Thrifting and my Memorial day outfit

just had to do a photo of this great little pouch my parents gave me for my birthday in April! Not sure how old it is, but that fabric is great isn't it?!

 Hey everyone! I hope your Memorial day was not only fun but also filled with joy in the Lord. Praise God that mine was! He gave me joy today as I have starting really having to ask for that daily these days. :) But praise God He gives us joy when we ask for it! I was a grump a lot this past week because I was not spending as much time in prayer and with the Lord as I should have. I just needed to get back into being with my Savior because its not a duty and its because I need and want to be with Him in prayer and meditating on His Word.

Praise God as well for all our veterans who have served in our armed forces over the many years the United States has been a country under God! Praise God as well for the troops who are still over seas and have just come home. My dad is a veteran so all the troops really mean a lot to me! I don't believe I would appreciate the military as much as I do if it were not for my dads example of making sacrifices to defend our country as well as my grandfather's example as well. Praise God for all these brave men!

But anyway back to the outfit and thrifting post. :) I was blessed to have this blouse come into my wardrobe Tuesday when my mother found it at our local charity thrift shop here in our home town. Its H&M and it seemed as though it had never been worn! $4.00 and I was sold. :) I have two white blouses in my wardrobe already, but they seem to be a new staple to my wardrobe for summer, so another was a big help to me.

 

I also wore my favorite brown thrifted belt I found a while ago last February I believe. Its been a wardrobe staple for me as well, it defines a waist well with shirts and blouses as well as dresses. I believe belts are great! They are my favorite wardrobe accessory really. :) Can you tell by my outfits I post?! The red skirt is one that was made about 5 years ago. It was the first skirt I believe I ever made! I remember getting the fabric and being excited to try out doing my first skirt with my sisters help. She ended up doing the hard past, the zipper, of course! But I still learned a lot and now I am glad to say I can put in zippers with confidence. :)

Now for the reveal of my favorite, most amazing thrift find to date I believe!!! On friday my mother and I went to the charity thrift shop again, yes we went twice this week because we had some donations on friday, so we just had to see if I could find a pair of black 1940's ish sandals! I had found so many expensive ones online on etsy and did not want to pay all that money! So when I dug through the rows of shoes and found these in my size I was floored!!!

The Lord truly helped me find them as He usually does and I am proud to say I paid only $3.00 for these beauties that I believe will get so much wear for many years! I paid with my change from my coin purse! What a blessing and what a surprise these were to find.  They are real leather and the heel is not too high for daily wear in my opinion. Lord willing photos of them with my swing dress to come.

Have a lovely rest of your week!
In Christ,
Rebecca

Outfit of the day and a thrift find

 Hey everyone! I have been blessed to find an abundance of items at thrift stores in my short life. I don't even go to department stores anymore or the mall. I either sew it up or get it from a friend or the thrift store. Its much better for my budget and clothing needs. I love vintage clothing and styles and I can usually sew that or find it used and actually I guess its sort of becoming a trend. But I have always loved vintage/old clothing styles before they were "in". :)

 I found this vintage navy blue belt on wednesday when we went to a local charity thrift store in my town I had not visited in years. I was suprised to find this beauty for 75 cents, yes thats right $.75! I have seen the same type of belt for much more online on etsy, so I was excited to find this one for a very frugal price. It goes well with my navy blue jean 40's/50's inspired skirt I made this past fall. This skirt has become my spring/summer favorite! It goes with just about every top I own and is light weight, but at the same heavy enough for rainy days.Its become my go to item in my closet. I made it from Simplicity pattern 2758, which was super easy to sew up, I posted about another one I made from the same pattern here-http://singinginhisname.blogspot.com/2010/11/finished-sewing-project-black-skirt.html

The t-shirt was a gift from my parents as a souvenir when we went to visit my Grandparents years ago. I realized that with a belt I can dress up a t-shirt pretty easy and still have a nice outfit. Casual, but feminine! Love it! Tomorrow I am posting pictures of more thrift store finds.

 

Have a lovely day! It was the first really humid day here yesterday, so summer clothing ideas are being put together my yours truly. I will post some of my ideas tomorrow. 

In Christ,

Rebecca

Sewing A Swing dress

vintage singer sewing machine is up and going finally! We had it serviced and now my sister and I are loving it for heavy duty sewing, such as slat bonnets we are putting up for sale on our website soon. Sewing through cardboard would not go well on my Janome modern machine. :)

 Hello everyone! I have been sewing up a storm today and since Monday. I decided to sew myself up a 1940's swing dress. I watched this movie here-http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036160/ and this movie-http://www.amazon.co.uk/Two-Thousand-Women-Phyllis-Calvert/dp/B000MOUA3G and that was dangerous! Now I just really badly want a swing dress. :) Both very fun movies by the way! I would recommend them to older viewers though, both have romance scenes in them that are a little intimate. And of course in the era drinking and smoking were both very prevalent, of course its that way today too. Basically if you are under 18 ask your parents permission before watching. :) They were pretty enjoyable though and gave me a lot more insight into what it was like during world war 2 in Britain that is. Wonderful dresses in both movies! great inspiration!

My yellow roses have been doing so so well! I will post a tutorial for doing rose water later. It smells wonderful!

I have the bodice finished now, except for the waist band. In these photos I was in the middle of hemming the sleeves with some lace an older woman just gifted us with! I was so excited as its so much easier to hem with flat lace and its so much prettier. :)

I studied for psychology while hand sewing the inside seams with french seams and hemming the sleeves with lace as well as pinning the sleeves into the bodice and then sewing them up. I am trying to finish the dress so I can wear it on Sunday morning for church, but we will see if that works out because I am not the most timely seamstress. So many other things to do besides sewing. :) Also it may just be hideous and I might not want you all to see the finished result. :) But I believe that will not happen Lord willing! :)

I have not sewn a dress in about a year because every time I tried to sew a modern dress by myself or any dress by myself it turned out unwearable. Civil war gowns I have usually had help to sew them. But I have never sewn a 40's dress before. But it seems to be going well so far. I love love love my fabric! I bought it off the red tag table at our Joann's in April and its a polyester/rayon blend I believe. Its gotten humid these past few days in the high 90 degrees Fahrenheit, so I hope to get it done for Sunday before we get 100 degree Fahrenheit weather!

The lovely lace above! I just loved using it for hemming! It was so much easier. I also received these vintage scissors from the nice older lady who gave us some sewing supplies. They are nice and sharp and great for seam ripping. I hate seam rippers because they are never sharp! So small scissors are much better for me. 

The pattern I am using is from Sense and Sensibility patterns and you can find their website in the side bar under my favorite web sites list. The bodice above as well, its hard to see with the busy print the details, but I love that because you can't see my mistakes as well. :)

The fabric up close and personal above. I thought it was funny because some of the flowers seem to resemble spider webs, but you did not notice that right?? I will just look as if its a bit of lace in between the roses. :)
I hope your day has gone well! Its been lovely here. I will be sharing some outfit posts soon and progress on the swing dress as well as a tutorial on how to make rose water Lord willing soon. I tried it Tuesday and its wonderful! Also some thrift store finds as well will be shared soon. :) Do head over to Casey's Elegant Musings to see her finished swing dress in the mean time. Its so cute! :) http://elegantmusings.com/tag/swing-dress-sew-along/

In Christ,
Rebecca

Way to help our sisters in Christ and their families

Hey everyone!

When I heard about some sisters in Christ and their families in Alabama lost everything in the tornado, I wanted to help and LAF has a great way to do that. If you love to sew and have some extra sewing notions, fabrics, or any other things that are useful for sewing such as patterns you can send them to them! Read about it here-http://www.ladiesagainstfeminism.com/what-can-we-do/sewing-love-for-the-lee-and-crawford-ladies/#more-2995

They are also raising money for a sewing machine for each of the two families. So you can also help them out in that way! they are almost to the goal of money they need for each machine. Apparently they sewed a lot of their families clothing, so sewing supplies are needed. Just wanted to let ladies that read my blog that also sew see somewhere they can send their sewing notions they are not longer needing. :) My sister and I actually have quite a few things. :)

In Christ,
Rebecca

My Hair Care routine update and self sufficiency

Hello everyone!

I have been asked by a few friends in person and on the blog sphere what my hair care routine actually is. So I am going to try and answer that question in this post. There are so many different things on the internet, it did seem overwhelming and a little scary back in August 2010 when I took the plunge and decided to wash my hair with an egg and some baking soda and water. :) I first heard about the method from the Feelin Feminine website. You can find it here-http://feelinfeminine.com/ Jocelyn had also posted a lot of tutorials on her blog A Pondering Heart, that interested me and thats how I took the plunge and washed my hair with a fresh egg from some of our friends hens. :) I also rinsed with apple cider vinegar back then, but now I don't do that anymore and love the results much better.
Little did I realize that I would be changing the way I thought about taking care of my curls. :)

Now here is a recent photo from about a month ago of what hair looks like currently. I believe its much healthier to the touch, not so dry and brittle and much bouncier curls. :)

photo credit-http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/shopping-storing/food/storing-hard-cooked-eggs-10000000695687/index.html

I told you all that the first thing I tried was washing my hair with an egg. Now I do not wash my hair with an egg every day. My new routine that has been working for me is doing it once a week, but washing my hair with water and the egg yoke only. I use the egg white whisked for moose. Like I said I do not do this daily, just once a week. I highly recommend using fresh brown eggs from a farmer you may buy from or friends who have laying hens. But if you can't get that get brown organic, cage free eggs from your grocery store. The white eggs you do not know where they have been and they don't have as much protein and stuff that is good for you in them. Since most white eggs were processed in a plant and were from chickens who were ill treated and not fed good stuff they won't be so great for you. But anyway brown eggs are the best in my opinion! :)

photo credit-http://lifehackery.com/2008/07/22/home-4/

The next thing I use it baking soda, now many of you may be saying it has no smell really and you use that for baking, not washing?! Well baking soda actually is a very good for washing just about anything, hair included. My mom uses it to scrub our sinks and I scrub that sinks in the bathrooms and the bath tub with the stuff. It also works great on tile. I am not sure what is exactly in the stuff that makes it such a great thing to clean with, but it works well for hair as well. I only scrub my scalp with it. I don't dump it all over my hair. I talked about in this post putting a little in the bottom of a condiment/sqeeze bottle and adding water up to the top. I still do this, but I have cut back on how much baking soda I use. My hair is very dry usually and baking soda can dry out your hair. 


I have heard in the no shampoo world that gals like me with hair that tends to be dry use very little( I don't measure it when I put it in the bottle), but I probably use about a teaspoon and a half I am guessing. But definitely experiment yourself to see what is best for you. I have heard gals with hair that tends to get greasy should use more than what I would use, because it will keep there hair not so greasy. 

You may be wondering what do you do for conditioning your hair?! You said you don't use vinegar anymore. Well I stopped using the apple cider vinegar because my dad and sister and mother all said my hair smelled funny, not bad, just a little weird. :) That was before I had added essential oils to my routine. Maybe when you all experiment you could add some essential oils to your routine to cover up the vinegar. But instead of vinegar I have been using an organic conditioner we have that needs to be used up. But now that thats gone I am using egg whites again. But I don't put that in till after I have gotten out of the shower. I don't condition in the shower anymore. This works well for me. You just take one egg white from one egg and whisk it till its frothy and then put it through your hair just as you would a store bought moose or gel.  It works great for me!

I also have started using essential oils. I love to use orange or lavender. I add a few drops to my baking soda shampoo and I put some in my hair between washings when I don't need to wash it but I want some scent. I love the natural scent and I am never using store bought bath and body works sprays again either. I love essential oils instead. I have seen bottles of it at wegmans, which was the best buy for us when we first wanted some essential oils to try and at whole foods. Wholes food is really expensive, so I would recommend that as a last resort. We have now been getting them in bulk from a whole sale company. So that has been great! But definately research how you could make or buy them cheaper than at the regular grocery. I have been making rose oil this past week with yellow roses from my yellow rose bush in our yard. I plant to make some rose water as well. So you could do that as well instead of essential oils. I so very much want to be self sufficient and not need to go to a grocery all the time. We hardly go anymore, since we started growing some veges, going to the farmers markets, getting eggs from a local farmer, milk and meats and cheese as well from a local farmer. So we hardly go anymore! So start small and try and make your own maybe. I was inspired very much this month by the Devrae family.Here is a video about them below-

They are totally self sufficient, well dependent on the land the Lord has given them. I would love for my family and I to be able to be somewhat sufficient as that someday. We are hoping to get laying hens soon, but in our city it may not be aloud. Still seeing if we can though.:) 


well sorry for the rant off of hair care, but definately when you change your life style from buying off a shelf all the time to buying from farmers, etc. or growing it yourself you tend to appreciate and be more thankful for what the Lord has provided. I have found this to be true! No way am I sufficient on only the land the Lord has given my family, but we are trying to be more frugal with our purchases and buying fresh and natural foods and products instead of the massed produced stuff. This has really been on my mind lately after going to the food and farmers rights rally. 


Have a lovely rest of your monday!


In Christ,
Rebecca


I thought I better add a list of places where I found recipes and other encouragement and ideas about going without store bought shampoos and conditioners. 
http://ylcf.org/gotcurl/ - great place for curly girls!
http://aponderingheart.com/blog/?p=4749
http://aponderingheart.com/blog/?p=2201
http://feelinfeminine.com/?page_id=2 - I was featured with my no shampoo story in their e-book on feelin feminine, may be worth your money if you are new to it and want all the resources in one spot!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yF0hizHWghc&feature=related - this gal did a great video telling about what she uses to wash her hair! I got inspired by her in the first place when I found her on the feelin feminine site!

I hope all these links help you all out! :)

A Pure Bride

I read this chapter of Revelation on Sunday and its stayed with me since then! The Lord has prepared His bride and is ready for us! This song by Leeland really said it all for me as well! A Pure Bride is what our Lord is coming for! Not a bride that is dirty and defiled, but one that is pure because of the Lamb! So remember He is wiping away every tear and all the pain and has made His Bride pure through Christ Jesus the Lamb who died for sinners. 

Here is Revelation 21 below and read it and drink from His Word the words of life. Praise God the Holy Spirit dwells in us His people until He returns and then we will be made one with our groom Christ Jesus the Lamb! These words have encouraged me these past few days.

The New Heaven and the New Earth

21:1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place [1] of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, [2] and God himself will be with them as their God. [3] 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

5 And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” 6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. 7 The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8 But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

The New Jerusalem

9 Then came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues and spoke to me, saying, “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.” 10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, 11 having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal. 12 It had a great, high wall, with twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and on the gates the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel were inscribed— 13 on the east three gates, on the north three gates, on the south three gates, and on the west three gates. 14 And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them were the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.

15 And the one who spoke with me had a measuring rod of gold to measure the city and its gates and walls. 16 The city lies foursquare, its length the same as its width. And he measured the city with his rod, 12,000 stadia. [4] Its length and width and height are equal. 17 He also measured its wall, 144 cubits [5] by human measurement, which is also an angel's measurement. 18 The wall was built of jasper, while the city was pure gold, clear as glass. 19 The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every kind of jewel. The first was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald, 20 the fifth onyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, the twelfth amethyst. 21 And the twelve gates were twelve pearls, each of the gates made of a single pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, transparent as glass.

22 And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. 23 And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. 24 By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, 25 and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there. 26 They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations. 27 But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb's book of life."

Have a lovely rest of your thursday and Saturday I am getting photos of my sister and I's business being at our first reenactment. Its so exciting seeing all our creations being made up and labeled to be sold to others. Photos to come!
In Christ,
Rebecca

Jesus Lover of My Soul

I remember singing this song at church when I was about 16 and I forgot about it until now! I love that lots of the words are from the Scriptures, such as You set my feet upon a rock making my steps secure! Thats from Psalm 40! Praise God He is the only lover of our souls! He is always there even when the world falls! I wrote another song about it this and will post it soon.

Btw, got a lot of studying done today! God is so good! I believe I will be able to get through these next two clep tests. :)


In Christ,
Rebecca