My favorite dress right now!

Hey everyone! You all may remember me wearing this dress a while ago in my thrifting video. You can watch the video over here-http://singinginhisname.blogspot.com/2011/03/thrifting-introductionhaul.html
Well I have found that I can wear it without a blouse under it and its still pretty modest I believe. Its cool and light for the humid summers here.
I bought it for 8 or 9 dollars I believe when I was about 12 or 13 and I still love it. :) I am wearing a pair of earrings that are from when I was about 7 from Florida and my gladiator sandals I scored for $20.00 2 years ago. So this outfit cost me about $30.00 overall, but these peices have been used in my wardrobe for a while, so I say they have been paid for considering how long I have been wearing them. The pearls were given to me for my 18th b-day by my parents.

I hope you all are having a lovely summer! Its busy for me since I am still doing clep tests, but its a good busy. :) What is your favorite thing to wear in the summer? Mine are definately dresses and sandals! :)

In Christ,
Rebecca

1940s Swing dress done!

Hey everyone! I was inspired to finish the swing dress this morning and now its finished!  I adore it and wanted to wear it all day today, but thought I should save it for my grandparents 50th wedding anniversary celebration that my family is going to on Tuesday. We will be gone to see them and the rest of my mom's side of the family for 2 weeks! I can't believe it. Its going to go by so fast too.

I never thought when I was a little girl I would learn how to sew. To tell you the truth I guess I thought naturally all clothing came from the store already made.  Then my sister had an interest in sewing clothing herself and I was interested, but after many attempts to sew a garment, it usually ended in frustration. Then about 3 years ago this October, I decided to try my hand at it again when we dove into civil war reenacting. That was my introduction to sewing again and after sewing the underpinnings and a civil war dress, I can sew modern garments pretty easily with a little fiddling. :)

No this dress is not perfect and you would see that with up close photos, but its a great church/everyday dress style for me. I am going to sew some more of these in the future. I would highly recommend Jennie's pattern to intermediate seamstresses. It was a little difficult on those shoulder seams and getting the bodice to fit right. But I did this dress all by myself! The first modern dress I have ever done! Its exciting! 

I decided not to put in a zipper as Jennie says in her pattern. I used the Sense and Sensibility swing dress pattern. You can see her website here.

I also omitted the ties in the back. I was really wanting to get this done and could not find the tie pattern piece and did not feel as though I wanted to figure it out myself. :) I used a polyester semi sheer fabric I scored at Joann fabrics in March for about $8.00 for all three yards. It was on the red tag clearance table and I was so excited to sew up a dress out of it. I started seeing what patterns we had available in our stash and always wanting a 1940's swing dress, the journey of sewing this dress began in May.

You can see my pictures of starting it here.

I also changed the bodice somewhat. I wanted the waist band to not be over my tummy and to be at my natural waist, so I made the bodice shorter and put the waist band higher. I am very satisfied with that! Its much more flattering. :) I did have to change the bodice as it was too big in the bust for me. I did not change the skirt a bit, except I did find it was a little too big when I was putting it to the bodice, so I added a pleat in the front. This was probably because of the seam allowance in the skirt for the side zipper that I omitted. I am not going to lie, its a little hard to get the dress over my head, but with a little wiggle and being pretty careful it can be done. :)

Oh and the belt I added last minute when Bethany, my sister, did the photos and I love it! It was one dollar at the thrift store and the shoes were $3.00 as well, from the thrift store. I love the overall finished outfit!

Have a lovely day and one more post coming Saturday before we leave for my grandparents home!

In Christ,
Rebecca

Sue Gregg cookbook booth

Hi everyone! My family and I started doing the Sue Gregg booth at our local homeschool convention last year and we did it again this past weekend. If you have not heard of Sue Gregg you can see her website here-www.suegregg.com 

The basic idea of her books is that you can use whole foods and whole grains in place of processed white flour and sugar and other ingredients that are not as healthy even if you are on a budget. She has menu plans by month and many recipes and tips on using whole foods and grains in your cooking and baking.

My sister managed the booth this year and we were so suprised that setting up the booth only took us 45 minutes! Compared to last year taking us 3 hours!! Praise God we have a better idea now how to set up and tear down the booth efficiently! thank you to all the sue gregg volunteers! We could have not done it without you and thank you to all the eager people at the convention that were eager to learn about a new way to view food. :)

In Christ,
Rebecca

May Secession Vote Reenactment

 Hello everyone! I have been so so busy, life is so full, but I wanted to share with you all a reenactment my family did in May in our hometown. It was a secession vote reenactment of when the confederate states seceded from the Union. My family went and set of camp and participated as civilians as usual, except this time we actually acted as citizens of the town. We were not allowed to have a camp fire, so we brought sandwhiches and other period food that did not need to be cooked. My sister and I above are quilting the quilt I posted about earlier this year. We are finally getting it finished. :)
My sister and I have also put pictures on our website here of things we are selling-www.viennawoodsrepros.com
So please do go and see what we are up to! There are aprons, bonnets, soap, and many more items we have made with care on there! They are all based off of what you would have used in the civil war period. So what fun to have something that was similar to what would have been used in time for the 150th anniversary of the war! :)

My dad telling about the telegraph and how it was used instead of cell phones or computers to communicate intelligence information to the different armies. It was also used to send the results of the secession votes to Richmond, which was the capital then.

We also had a lot of children and teens to tell about quilting. Here is one photo we got me showing a gal how to thread a needle and quilt the quilt. We try to be very hands on with our demonstrations of period life. So why not have the spectators in on sewing the quilt?!

My mother above manning our table where we were selling period items we made such as slat bonnets, aprons, signal flags, and soap.

Overall it was a lovely day! Wonderful weather and lots of people that were very interested in the history of the american civil war. I just came home sunday with my family from the HEAV homeschool convention of VA. It was wonderful! We are gearing up for another reenactment friday and saturday and then we leave to go and see my grandparents. Hence the reason for sparatic blog posts. I am so glad to be able to finally share with you all the Secession vote pictures. All of these were not done by me, a nice gentleman also did some of these and I don't have his name to give him credit, but they are amazing aren't they! For once I was in the photos, since I usually do pictures when there are no other people to do it.

Feminism vs. Women in Christ relying on God

Ladies I realize I have been absent for a while, I believe this blog will be silent for most of this month. There are so many other things that are top priority right and blogging will never be one of them. But I wanted to share this video, its quite convicting and if you do not know what feminism is or realize that its not giving you fulfillment in Christ then watch this video. I especially loved the last part, which is part 5 of the series. Praise God that He is enough! Praise God that He is bigger than we are! Praise God that we can submit to Him in an age that submits to ourselves as god. Praise God He is alive and hears the crys of His children who need Him in this time where many turn to themselves for fulfillment. Christ is the only way to joy and fulfillment ladies.
Have a lovely rest of your day!
In Christ,
Rebecca

Thrifting and lovely finds

I was gifted by an older women with some lovely belt buckles! I was so excited as I was the only one out of the three women in my family, my mom, sister and I who wear belts. So I got to keep all these lovlies!I had too much fun photographing them with the old tree as a great backdrop!

They came in all shapes and sizes and colors and some of them still un-used on the cards! The ones on the cards say 90 cents each! I am curious how old they are, I am thinking not very old, but still they are a treasure, as you can't find any in the stores such as these. :)

 

I was so excited when I realized that this lovely ribbon the older lady gave us would make a great belt! I loved the cheerful flower and heart design! It makes me remember my childhood. :) *unicorns and toad stools and fairies* Then I found out they were not real. :)

The dress is Merino brand from Target- thrifted $4.00

Vintage leather peep toe heals- $.75 thrifted

belt - free!

blue necklace- gift made by a friend

Jean shoulder bag- Ashley of Bramblewood fashion( won in a give away!) thank you Ashley! I love it! Its my summer go to bag! :) see her blog here-http://bramblewoodfashion.blogspot.com/

White lace head band- Garlands of Grace Etsy shop ( purchased with my birthday money in April) visit their store here-http://www.etsy.com/shop/GarlandsOfGrace?ref=ss_profile

total for outfit- $4.75!!!

Oh and on another note, you all may be wondering, hey that dress seems a little short Rebecca! Well I don't believe its too short, it covers all the areas I believe need covering. Anyones thoughts on this? Are the knees in some way not modest to show?! My dad does not think so, but hey some people may believe it can distract guys. Been wondering what guys and gals might think on the subject of well knees. :)

Have a lovely rest of your wednesday! I decided to dress up a bit more since my dad is going on a date with my sister and I. :) Can't wait!

In Christ,
Rebecca