secretly seeing this married man, she would fall in love with him. He of course plans to leave his wife, who is a bitter old hag who only married him for his money. But then the wife discovered the plans and confronts the girl (we'll call her Charlotte) and in a fit of rage stabs poor Charlotte in the heart with a hair comb. Theodora (the haggish wife) then hides the girls body in a secret passageway and tells her husband that Charlotte has left. The man (he'll be called Edward), is heart broken and searches for Charlotte endlessly. However, it soon becomes evident that Theodora's story is not true when the local police come asking if they have seen Charlotte lately. Theodora continues with her story that Charlotte has left, but Edward doubts this. Besides there is a strangely horrid stench coming from behind a wall in the kitchen. Theodora refuses to change her story, and Charlotte becomes and unsolved murder in the little town of Riverside. Eventually Theodora dies of Polio, and Edward helplessly continues his search for the only woman he ever loved. He would then die of a broken heart.

Then low an behold, an attractive, unsuspecting young woman, who looks curiously like poor Charlotte, would stumble upon her remains, solving the hundred year old mystery. She'd become a national hero and Rob Pattinson would then propose to her.

I can't believe I just typed all that up. But I totally have the plot for my next novel.

My goals were to find anything I could put up in the store (which I'm working on this weekend), anything I could use for me, and any maple furniture. Here's a funny story. When I move out of the house, I will already have enough furniture to fill my own. No joke. Let me explain. My great grandparents are basically my hero's. They were married for 60 some years before my grandpa died. If you haven't already figured this out, I don't really get along with my extended family, save my great grandparents. My Grandpa died in 2003. We all miss him very much. He was the jolliest man you'd have ever met, and I wish everyone had gotten the chance to meet him. My great grandma is a fighter. She has all kinds of health problems, and each year she gets worse and worse, and as horrible as it sounds we're all poised for her to pass away. Trust me NO ONE wants that, but she is almost 90, and it's a fact of life that we are prepared for. My grandma was a Rosie the Riveter during WWII (my grandpa was in the navy, stationed in Idaho (yes Idaho) and was getting ready to be deployed when the war ended). She used to tell me stories about her mother when she was growing up and about all kinds of crazy things she did. My mom and I are both alot like her, and both very close to her. We have a picture of her from when she was really young and holy crap she was beautiful! My mom looks so much like her and I look like my mom, so... But anyways. My grandparents lived in the Brady-rific house from the 60's until they had to move in with my mom's parents back in 2000. I loved that house. They lived there since my mom was five. Almost every holiday was spent there and I have so many wonderful memories from that house. The whole house had maple furniture. My mom loved the stuff and knew that once I was older (and less teenage angsty) I would too. So she kept a bedroom set from their house for me. It's just a headboard, dresser, full mirror, desk, and chair, but it's beautiful. I currently use all but the headboard in my room. So then when my grandparents moved to arizona, they were getting rid of a whole bunch of other furniture they'd kept, and I stole it. I told my grandmas that under no circumstances were they to get rid of the maple love seat and chair that I very distinctly remember being held in as a toddler (take that Freud). So now that is also sitting in our garage waiting for me to bring it on an adventure. I think there might be a few other pieces I confiscated, but I don't remember. Well we went looking for maple things today and found squat. We're pretty sure this house was a museum at one time and so most of the stuff was old museumy stuff. There was nothing of the vintage clothing they promised. I did manage to find a pretty chemise to sell but it was wayyyy over priced. My mom found a few things she liked, but not much. We're going back Saturday because everything is half off and we're just going to see what's left. Maybe my piano that I fell in love with?

I'll post the rest of the pics I took from the place later.

I'm alone on a bicycle for two* (or "this week" part 1)

Yesterday I was feeling very girly and giddy. I'm not sure if this is due to the amount of coffee I'd had by noon (six cups fellows), or the fact that the sky is evident of the promise of rain (though there has been promise of rain for the last two weeks and yet it managed to be warm and sunny for the last two weeks), or because I looked at the pictures on this post, or because I'm wearing heels for the first time in forever, or because I'm listening to silly-girly love songs by Lily Allen (you all know I have mad love for her, but the songs Chinese, and Who'd have known make me love her a thousand times more), but whatever it is, I like it. Of course this girly-ness isn't really conducive to productivity, but regardless it's been fun. I'm still feeling a little girly today, but not as much as yesterday. This morning has been slightly frustrating. I think it all stems from the fact that I've been hankering to go for a bike ride all week. I have a beach cruiser (in red!) that currently has a flat tire, so I must remedy this asap. I also want to find a basket for the front of it. I wish I lived somewhere that was conducive to bike riding. Unfortunately the suburban area in which I live would probably result in points and laughs, or frowns and scowls if I went about like this:

Which is inevitably what I would try to look like if I was to ride my bike around the Orangecrest area of Riverside. Oh to live in an urban environment! I wouldn't mind seeing less of the blonde, implanted, tanorexic, wannabarbie, Bro Ho's that populate the area as well. Well Suburbia be damned, I'm gonna go for a stinkin' bike ride! When I was younger I rode my bike everywhere! When we lived downtown at one point we lived across the street from a Bank of America with a huge parking lot that we'd ride in. Plus the neighbourhood was pretty small and quiet so we rode all over there as well. We moved 16 blocks away from that house though and the area was less bike friendly, however that didn't stop us. My bike actually got stolen by some Mexican guy. I saw him riding it around every now and then and it always pissed me off. But then I got my beach cruiser and haven't had any excuse to use it. I'm going to find an excuse.





In other news regarding my mother's attempt at getting me to move out of the house, my brother got a mouse. Yes a mouse. We now have two turtles, two rabbits, and a mouse. The mouse's name is Wilburt. Eric thinks it's very funny to push it into my face. Here's the thing, despite the inherent evil in the turtles, I can deal with them, and I can handle the rabbits if I take a claratin. But I cannot abide mice. Or rats. Or anything in the family of rodent. I think I'm going to have to kill the thing. I hate, hate, hate! mice! Almost as much as I hate spiders! Oh crap! Now Fraser is going to get a tarantula or something...





Here's what I looked like yesterday:

That's not actually trash behind me

Hi I'm Ashley and I like looking like I'm four

Sweater- Target a million years ago
Top- Made by me. Pattern is a Built By Wendy
Skirt- Vintage
Tights- Target
Shoes- Target
Pocket watch necklace- Modcloth.com
Bag- Forever 21
Lolita Glasses- Fredflare.com
I'm currently in the middle of watching the movie Lolita. It's trippy. Oh and I'd just like to say that when I made that shirt in October or November it was skin tight on me. I've been trying to find time for more sewing, but time has been a bit elusive, due to the whole "I'm working a horribly boring job to feed my habit, which is music, which I hope will not be just a habit for too much longer, but an actual career" thing. So when I'm not at work, generally I'm writing music and all that. But that's not the point. The point it that I am trying to find some time for some sewing this week. I bought a table cloth from the 60's last week at a church rummage sale (Sarah remind me that I bought you something I need to mail to you). The table cloth is probably about 5 or more yards of fabric! It's linen with a standard linen background, but there are these royally 60's flowers all over it in bright pink, and blue, and orange and green. It's perfect for a summer sundress. I started another Built By Wendy patter with it, which is a weird pattern. everything but the sleeves fit. I can't get the sleeves past my elbow. So I've since scrapped the sleeves and am going to make it sleeveless. I attempted putting on the neck piece lats night, but it got screwed up. I couldn't figure out why until I remembered that I forgot to gather the neck of the dress. I actually like it sans sleeves better. It looks much more retro. I'll post pictures soon.

Speaking of pictures, my mom bought a new camera. She got the one I wanted, so I'm currently stealing it. It's a Nikon and takes really nice pictures I'm excited to use it. Also my mom and I have decided we're going to be opening a store together. It's still undecided as to weather it'll be on eBay or Etsy. But we're going to be selling vintage items and the like. I'm excited for this. I talk Dee into modeling for me in the clothes I'll be selling. She cracks me up. Expect a post about her and her fashion sense soon.

On a totally unrelated to anything note, I think I've decided I like my middle name. I think it does fit me very nicely. It's much better than my first.

* Mad points if you can tell me who's song this is?

Fashion and Guinness = A good time

I have another two posts about yesterday and today's adventures, but until then enjoys this:

Watch the Haute Couture and Ready to Wear Collections

I also like the Cruise line. Brilliant.

Oh and if you need a cake for St Patrick's Day (The best Holiday next to Christmas) Try this one:

Chocolate guinness cake

I'm excited to try it!

Monday Inpiration Station

I think I started like ten new posts this weekend, and none of them ended up being what I hoped for. Which is really rather depressing. Wow that was a close one. Please don't ask why, but I was just sitting here at my desk, randomly shaking my boobs when someone walked by and I totally had to make it seem like I wasn't grabbing and shaking my boobs. I need to go back to bed. Last night I stayed up til two-thirty and had to be up at six, which turned into seven thirty. I did get up a six to turn my alarm off, then I started having a conversation with my dream world, but I was awake enough to realize this, just not enough to stop it, so I went back to sleep. Why was I up this late you ask? Well my mom and sister put on the movie Nell which is one of my favourite movies. I remember watching it when I was a little girl (well I watched the parts that did not involve Jodie Foster and Liam Neeson's nude hindquarters) and loving it. I've always secretly wanted to live as a hermitess in the Appalachia's. Or at least have a cabin out in the woods where you really rough it. So I watched that till about twelve-thirty, when I decided to put myself to sleep. Except I didn't I went and wrote a song, and fixed two. Thus, I didn't get to bed until two-thirty. So I'm very tired and on top of it all, my make-up case is MIA. not a big deal normally since all I wear is mascara, but I had a horrible breakout this weekend and couldn't find any concealer. On a totally unrelated note, we got another stinkin turtle. This one is named Eloise. The plan is for her and Fritz to have little evil turtle spawns. I neither condone, nor support this mission.

Okay well time for a New Segment here on this here blog. First you may notice that I changed the layout a bit. This is because I am in the mood for changes. Serious changes. That don't involve me lopping off my hair. So item one that was changed, was the blog layout. Secondly I changed up my room. okay Not really, but I cleaned it. Well mostly. I still have to finish it, but I did a deep spring cleaning, which was intense and amazing. I've got a few things to finish in it, but for reference here is the before:

Not so hot. Tomorrow I'll post pics of the after. Okay but really here's the new segment. Drum roll Please:

The Monday Inspiration Station! Aren't you excited? I'm going to post pics of the things that are inspiring me for the coming week. So here goes.

First this dress

I'm actually fairly convinced that this is the most perfectly perfect dress in the history of dresses. It's from Topshop. I found it via the blog Retro To Go, which is linked on the side bar. Red is my favourite colour, but there's something about this dress that brings images of swimming holes and tire swings and lemonade, and bike rides. I think I need to own it. Or make my own version.

I take alot of inspiration from art. I always wanted to draw, but I can't even make stick figures look decent. I've had one successful drawing and I think it's buried in the archives of the Riverside Art Museum. We were given and assignment in a class I went to involuntarily, in which we were given a photograph of that mountain/volcano/big tall thing in Fiji and told to draw a point of view of it. We could choose any point of view we wanted, but you had to be able to see the mountain thing in the drawing. We used pastels I think. My mom, who is a wonderful artist, did hers from under the ocean in the shadow of the mountain thing. Mine was from the point of view of someone sitting in the back of a boat viewing it straight on. Real original right? The teacher lady thought it was really cool, but only because you could see the boat at the bottom of the page. She said it was a very good perspective, because I actually drew what I was seeing, the front of the boat, a life vest, the mountain thing. We were supposed to get them back, but never did. But anyways. I love this picture. It kinda reminds me of a bad-ass Belle from Beauty and the Beast. I don't remember where I found this, I know it's a print for sale on etsy, but I don't remember the artist or the person who found it.

Something about this reminds me of my childhood. When I was little we lived with my grandparents who lived in the parish (it wasn't as quaint as you are all imagining) next to the church my grandpa was the pastor of. There was a HUGE field in the back that my sisters and I played in everyday. We had three forts out there, all filled with various treasures we found in the other half of the field which was rented out as a junk yard basically. We found all this old military stuff once and were CONVINCED that it belonged to German Spies from WWII. So we'd play that we were army nurses, who held all the secrets to ending the war, and carry around these gigantic walky-talkies, that in reality were probably 80's cell phones (I told you, I've always been a romantic). There was a field behind my grandparent's field that was filled with those huge bins that are put on train cars to transport stuff. Bri and I would sneak through the cuts in the gates and play in and among those stupid bins. Recently I saw a CSI where someone was killed by one of those things squashing them. It's a wonder Bri and I lived. My favourite spots in the whole world (even to this day) are this one branch in the main fort, and the spooky shaded area of the west fort. The Branch was really high up, and we'd climb the tree at sunset everyday and watch the sun set behind the hills. One time I sat there with the boy I was in love with (at the ripe old age of six) and we held hands, and I thought my heart was going to jump out of my chest. Turns out he was afraid of hights and had decided that if he was going down, so was I. Which we did by the way. We figured out that the huge Pepper tree we were perched in was thick enough to slide down the branches. Seriously the best day of my life. The West fort was in a perpetually shady spot, so it was always cool. The Pepper tree there grew into the next field over's property and split the chain link fence so you could climb through it into the field. Which consequentially was owned by a man who had, had four wives who had all mysteriously disappeared. Once there was a young girl who heard him kill this fourth wife. She went for a walk one night and was never heard from again. Of course all this happened during the prairie days, but the man still lived there. I'm pretty sure I found the dead girl's grave when I was seven. (Note: the man who lived there was not a serial killer, I just had an imagination that was too big and wild for my own good) (Also I had no intention of writing that much, but I had a really wonderfully romantic childhood, I just kept remembering things)

I'm fairly certain Zooey Deschanel can do no wrong when it comes to clothing. I love her. Everything about her. Zooey please be my friend. Something about this picture reminds me of The Secret Garden. Mary Lennox is my home girl. Always was, always will be. When I got the chicken pox when I was seven or eight, my parents rented EVERY film version of The Secret Garden for me to watch as I lay in bed. Consequentially it was over Easter and all I wanted to do was get better so I could go out an plant a garden and find a cute boy named Collin and a deer (someday I will have a pet deer, by George!), and spend all day smelling the flowers I would grow. Also that Easter I had a most amazingly awesome '90's dress ever. It had a black and white plaid skirt, with a white top attached, and a faux vest in the same plaid that covered the front of the top. There was a big bundle of flowers holding the vest together. The college girl who was dating my uncle at the time and was my idol thought it was the cutest thing ever and tried to find one similar in her size. Her name was Rachel and she did find one pretty close that she wore with floral Doc Martins, black tights and white socks with lace around the tops. She was the shizz, and I wanted to be her. Mostly cuz she looked like a cross between me and Winnie from the Wonder Years and I sooooo wanted to be Winnie. Rachel, wherever you are, thanks for being so utterly cool in the eyes of a little girl. I named a cat after you, just so ya know. I guess if you were to ask me who my fashion muses were, I'd say Zooey Deschanel, Mary Lennox, and that chick named Rachel.

There are some things I really love. They are these: Leaves, Abandoned Buildings, trees, the colour brown, forests, things that look like, hobos, Gypsies, hippies, or ghosts belong there. This photo has it all. I half expect the headless horseman to come popping out of that shack.

Okay that's enough for now. Have a lovely day!