Top Ten and Stylish Blogger Award: Cheers, My Dears!

In the last couple of months, I've been lucky enough to snag two Blogger awards from two dolls whose musings I adore reading!

The first is the Stylish Blogger Award:



This was passed to me by the lovely Annimal over at Annimal House

I'm supposed to list some things about me that I've not revealed in my blog. Ok, my dears. Here goes:

1.
For six years, I worked for the anti-fashion Abercrombie and Fitch. Shock, Horror!!! I even worked for them while I was in fashion school in London. If I had class before work, I'd take my A&F clothes with me so that I wouldn't have to be seen by my classmates in non-fashion/conformity.




2. When I was 10, I started taking flute lessons. I'm not that good anymore, due mainly to lack of practice, but I'll bet I can still play the solo from California Dreamin' like a pro!

3. I'm a nail biter....well picker really. My fingernails always look terrible!

4. I have three BA's: American Fine Arts/Visual Design Concentration, American Fashion Design, and British Fashion Design....and still can't find a flipping job.




5. My favourite drink is Pimm's and Lemonade, closely followed by Gin and Tonic.










6. As if the All-American-ness of A&F weren't bad enough, I was also a cheerleader in high school as well as in college. Actually, I loved it!






7. I hate peanut butter flavoured desserts. Just the thought of them makes me want to hurl. And don't even get me started on peanut butter and chocolate. Gross. Except for those lovely Reese's eggs they have at Easter! They're quite yumsy!




I've also been showered with the 'Top Ten Award' from Kaitlyn at Born Late :




I'm supposed to list my top ten favourite beauty products:

1. Coty Airspun Loose Face Powder. This fab product has been around since 1934, and I've been using it since I was in high school. I love it. I do however hate that they've changed the scent of it in the past couple of years. Now it has a kind of Noxzema-ish/Vicks Vapo Rub under smell. One of the things I loved was the sweet powdery smell of the original without any hint of menthol or eucalyptus, thank you very much. Shame on you, Coty.



2. Rimmel Glam'Eyes Liquid Liner in Black. I love Rimmel liquid liner. It doesn't smudge, smear, or flake. The bad thing is that all of the liquid liners that they offer in the US come with a brush applicator....I can't work with a brush applicator. This means that I've been cleaning and disinfecting my Rimmel Exaggerate Liner applicator top (from my last purchase from Boots on Carnaby Street) so that I can replace the brush with the pen applicator every time I buy more. Annoying.



3. Alpha-H Liquid Gold. Great skin firmer. I use it makes my skin look super fresh and, more importantly, the uneven colour (redness) around the middle of my face has disappeared since I've started using it.


4. Another Alpha-H product: Mr And Miss H PHase Three Clearing Gel. This is the best spot remedy EVER! And it doesn't dry my skin like other spot creams do. And it smells really lovely.



5. The Body Shop Morroccan Rose Eau de Toilette fragrance. I've always liked rosey perfumes, but they have a tendency to smell a bit like an old lady at a bingo game....or a funeral. But this scent from The Body Shop is gorgeous! It's got a nice rose scent, but it's tamed a bit by spicy as well as citrus undertones.




6. Fake Eyelashes. I really don't care which brand, although I am partial to Naturalites 101. Unfortunately, I can't find those in the States, so I've been using the Mod Lash equivilant quite often.



7. 17 (Boots) Blusher in Damson Wine. I love this blusher! Unfortunately for me, I've run out! It's the exact colour of a blusher I used to use in high school that I think was by Cover Girl. It got discontinued and I was devistated, but Boots' house brand made up for it! It's a good colour for those of us who are very pale, but with a yellowish undertone.



8. Gold Bond Ultimate Healing Lotion with Aloe. This is THE best body lotion out there if you have dry skin!



9. Silvikrin Maximum Hold Hairspray. It holds like a pro without being sticky...or stinky! Again, though, something I can't get in the US. While here, I've been using Net Effect Professional Mega Hairspray. It's about the same and doesn't smell too bad.



10. Rimmel Extra Super Lash Mascara. Great stuff!



For both awards I'm supposed to link to some great blogs that I follow, so I'll combine it and do them all here!....

My Pretty Baby Cried She Was a Bird

Plaid Stallions: Rambling and Reflections on '70s pop culture

Smashingbird

And Your Cowboy Mouth

Dear Beatrice

Night Lights

Magic Mac

Nifty*Thrifty*Retro*Mama

The Modern Day Flapper

Alison's Wonderland

"Gypsy Glad Rags For High Fashion Nomads": 1967, Look Magazine

Look Magazine, 1967.

'LET YOURSELF GO GYPSY'.....



"At Romany banquet, Mirella, with fowl in her lap, wears vivid blouse and skirt of silk jersey and cotton; Isa, with bird in hand, a pajama of printed cotton jersey."

















"Hitting the hay the gypsy way, Mirella in silk-organdy ruffled pajamas, mini-blouse. Pablo used dark body makeup, buffed to a sheen, bronze base with pink-brown blusher on face, silvered lipstick."












"Mirella swirls to off-camera gypsy violins in a skirt of fiery scarves worn low on hips and suspended from a jeweled chain belt. Another scarf and a bib of beads top her supple bronzed midriff."



"According to Ian Yoors, whose book The Gypsies was published by Simon and Schuster early this month, the wandering Rom have a saying: yekka buliasa nashti beshes pe done grastende (with one behind, you cannot sit on two horses). Straight-arrow Isa demonstrates. Her polka-dot blouse knots povocatively above enourmous Romany-striped cotton skirt."

Vintage '60s Fashion Patterns!

Hello my little dolls!!

I've been trying to get some things properly photogged for Etsy, but can't get anyone to actually take the bloody things. Quite annoying, but whatever. In the meantime, I'm doing some more toiles of some vintage patterns. The latest one is a perfect example of why.
This pattern for 1950s slim trousers looks VERY slim if you're going by the sketch:



In reality, once I got them together they look more like this:



Add to that they're far to small for me...25 waist my arse...so i've added an inch to them at the waist and tapered the legs down by 2 inches as well as adding an extend tab waistband, which the inside sketch shows and the directions allude to, but which isn't figured into the original pattern....go figure? Going to put the new pieces together tomorrow and if this alteration works out, I'll be sizing the final result for some lovely slim/cigarette trousers to make for my eventual Etsy shop.

I 've picked up some fab patterns lately as well as all the lovely '60s and '70s fabric I posted the other day. Some of the packages are a bit rough, but the patterns are complete and clean!...and they were only 5 cents each!
Here's some of the best ones:





















Can't wait to make some of these in vintage fabrics for sale!

I'll keep you posted!

DB x

Band Of The Month: Creedence Clearwater Revival--An American Soundtrack 1968-1972

For today's post, my lovelies, I've decided to focus on one of my personal favourite bands of the late '60s/early '70s, Creedence Clearwater Revival.




CCR and I go way back. I don't remember our very first meeting as I'm sure I was most likely less than a year old. You see, my dad was always a huge fan of them from his college days and they were played often around our house when I was little.




My first tangable CCR memory is of weekend trips to the lake with my parents. My dad had an old uber-cool '71 Blazer that we used to pull the boat on those excursions to the lake house. It was green with a black top and was nicknamed 'The Green Bean'.



It had an 8-track player in it and the only two 8-tracks we ever listened to on the way to the lake were Janis Joplin and, of course, CCR. I don't remember which album it was...most likely Cosmo's Factory or a Greatest Hits ...as I super young and it disappeared with the Green Bean itself. But I DO remember that 'Lookin' Out My Back Door' was on it. To this day it's my favourite Creedence tune and always reminds me of the lake!

Another favourite is Bad Moon Risin'. Again, it reminds me of my dad. I remember him telling me when I was little that they were saying, "There's a bathroom on the right". Of course I believed him and he had me thinking that really was the line for years. I reminded him of it a few days ago and he almost fell out of his chair laughing at me. Here's a pic of the two of us...he kind of looks like he could be in CCR himself!...



I always loved CCR's Deep Southern sound...although they weren't from the Deep South at all! Instead they were from San Francisco, but nevertheless they were pioneers of the 'Southern Rock' genre that flourished in the early 1970s.




Creedence was formed in the late '50s as The Blue Velvets. In the mid-'60s they changed their name to The Golliwogs. In 1968, the band known now as Creedence Clearwater Revival released their self titled debut album.





By 1969, the band was huge. They played Woodstock in August of that year...a great setlist including 'Commotion', 'Green River', and 'Susie Q'.






That same year, 1969, the band had THREE albums in the top ten after Willy and The Poor Boys was released in November. Cosmo's Factory was released less than a year later.





This article is scanned from my copy of the March 1970 issue of Song Hits Magazine where they were 'Pop Star of the Month' (click and enlarge to read it!):



Creedence Clearwater Revival disbanded in 1972, but individual band members have continued to play their music. Although I was always disappointed that I was born far too late to hear them together way back then, I was lucky enough to see John Fogarty in 2005 in Asheville, North Carolina. I was not disappointed any longer! John is just as good a show now as in 1970. If you ever have the opportunity, I highly recommend catching one of his gigs.