Goodbye, Shirley Temple

Yesterday, Shirley Temple passed away. She was 85.

I thought back to some movies starring her I saw when I was a child. I guess no other children I knew then watched such movies. I was so out-of-fashion. And maybe I still am. :)

She was famous even here in Switzerland. I have to admit, though, that I always have a strange feeling about all the non-Swiss Heidi movies out there. It's like if we Swiss people would make a Pocahontas movie... 

Nonetheless, she was a very cute Heidi, any maybe she influenced the image that many elderly persons have of that storybook character. I remember how older people looked at me or even caressed my very blond curls (hated it!) and called "Oh, she looks like a Heidi!" - strange enough that my sister's name is Heidi. Needless to say that I always felt a wee bit silly. 

Shirley was what we call one of the first, if not the first ever, child star in movie history. She had such a sweet face, a little bit cheeky sometimes, and blond curls. She could pose, sing and dance. Growing up, she became a pretty woman, the hair became darker. Blond little girls are always fascinating to adults. I was a very blond curly girl as well, so I know what I'm talking about. It's the same with kitties and puppies. They grow up to become dogs and cats and are not so super cute anymore to most people.

Having been "trained" to be a star it was probably not very easy to deal with a new situation, becoming less attractive to the audience, getting less offers as an actor. But still, as a young woman, she inspires me, mainly from a fashion and style point of view. I love these photos, I think she was a very handsome person.

 I don't have to point out that I'm in love with this hat...

Looking at these pictures, I realise that my interest for vintage clothing is not limited to women's outfits, but it's also wonderful to see all the gorgeous little girl's dresses of those times.

There's a lot of inspiration for any sewing mom like me.

Polka dots and hair bows....

Puffed sleeves and short skirts, buttons and trims.

Peter Pan collars.

And appliques.

And bows.

Look at the cherries, the cherries! Wonderful dress!

This romper is simply amazing.

Kind of a sailor collar combined with a peasant-style dress...

And then, of course, there's always a hat that catches my eye. I love this one particularly, as it's a Scottish inspired hat in a garrison style... Have to find a pattern and make one real soon!

Of course, when my daughter yesterday in the news saw Shirley with all the lovely dresses, she screamed with delight and said she wanted a dress like these. She was so amazed by this dancing little girl with her sweet poofy or long flowing dresses...

But I prefer to make her this one instead. Red polka dots, red trims, and a huge petticoat! 

There are a lot of nice ideas for the big girls too.... Checked shirt-dresses...

A skirt with her initials on it - amazing! Aw, and how much I would like to have the shoes....

This is what looks to me like one of those tropical inspired halter dresses that were "en vogue" then.

A wonderful late 1940s, early 1950s dress.

And a gorgeous 1940s two-piece suit. With hat. And purse. And gloves. Makes me happy just looking at this one.

And, after all, she was a mother too. 

1957

Growing out of a childhood as a movie star, I think this is the most amazing "role" she could get. People may remember her as the little girl who was a star, but to her family she was mother, wife, grandmother, great-grandmother.

Need more info about Shirley temple? Read here.

Treasures from the Past - Vintage 1950s Sewing Magazines

Being a vintage collector makes your live sometimes very difficult. I see so many patterns and vintage sewing magazines I would like to save!


Recently, I was very heroic and brave and saved some treasures. Vintage sewing magazines from the early 1950s. They are all from Germany. So far, so good.

The best thing:

They all still have their pattern sheets.

One magazine was mainly a "good housekeeping magazine". Lots of interesting and sometimes funny adds. (Breast enhancing pills seemed to be quite "en vogue" then... Made me smile, as some things maybe never will change.) Some adds were for products that still exist or used to exist when I was a little girl. Still remember some slogans from the TV spots.

Prym is still a very renowned maker of haberdashery products in Europe. They probably were most famous for their sew-on pressing buttons.

Look at the dresses. There are so many I would like to sew right away!

Sometimes there are patterns for the fuller-figured women. They are so nice, really!

Look at the darling children's patterns!

I'm in love in this blouse. made of organdy or voile, it would look amazing - even without the embroidery.

And this particular Burda sewing magazine is just the cherry on top. I grew up and learned sewing with  the Burda magazine. My mom still has loads of those from the late 1960s to the 1990s. I really had to have this one! It's amazing, and I will write about it later in a separate post.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures as much as I do.

Children's Carnival Costumes

I know, this is mainly a blog about vintage sewing and all related things, but I am also a "modern" sewer for my children and for those of my customers. There is one thing I have never really done before: costume sewing. I made a kilt for my little son and a Scottish inspired medieval skirt for my daughter and me last summer for the Highland Games. But I had not so much opportunities, as the examples for those garments didn't allow too much room for my own imagination and fantasy.

So when my husband told me it would be nice to attend at the annual masquerade parade for carnival this year, it was quite a challenge, as carnival in my region is very early. OMG, it's so soon after Christmas! I had to hurry to chose the costumes and order the materials. My daughter, as usual recently, wanted to be a princess or an elf, and as my little son has not yet an opinion of his own (not to mention that he still doesn't talk), I decided to make toadstool costumes for both. For my daughter a kind of toadstool princess, and my son would be a sweet little toadstool boy.

I had no pattern, so I took some inspiration from the internet and created some simple base garments which could be "upgraded" into mushrooms.
I used mainly fleece to make the costumes warm and cozy. First I made an overall for my son with some appliques on the lower part, so it looked like grass growing up his legs. There is even a lucky shamrock on his bottom. Both, the toadstool and the shamrock, are symbols for good luck in my country, and my son's name is Irish, so it's perfect. The overall was large enough to wear several layers of underwear, as temperatures are still very cold here, and we even had some snowfalls during the night.

My daughter absolutely wanted a skirt. She's very girly currently, and she likes ballet, so I decided to make her a tutu. I cut strips of white and red tulle and knotted them on an elastic band. It looked really poofy in the end, and she was totally in love with her new skirt from the first moment on...

The biggest challenge was the hats. My son's hat had to be smaller, so it would not disturb him while sitting in the pram, but her's should be large to keep the proportions of a real mushroom. I didn't use a finished polka dot fleece, as I wanted to look the pattern more natural and irregular, so I had to cut lots of white "dots" and sew them on the red fabric. After stuffing my daughter's hat, I tried it myself on and realised it was too heavy. My husband had a brilliant idea, and we used an inflatable swimming ring as stuffing.

The parade should be held on Sunday shortly after midday, but on Saturday afternoon I realised I had forgotten  two important things: the crown for the princess and the bags for the confetti. For the bags I used a red fleece with withe polka-dots which I sew to a base of very thick crafting felt. I cut the crown from the same material in yellow to create a crown. I added a velcro closure, so the crown could be stored flat while not in use. As I am a very crafty person, I also had some nice rhinestones in different shapes and colours at home which I sewed on the crown.

We had a lot of fun during the parade and afterwards at the children's carnival party. There was even a contest for the best costume, and my children won the first place, but unfortunately we had left earlier as the little ones were too tired, so we didn't win the award. 

Vintage Patio Dresses And A Pattern

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Recently, browsing through Pinterest I found a pinned picture of a wonderful vintage dress with a tiered skirt trimmed with lots of rick racks (or ric-racs). I soon found out that this was a so-called "Squaw Dress", fiesta dress, patio dress, whatever... How I love these photos!

A quick research led me to an amazing post on squaw dresses (though I don't like this name) on the blog of Lil' Vintage Homemaker (actually there are 3 posts about this subject). A picture research brought up a huge number of squaw, fiesta, patio dresses in all colour combinations. So much inspiration!

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As it happens, since I was a teenage girl, I am very much interested in Southwestern culture and lifestyle. My interest was focussed on the Native tribes of the Southwestern region. No wonder that I also have some beautiful silver and turquoise jewelry. So I realised that, having become a vintage lover as well, I need such a dress to wear with my jewelry. Or the other way round. Immediately.

I found some vintage dresses of the same type on Etsy, but most of them unaffordable, not in my size, or with glittery silver ric-rac trims. (I don't like glittery stuff on my garments. I prefer to wear some jewelry.)
Nonetheless, some silver and turquoise jewelry is almost a "must have" or rather: "must wear" when you wear such a dress.

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I had more luck when I searched for a similar pattern.

The embroidery of these two dresses looks almost like a necklace...

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Apparently, from what I could guess of the patterns I found on Google, this style was very popular from the late 1940s to the late 1950s or very early 1960s the latest. The skirt was usually combined with a blouse with kimono sleeves, short or long, or a short-sleeved peasant blouse.
On most patterns there's at least one design with ric-rac- trims.

This last picture shows the probably latest pattern - from 1961 - featuring a this kind of dress.

I found this gorgeous one on Google, but it was nowhere for sale... Sad face.

So another look at the Etsy marketplace brought up several results. In the end, I decided to buy this one,  Advance 6760, as I really wanted the blouse with kimono sleeves in the first place with the tiered skirt. I have a separate pattern for a peasant blouse, as seen on one of the patterns shown above, already.

Today it arrived, and I was so excited! While I was feeding my little ones, I was reading at the same time the sewing instructions. Some people read the newspaper, I'm reading sewing instructions. I am so in love with this pattern!

It offers a variety of possibilities. Make a blouse of the same fabric, so it looks like a one-piece dress, or make some more matching more blouses in different colours so you can change the look of this skirt or dress completely.
The separate skirt is also called "broomstick skirt", maybe because for all witches it's most useful to have such a comfortable garment for a ride on the broom. Ha, again, this pattern is just suitable for me in every way!

It needs a little bit more fabric than many other full skirts as all these tiers as ruffled. I was trying to calculate how many yards of ric-rac trim I need to buy. On the pattern it says one spool of 100 yards - I still will have to figure out the exact amount. Otherwise this project will cost me a fortune!