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Monday, January 25, 2016

How I Suffer From the Heat, and From Chilblains on My Feet

I feel no guilt whatsoever wearing this pheasant hat. After all the berries and grapes they made off with on the farm over the years, they deserved it. No, I didn't make the hat myself-mostly I'd just chase them from the yard threatening to pluck them. Perhaps an unlucky pheasant crossed the local milliner and this is the result-it appears to be a homemade hat. I'll never know, but I can well imagine!
 A little sparse on top (I can relate!) but still quite wearable.
It seems I rarely wear head-to-toe vintage anymore, and certainly not from the 1940's and 50's. It can look like a costume, but that's never bothered me (every day is a fancy dress party in my world) so I'm going to make a point of doing more "era correct" outfits, just for fun. Not every day, but more often than I have been. 

I learned something interesting today when the tag fell out of my perfect-fitting yellow glove. I wear a size 7 1/2 glove. Fascinating-I never knew my glove size. I imagine that's crucial information like knowing your telephone number (I still haven't memorised the land line because I never call it. Three YEARS and I still have to ask Danny what our number is), blood type, and which drugstore stocks Revlon Love That Red lipstick. Knowledge is power. 
Big hands I know you're the one.
Fine. I've never been dainty.

I've owned this dress for about fifteen years, and I've never liked it. The proportions are for a much taller woman, yet I've never bothered shortening the hem, or doing something with the sleeves. It isn't flattering alone, but it works so well with a shorter swing jacket that I've kept it. I've come to think of it almost like a polo neck-perfect for layering, but not much to look at alone. The shop where I purchased it in Lincoln is long-gone, but I remember buying it on impulse because I admired the buttons. I still do. 
 This blue and green brooch belonged to my mother. I don't recall her ever wearing it, and it really isn't her style at all (she preferred big modernist- type pieces) so I have to wonder if it was a gift. I don't wear it as much as I used to, but I thought it would be nice to at least feature it once on the blog.
 And THAT my friends, is how you do a button! It must be four inches across.
Outfit Particulars:
1950's dress-defunct vintage shop in Lincoln, Nebraska
Late 40's/early 50's jacket-Hand-Me-Ups
Belt-Goodwill
Vintage Gaymode handbag-Goodwill
Vintage gloves-Hand-Me-Ups
Necklace-Hand-Me-Ups
Vintage earrings-An antique store in Wisconsin years ago
Silver brooch-Hand-Me-Ups
Green and blue brooch-Mum
Vintage pheasant hat-Hand-Me-Ups
Fragrance-Vintage formulation Mitsouko
Lippy-Revlon Love That Red

Know what I did yesterday? Besides breaking my left toe (Sigh, I really did-banged it on the door trying to avoid tripping over a hatbox) . I stopped at Fairy Tail (that's how they spell it) costumes in the abandoned mall on Dodge Street and went nuts with their vintage at 75% off. You would have too. If you can get to Omaha (and I do think it is worth a trip in from Des Moines or Sioux City) DO IT! But hurry, because I might go back later this week to grab what's left. I came home with a couple of 40's jackets, a 50's coat, a 40's cold rayon dress, more psychedelia than you can imagine and still had money to buy the week's groceries. Some of the pieces need repairs, but that's true of vintage that costs much more. If you do make the trip into Omaha, drop me an email and we can meet-up if you like. 


The best purchase was a pair of gold lurex shorts which I plan to wear with my swimsuit and gold lame coat at the hotel pool. They do a cocktail hour in the evening, though no one really dresses for it (lots of blinged-out jeans and fleece tops) so perhaps I ought to save the ensemble for that. Last year I wore a paisley caftan. I suppose this means I should be on the lookout for a gold swimsuit for next year.

 The "wintry mix" has started falling (that's freezing rain, sleet, and snow) so I'm off to watch the cars struggling up the hill. If I were twenty  thirty  forty years younger I could make a good chunk of change pushing stuck cars off ice. Not for me now, I suppose-not when I can break a toe on a closet door. I'm sparing you the pictures because chilblains and a broken toe are probably too much sharing for a blog. As I was cradling my maimed foot last evening I mentioned between tears to Mr. ETB that I generally don't have issues with aging, and I'm not keen to try and look younger-but nothing drives home the joys of aging like looking down at a toe broken by what in my youth would have been, at worse, a stub. The little things get me much worse than living with chronic illness, and things that ought to upset me more than they do. It would have been depressing, until I remembered I have some really nice comfort shoes. And newly acquired vintage to wear.   
See you on the flip side.

7 comments:

  1. Oh your poor toe. What a drag. But what nice things. You look very nice. What I wouldn't give to make a trip out to visit you and that shop. I have a THING for 1940's rayon dresses and they are so rare these days. I find that good fashion can make an injury a little bit easier to deal with. Donchya think?

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  2. A broken toe, oh no! And there's not much they can do for a broken toe.
    Lurex gold shorts, oh my heart be still!
    That jacket is just too fab.
    I don't know my cell or land line number. As far as I know my address is the blue house up the hill from the Belgian run eye clinic and down the hill from the Tibetan refugee school. If there were a lippy in this town worth buying I'd know where it was in a red hot minute.
    I bought a pink & black burkini when I was in the US last September, it looks like long johns made out of swimsuit material. I figure a few 36" gold chains & a pair of designer sunglasses & I'll be the glamorous yet modestly attired Muslimah around the pool in Dubai.

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  3. Ouch to the broken toe!

    That is a very nice outfit. The big-button jacket is especially nice. And I wouldn't feel guilty about wearing pheasant feathers, it's no worse than wearing leather. (I'm assuming Americans eat pheasants too.)

    Vintage Mitsouko? *Sigh* I've all but stopped wearing Mitsy nowadays as I'm on my last good bottle. Whenever I wear it, it's like the ghost of my 20s, when I wore it all the time.

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  4. Ow! A broken toe - bugger that for a game of soldiers! I hope it doesn't hurt too much.

    You look so stylish in your lovely vintage gear. The dress is lovely and if you faffed around with it to make it fit you properly I think it would look stunning - it seems it could be very figure flattering in the photo. I love the jacket, the buttons and all the jewellery....

    How lovely you treated yourself to more vintage clothing. I'm going to have to find a vintage shop around here and start buying stuff. We have one that describes itself as vintage but it just sells tat, really. I picked up a vintage Laura Ashley dress for a £1.00 on Saturday in a charity shop - it won't fit me, but somebody in the blogosphere might like it!

    I've just had a reply from the supplier of my Aqua Allegoria Floral Rosa EDT; assuring me all their products are genuine and they are approved sellers of Guerlain items - but here's the joke - if I return the item unopened, unused and at my own expense they'll refund me. Are they daft? I'd have to open it to smell it and use it, to know its smell doesn't last, wouldn't I?

    C'est la vie!

    Veronica x
    vronni60s.blogspot.com

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  5. @Connie
    I know-isn't it strange how all the old rayon dresses disappeared about ten years ago? Suppose it is internet vintage sellers?

    @Bibi
    When we moved to Nebraska in 2001 our small town at the time didn't use street addresses. After a bit, the post office started insisting we use them, and we'd get letters from time to time reminding us that they will no longer deliver letters to people only by name. It was silly of course, it was a town of a few hundred people, and the postman lived across the county road from us.

    @Mim
    I'm at the point where I have to tilt the bottle to get the sprayer to work. I know when it is gone I probably won't search out another vintage bottle (though I hear the most recent reformulation is better than the first effort). I understand what you mean about ghosts of younger years. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't want to relive my youth.

    @Veronica
    Vintage Laura Ashley sells for quite a bit these days, so I'm sure it will make someone happy. I wish I'd saved more of my dresses (I have a few, but I was seriously into the Laura Ashley look around 1980).

    Oh that's rich-they'll give you a refund on the unopened bottle. Sigh. Don't know if you can use FragranceNet where you are, but I've had good luck with them, and they have a solid reputation.

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  6. Do hope that nice dress is more blue than gray, but in either shade it suits you and That Elegant Hat! Delighted to hear that you've struck the Mother Lode of thrift shoppes and carried away gold lame shorts. Methinks the pool ensemble is going to require a long-cigarette holder.

    My broken toe is wearing a plastic tube I removed from a cleaning product container, aforesaid tube being duct taped to an adjoing non-broken toe. (Beware large ladies being pushed in wheel chairs by disgruntled teens! Neither passenger nor pusher cares what havoc they wreak on bystanders' boots - or feet.)

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  7. @Beth
    It is a cornflower blue, but the lights in the bathroom are terrible. Mr. ETB replaced them with some sort of energy saving whatnots and they either wash me out, or make me look like I have red hair.

    That sounds like a good contraption. I can't buddy-tape the toe because of the problems with the rest of them, but that is really the best way to imobilise it. Hope you're healing.

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