Graciously styled with a bonus of youthful and becoming details

* So here's how I came up with today's blog post - get comfortable!

Our friend Mark recently lent us some great DVDs, including some compilations of vintage commercials, educational films and propaganda. How To Be A Housewife has a looong infomercial for Ironrite, this crazy self-standing ironing machine. It makes ironing so much easier and quicker! They even send a representative from the company to your home to show you how to use it! And we thought, yeah sure, but how much would something like that cost?

Voila! Glen has a collection of vintage catalogs. According to the Fall and Winter 1955 issue of the Simpson Sears catalog, a Kenmore roll-away ironer (which looks to be the same thing as an Ironrite) cost $87.95 cash. To compare, a least expensive Kenmore regular iron is $4.65. So yeaaah, I don't think too many housewives had an Ironrite.
But! Since we had the catalog out, I looked through it. Wowee is it chock full of goodness! There are 6 pages of sewing notions, wool, etc. but only 3 packets of hot iron transfers. You could also buy embroidery thread, and pre-printed pillowcases and nursery sets to embroider yourself.

The clothes! Oh, the dresses and coats and pages upon pages of girdles. And I started thinking, what size would I need? And lo, a blog post was born!

* Now then, my figure type, according to these descriptions, would either be Average Women's or Women's Half Sizes - I have a "mature, well-developed figure" and I'm 5' 4" so I'm right on the edge of those categories.

My measurements are 45 - 40 1/2 - 47 (yeah, yeah, stereotypical American). According to the Average Woman's chart, I wear between a 42 and a 44. According to the Women's Half Size chart, I wear a 24 1/2.

Most of the clothes (including the coats) in the catalog are for Misses - there are only 4 1/2 pages with Women's clothes. On the pages with Women's and Half Sizes' clothes are taglines such as "... give a youthful and slenderizing effect" and "slenderizing lines that do flattering things to a woman's figure."

Conclusion? It would have been just as hard, if not harder, for me to find clothes in 1955.

But wait, there's more! Glen also has a 1983 Sears Christmas Wish Book. Oh.my.god I can't believe I wore some of these clothes. (to be fair, some of the sweaters aren't so bad). 

There are size charts for Juniors and Misses', and under "Hard-to-find Sizes" we also have Women's, Half Sizes, Petite and Tall (who only get loungewear and robes). Once again I can be either Woman (hear me roar) or Half Size. Surprise - my size is still 42 in Women's! I honestly expected it to be different, since I've always heard that size numbers have changed drastically since the '50s. In Half Size I'm a 22 1/2, so just one size down from 1955.

Let's look at Sears today. Whoa, they still have catalogs! Including the Wish Book! How retro of them. The size charts are Petite, Regular, Tall, Image and Image Petite. Image?!?!? For Pete's sake. ANYway, I am now a size 18W in "Image." So sometime between '83 and today they did away with Women's and Half Size. Also, the charts have specific measurements rather than ranges.

Meanwhile, Target sizes its women's clothes with its own numbering system: 1, 2, 3, etc. However, there are no size charts on its website, so good luck! Torrid uses 2 systems: they have 1, 2, 3 and they also use the usual numbers - I'm a 2, equivalent to 18/20. Pennington's uses usual numbers, so I'm an 18. At the Gap I'm between 20 and 22. At Land's End I'm either a Misses' 20 or a Women's 1X / 18W.

So, if I'm pretty much an 18 according to all those charts, why are all my pants and skirts size 16? I have NO IDEA.

Until next time, remember, always try it on before you buy!

what lurks in the wool aisle

* Greetings, it is I, here once again to share my thrift store and swap meet treasures!

In honor of upcoming Halloween (what, it's never too soon to start counting down!), may I present Junior Casuals from Mary Maxim, date unknown.

Clowns. Scary, rubber-nosed, kneeling clowns with a suspicious look in their eye. The little girl seems happy enough, like she's about to curtsey. But we'll never see her again ... in this booklet at least.

.

How can they be smiling and not notice the scarecrow coming to life mere feet from where they stand?!?

They've brought along carrots to appease the appetite of the White Rabbit. Perhaps they will live after all.

I think the little girl is beginning to lose her mind. The pinata speaks to her, commands her to do his bidding.

This fellow isn't too bad, but he's about to win some kind of staring contest.

That has got to be one of the worst cat costumes I've ever seen. The eyes are so blank and soulless ...

We reach the end. The little girl has seen too much today. "Come and play with us, Danny. Forever... and ever... and ever"

Five towels agree ...

* Let's talk about chores! And embroidered towels! what fun!

Srsly, as I may have mentioned I've been on a real embroidery/cross-stitching kick lately. I'm working on one cross stitch, and planning 3 embroideries, including some kitchen towels. I've been collecting vintage patterns for a year now, so I have quite the selection to choose from.

Especially popular/common are day-of-the-week towels. So I started to wonder, do they all say to do the same chore on the same day? Let's see!

Across the board, Monday is the day for laundry.
The funny thing is, I realized that I do laundry on Mondays. Got it from my mom, who also does laundry on Mondays. So I asked her why - it's because her mom did laundry on Mondays. There ya go, passed down through the generations.

Is there a  GIANT cat looking through the window?!?

Everybody also agrees that Tuesday is for ironing. Guess it makes sense to iron the day after doing laundry.

Wednesday the towels start to disagree (not a sentence you get to type every day). Aunt Martha says Wednesday is the time for a notepad and pencil to dance - I'm gonna assume that means go grocery shopping. But everyone else agrees that Wednesday is for mending.

Thursday is the day for grocery shopping to everyone but the colonial girl and Aunt Martha. Martha says Thurs is for mending, and the colonial girl goes visiting. Hmm, the colonial girl never goes grocery shopping, guess she just eats at other people's houses while she's visiting.
(I love this design because we have a local grocery store called Thrifty. I stitched this onto a reusable tote for my mom-in-law.)

On Friday, Gretchen the Dutch girl leaves the pack and bakes, while all the other towels (and my mom and I) clean.

Saturday Gretchen and the other towels reverse - Gretchen does her cleaning and the kitten, bees and colonial girl bake.

Aww, little baby bee sleeping in the hammock!

Sunday everybody is back to agreement - in a manner of speaking. The bees and kitten relax in hammocks, Gretchen picks flowers, Aunt Martha's newspaper funnies sit around and laugh, and the colonial girl goes to church.

To sum up, the towels agree on Monday, Tuesday and Sunday. Other days you are free to do your own thing.
Hope you enjoyed my Tour of Towels! If you'd like to see more, check out Vintage Embroidery Patterns and New Embroidery with Vintage Patterns on Flickr.

p.s. I am sorely tempted to do something ... horrific with this one ;)

Hey Good Looking!

Today's very special cookbook is Good Looking Cooking, published in 1959 by Knox Gelatine. The illustrations of the young ladies throughout are adorable!

And just what is gelatine? Silly girl, it's "a wonder cooking ingredient" And it's 85% protein!
I think that if they told the bare facts, that gelatine is "a mixture of peptides and proteins produced by partial hydrolysis of collagen extracted from the boiled bones, connective tissues, organs and some intestines of animals such as domesticated cattle, and horses " that just maybe all these recipes wouldn't sound quite so yummy. Whip up some boiled pig skin for dessert!

Why use gelatine? Because you have to be pretty, pretty, pretty! And especially to lose weight! :sigh: Even the "good health" mentions only the effects on her appearance.

Psst, Monsieur Moose - you might not want to eat that, it could be your cousin.

 Another totally cute illustration! And the dessert sounds good, except for that pesky animal hide part.

"More good things to eat" implies that Ham 'n' Cheese Loaf is good. Au contraire - any recipe that instructs "mixture mounds when dropped from spoon" does not count as good.

And that concludes our gelatine tour - thanks for stopping by!

Beautiful but chilly ...

A view of Manzanita and Nehalem Bay from a viewpoint on 101.

 * Last week Glen and I took a well-deserved vacation, motoring down the Oregon coast in a Rialta. We had a blast, staying in state parks, wearing long sleeves to the beach, shopping at Tarjey and Trader Joe's, and browsing antique stores. Here's a sample of my finds!

"Disneyland's 5/8 scale doubledecker Omnibus carries hundreds of passengers daily on a fun-filled tour of Main Street. Camera fans especially like the unique angles the Omnibus' second deck provides."

6 Disneyland postcards! According to the wacky lady owner, these postcards were released just after Disneyland opened and go for $10 on eBay ;) Had they not been $2 each, I would have bought twice as many.

The back says "Pacific Telephone Employees' Booklet Rack Service"

As my husband pointed out, ALL cakes are cakes men like. Some sound pretty tasty, though - Banana Spice Cake with Banana Butter Frosting!

Picked up 6 more paperbacks for the ever-growing pulp collection. I love this cover!

We also visited Tillamook Cheese for a free tour and free samples of cheese and ice cream. Of course we had to buy some as well ;) A tasty tasty stop for sure.

After reentering Canada, we stopped at Ikea and got a lovely Benno DVD tower that's just perfect for paperbacks. And FINALLY some plain kitchen dish towels! Let the embroidery begin.

apple sauce!

* I've really been lucky in finding vintage embroidery patterns lately! I go a while with nothing, then boom! Here's my latest find, only 50¢ at the swap meet :)

"Enliven your kitchen or dinette with these adorable animated fruits with their intriguing quips."

Cute cute cute! I love the pineapple cooler and the sugar plum. The pattern is uncut so no pieces are missing - yay! It also has some floating small border-type designs, including dancing cherries and a parade of berries.

"A parade of amusing vegetables that play and dance on tablecloths, napkins, curtains and towels."

I'm a sucker for anthropomorphic food I guess. This one had been cut, so the running tomato, the dancing green beans and the sitting purple thing are missing. I love that the onion is crying. Found this one at a thrift store up island, which is fast becoming one of the top thrift stores to find stuff we like - it has a great book section and craft section.

I have plenty of floral pillowcase borders, but who could resist that kitten in a shoe! Mom Walds Place in the New Embroidery with Vintage Patterns group on Flickr did an adorable version as a shoe bag :)

I have just one problem - where do I find good quality tea towels and placemats so I can use all these patterns? I've looked in Wal-Mart (ugh), Superstore, Home Outfitters and Zellers. All the ones I find are either made from the wrong kind of fabric, or already patterned, or waffle textured so the stitching wouldn't look right. And the ones I find at swap meets or thrift stores already have embroidery on them, or they are from the 80s. 

The search continues ... (if only I could sew).

can't sleep, wallpaper will eat me ...

I don't usually do 70s, but this book was cheap and the colour photos had to be shared! "Decorating Your Child's Room" by Carole S. Frankel, copyright 1971. I realize that children's rooms look good when they are colourful, but this is too much.

"Note that the gay design is carried out in the easy-care, easy-to-apply hard surface flooring."

This photo was provided by the Flintkote/Latex Foam Rubber Council. ;) The room looks huge thanks to the absence of a rug. Many of these rooms involve built-in furniture, which is a great idea but sure limits changing things around once the child has grown and tastes have changed.

"Teens with tiny rooms might consider the airy chic of wicker furniture. The light scale makes it ideal for bed/sitting rooms."

All the light and airy chic in the world isn't going to overcome that WALLPAPER. I do like how all the book covers match. Even the pencil is yellow!

"A shared bedroom can express two very distinct personalities. Note that the boy's side has a desk, while the pre-school toddler insisted on a miniature dressing table just like mommy's!"

 That is a good idea, but based on the width of the dresser those are some shallow drawers. The yellow isn't so bad, but the orange is burning my eyes.

"An Early American home need not call for traditional furnishings, as this shared bedroom dramatically proves. Red, white and blue, a recent, as well as an "early" American color scheme, has great appeal for girls as well as boys."

I grew up in the 70s, and how well I remember the "rustic" furniture, and the red, white and blue explosion to celebrate the centennial! I don't see it used as a colour scheme much lately; the closest would be a navy blue and white nautical/boat flag theme, which sometimes has a touch of red as well.
And look at the points on the corners of the beds - just picture the horsing around, the fall onto one of those, the nice round bruise that would last for weeks. 

"Fire-engine red carpet in a synthetic, easy-care fiber sparks the setting and takes daily punishment from its energetic master with no change!"

How anybody would be able to sleep in there is beyond me. But the carpet would enhance the "floor is lava" game :)

Until next time, namaste!