Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to you all!  We finally made it home from my Mom and Dad's house.  Today was lovely.  Time with family, a wonderful meal, thoughtful gifts, tons of snow, and a true day of peace, joy and contentment!

I thought I'd share my passion for Christmas and its decorations.  I have a rule when it comes to Christmas decorating...everything I purchase has to be my age or older, a reproduction of something my age or older.  I totally also decorate with items gifted to me or those made by family and friends!  I started collecting Christmas decorations waaaay before I married Greg almost 24 years ago.  The trimmings and trappings of the season really and truly pull at my heart strings!

I used to decorate the whole house, but lately, I have been content to just decorate the "Ladies Parlous".

I love antique post cards and tuck them into the frames of my pressed ferns.

My sweet Mama embroidered this stocking for me when I was very young.  She did a stellar job on it!

 

The pinecone ornament is one that my Colton made when he was a Cub Scout.

A stack of children't books from the 1940s and 1950s.  There is even a Family Circle Women's magazine from 1960.

The reproduction candy tin holds cards from the 1930s.  I thought they were 1940s, but last night I looked through them and the recipient of the cards wrote the dates they were received on the inside!  Fabulous!

The antique paper mache goose decoy came from a thrift store.  The pressed paper Christmas scene is from the Edwardian era.  Mom gave me the reproduction chocolate pot set last year.

A sleigh very similar to this one sat on my kitchen table when I was a child.  Mom gave hers away years ago.  One day while at a thrift store, I came across this one!  Don't know if it is the same one, but that would be fun!  It now holds vintage Christmas lights...my favorite ones are the American Flag Chinese lantern and the Santa.

Vintage home made tree skirt also came from a thrift store.  The cat we had years ago decided that the pom poms would be a tasty treat!

I also had antique chenille candy canes on my tree growing up.  I found a full set of 12 at an estate sale!

My Cody "made" this ornament when he was about 2 when I was working at a daycare center.  I have strings and strings of glass garland, the first one coming from my Grandma!

The paper mache love birds, cotton batting snowman and celluloid angel in the moon all came from an Estate sale.

Some of the funnest ornaments we have are ones that spin when air currents waft by them.  Those came from Greg's Grandma who hung them on her tree in the 1950s!

I love novelty candles.  Sadly, many of them melted in hot attics.  Happily I have been able to acquire many from family members!

This wonderful nativity came from my Grandparents.  It was made in Occupied Japan from chalk.

I love old boxes, whether they be ornament hook boxes, gift boxes, candle boxes or boxes of real spun glass angel hair!  The novelty gift wrapping tape is so fun!

This fabulous box of lights dates from 1927!  They still work and burn HOT!  The bottom hat box is very old as well.

I saw on Pinterest stacks of SHINY BRITE ornament boxes and thought, "Hey! I have those boxes!"  So, I made stacks with my boxes!

Bottle brush trees and cardboard houses dusted with mica are also a favorite of mine.

Many of the antique and vintage ornaments on our tree come from both Greg's and my Grandparents.  I love knowing that these very ornaments adorned trees lovingly decorated in the 1940s and 1950s by those that we loved!

I think this was my very first Christmas decoration.  A crazy awesome bees wax nativity that was once covered with gold leaf.  It belonged to my Great-Grandma Nonnie.

A plastic Santa stands guard over fun Christmas records. 

My tree topper is like the one that used to sit on top of my Mom's tree when she was a little girl.  I found one for Mom at an antique store a couple of years ago and then I found this one for me!  I love this little cherub!

Well, that's all from our house.  I hope your day was a truly good one.  That you had a sense of peace and joy.

Blessings!

g

A Merry Dickens Christmas To You All!!!

This past Saturday was Ye Olde Fashioned Family Christmas celebration at my church and some of the members of We Wear History dressed up to add "atmosphere" to the event.  The ladies attended as villagers who were out shopping and making merry and the gentlemen were Ebenezer Scrooge.  One was his young not so jaded self, the other, the older "Scrooge" self.  We also had a sweet Belle, Ebenezer's love interest in his youth.  It was a really fun experience as we got to visit with people, watch children make crafts, listen to "A Christmas Carol" read my by Brother in Law, and general have a merry time!

Village ladies, the two Scrooges, and Miss Belle.

The elves from Stained Glass Coffee Shop.  Free brewed coffee and hot chocolate was served to the wet (it rained most of the day) event goers.  The "one horse open sleigh" was loaned to us by the founding pastor of our church, Tri Robinson.  It was fabulous.  Many a family had their pictures taken in it!

Ebenezer in his night clothing.  The Victorian Smoking Jacket was made a while ago.  I really quickly made the night shirt using Simplicity 4923.  I extended the body part to 50" to make it longer.  It is about as long as the smoking jacket so you can't see it in the pictures... Chris White, my BIL is an author and the visionary for the event.  He read "A Christmas Carol" in 4 segments throughout the event.

Young Ebenezer and his Belle....aren't they the cutest?  Belle's outfit is actually my very first Regency Era dress I made over 12 years ago after binge watching "Pride and Prejudice".  There used to be a burgundy bonnet that went along with it.  It was patterned after Lizzie Bennet's dress when she sees Darcy coming out of the lake all dripping wet....

Yay for completed dresses!  1837 Cranberry Christmas dress.  The sleeves maintained their shape nicely, but as I said, next time I will be adding netting between the layers.

The little girls I encountered were so funny about my basket.  They asked what I had in it and were severely disappointed when I showed them my phone, camera, gum and car keys.  I think they were expecting something exciting like a pastry from the bakers or some needle work!

The shape of this bonnet makes me really happy.  Lynn McMasters has done a fabulous job making the pattern!

Miss Villager with Mr. Scrooge... My fabulous husband grew mutton chop side burns especially for this event!!  He looked aaaaawesome!!  He shaved them off yesterday.  I am so sad.

I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas!  I hope your day is filled with joy, blessings, family, fun and great food!!!

"But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid; for behold I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all the people; for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord."

Luke 2:10-11

Be blessed my friends!!!

g

Completed 1837 Christmas Dress, Pelerine, and Bonnet!!

Whoo!!  I almost didn't make this deadline!  I am acutally kind of shocked that I got everything done in the amount of time I had!  And might I please add that I NEVER want to do this again?  Yes, I did put this on myself, no one forced my hand or twisted my arm.  But please, next time I talk myself into doing this, someone please slap me...hard...right across the face!!  I totally give you permission!  Since I started the dress earlier this week, I completed said dress, the pelerine that goes with the dress, an 1837 bonnet, and a Scrooge night gown for my husband to wear for his roll as Ebenezer.  Like I said, I NEVER want to put myself through this again.

Anyhoo, here is the completed dress and bonnet!!  I acutally ended up wearing the lace pelerine today as my mom said that she didn't like the red pelerine because it covered all the pleating on the upper sleeves.  For the bonnet I use the Lynn McMasters 1830s Romantic Period Bonnet again.  I didn't have enough time to alter it so I made it as is right out of the envelope.  I really love how it turned out! I wanted the color to be totally non matchy-matchy and I think the teal and yellow worked really well with the color of the dress!

Items finished and ready to wear!

I know that I said that I would take tons of pictures of the sleeve making process, but I only took three.  I think the problem is I get going and in the groove and I plain forget to take pictures of the process!  But, the sleeved went together really smoothly.

Pattern piece.  The pleating of the sleeves took a bit of time.  In the future, I will put some layers of tulle in between the fashion fabric and lining to make sure the puff stays puffy

In the process of pleating.

Finished with the pleating!!  The black arrow shows where I placed a strip of self bias tape.  The pattern said to just bast across the bottom of the pleats but I wanted something a little more fancy.

You can see the band in this image.  

The next part was a bit time consuming.  The pattern said after you sew the sleeve up, to sew it into the bodice and then play around with the tightness of the sleeve.  I guess I have freakishly small arms as I took the sleeves in quite a bit to get them to really fit snuggly to my fore arms.

The pelerine was very simple to make.  The pattern didn't call for it to be lined, but I lined mine as my silk is stupidly thin!  I really like how the scallops look!  Next time I wear my dress, I will be wearing the pelerine!

Fun stove pipe bonnet of teal poly satin and pale gold silk.  The flowers came from hobby lobby and were made of paper.  I thought they were the perfect color to compliment the bonnet.

Inspiration for my bonnet came from Whitaker Auctions

I LOVE this bonnet!  The color combination is so incredible!

I did this bonnet in such a quick manner that the back seam ended up being off center.  It speaks volumes as to how tired I was that I didn't tear it apart and make it center.  Yay for conquering OCD!!

Tra la la la!!!  Sewing marathon is over and today was a fabulous day of playing dress up!

Next up... pictures of the wearing of the dress and bonnet and pics of the characters from our Ye Olde Family Christmas Event!!

Be blessed my friends!!

g