All posts tagged: vintage

Vintage of the future?

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I passed Urban Outfitters last week and in the window was a whole display of retro looking record players.  It didn’t make me miss my record player as I never had my own, I used the one in the living room which was attached to the giant stereo system. I did however own a cassette player and I admit I would be totally into a window display of these.  This year also celebrates 50 years of the cassette tape (nice fun fact to make you feel elderly).  Most of my music was on good old C90 tape. Never C45, which only held half the music of a C90, I wanted an album on each side of my tape thank you very much. Anyway, the lotso record players made me wonder, will the same window be full of 1st generation white chunky iPods in 30 or 40 years time? Are you keeping your old iPod or smart phone so that your kids and grandkids can marvel at the ancient technology of the heady past of 2013? …

Making ‘catseatdogs’ jewels

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I made a quick long necklace today on a complete whim.  I pulled out the top/dress I like when the weather is like the inside of an oven with no cakes, and decided I needed a long necklace to wear with it. I have had this sliced up tagua nut set for a while and have never really decided how to use them.  Funny how all of a sudden a design pops into your head and you know exactly how to execute it.  So, I grabbed my leather and tied them on, chose a button and made a fastener with it.  Ta dah! I love these simple necklaces I made last week, they are light to wear and look great together or alone.  I have some similar necklaces which I wear with everything.  They are in my Etsy store if you want to see more photos. I washed up some buttons today which I have had a while, stored in an old cake tin which I think is the storage of choice for vintage buttons. …

August ten on the 10th

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A lovely day for today’s ten on the 10th. We headed into St Louis to explore a junk shop we like and to visit The Upcycle Exchange to check out some new yarn they have in. We lunched at the Everest Cafe on The Grove and came home and made a ‘base’ in the garden! The ‘base’ was built with supplies we got at the Upcycle Exchange and lots of imagination. I am going to do a post about it next week with lots of photos. Here are today’s terrific ten. A wonderful window at Anthropologie. I keep seeing this cool guy and managed to snap his photo today! Flowers on a painted screen, only slightly spoiled by water damage.  Still lovely. Vintage luggage on a barber’s chair. Lovely vintage Singer sewing machine. Best doll face I have seen. This can had dates in it still! Love this peacock. Piles and piles of wool at the Upcycle Exchange. Cumin seeds and sweet thingys at Everest Cafe. A fun day filled with treasure. You will be …

June 2013 Photo a day

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I cannot believe how fast June has zipped by (I am sure I say that every month!).  At the same time, when I look back at the photos from the beginning of the month, they seem so long ago. We have been on holiday to Cape Cod for two whole weeks, then I was back in St Louis for about 10 minutes and I was off to New York for the Alt Summit and a lovely weekend in Brooklyn. It has been hot and cool and wet and stormy. I followed the A Month of… prompts from Just B Australia for most of the month, but by the last week I was back to Fat Mum Slim.  Apparently it is harder to break a habit than I thought!  I do enjoy the FMS prompts though even though they do circle round on a regular basis, but that just makes for a new photo challenge, n’est pas?! Well, here are  my June daily snaps. 1. Tea 2. Story. 3. Fabric 4. Party.  Pie from Marion’s Pie …

Cool things I have found

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Seaweed flowers on the beach. There is a ton of seaweed, and I like that some of it looks like flowers. I spot the pretty ones and take a photo. Never arrange what I find, just take a snap and keep looking. Chips. These chips are yum! Spotted in Trader Joes. Buttons in a lovely box. I must confess I love the box that these buttons are in as much as the buttons. The brass hearts are the reason I had to have them. There are some mother of pearl buttons in here too and a pin!

A Beautiful Mess iPhone app is here!

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This week saw the very exciting launch of the A Beautiful Mess iPhone app.  Emma and Elsie at ABM had been talking up the app for a few weeks, would it live up to the hype?  Yes, yes it does. It is available internationally and costs 99c here in the US. There is a great base of doodles and frames, texts and filters.  Not many filters, but there are so many filter apps available, I wasn’t too bothered about that. I loved the doodles and borders options.  They have a ton of colour options too and if you layer them up, you can get some fab effects! My Sindy doll helped me experiment with the A Beautiful Mess app! In the top photo, she is sporting a vintage 1970’s original crocheted dress which I think my Mum made, the ukulele/guitar  is also vintage (from way back when I was a little girl). I added various borders, adding layers and colours.  I love the effect of lots of the same layers, just moved slightly. In the …

What did you get up to this weekend?

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I went out early (ish) on Saturday to trawl yard sales.  There was one at a local church and I had high hopes for treasure.  I wasn’t disappointed! I got four scarves in all, but these two are the prettiest. I think the blue one is silk, the flowers on it are so delicate, they might even be hand painted. The pink one might be a head scarf and it was ‘Made in France’  for a St Louis department store of the olden days called ‘Stix, Baer and Fuller’. The department store was open from 1892 until 1984. This scarf  looks very 1960’s, but I am not sure as I can’t find any images of it. Do you know any St Louis ‘Stix, Baer and Fuller’ history?  Do share.  You know where the comments are, get to it! I missed this pan when I did my initial sale walk through.  I spotted it when I had already gathered what I thought was my final choices.  I have been looking for a tube/bundt/angel cake tin for …

1977 Needlework and Crafts

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Happy Earth Day! Remember to recycle and reuse. Walk or bike where you can. Plant some vegetables or some flowers or some herbs, or all of them! May your trash can be empty, your legs be strong and your garden green! Talking of recycling, look at this fab McCall’s Needlework and Crafts magazine from Spring 1977.  In 1977 I was seven years old and into ‘Sindy’ dolls and ‘Spirograph’. These crochet flowers are gorgeous and check the fake soil and moss! Creepy or cute? Same question.  I quite like the gangly rabbit, but his teeth look like they want to eat me, or those mice.  Pick the mice Mr Rabbit. Of course I adore these macrame pieces.  I think they are a little bit cool, even the tiles they are photographed on are cool.  I love the statement on the opposite page ‘macrame jewelry is always right!’  Maybe I will steal that tag line for my catseatdogs jewelry! Now, here is something I want to make.  Peas in a pod which unzips!  That place mat …

February Photo a Day 2013

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Another month of daily photos complete!  I must say, I do like to look back over the month and see what I took.  Some of this month’s have been a struggle and resulted in a quick snap and done, like ‘fork’ and ‘where you ate your lunch’.  On the other hand I am really happy with some of the photos like the ‘hope’ mittens and the last one ‘upside down’.  Nothing like a mess about with a few apps to make a boring prompt a bit more interesting, which I suppose is the whole point of the challenge. If you fancy joining in, here are the March prompts – Fat Mum Slim photo a day. Day 1. Fork Fork in a cake at Handmade Happy Hour in Home Wine Kitchen which is a fabulous local restaurant and venue. Day 2. Pattern. Close up of the pattern in some vintage fabric I bought from Miss Ohio Vintage, I plan to make a summer infinity scarf with it. Day 3. Something beginning with e.   A school …

Twenty five cents worth of joy

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Up this morning in the dark and cold, freezing – dig out gloves and hats and boots cold. Two days ago it was 84 degrees, this morning was 40, so the gloves had to be hunted down. We set up our yard sale as part of a city wide sale extravaganza! Boxes and bags of toys were brought up from the basement. Toys and books were wrestled over – ‘Let’s sell’ ‘No I want to keep it, it’s sentimental’ Why is a toy which hasn’t been seen in two years suddenly sentimental when someone else might buy it? It maybe came from a yard sale in the first place! Eventually everyone agreed on yard sale stock and customers arrived. Coffee was made and pumpkin syrup added and off we went into the Brentwood yard sales. First stop was a sale right at the end of the street along from us.  After avoiding ‘Big Game Hunting’ magazines by the pile (I nearly ran away at the mere thought) I spotted my 25c wonder. He was wobbling …