Saturday, March 31, 2012

2 of my favorite things

Horses. Beach.
and bonus....Robert Louis Stevenson.
"We consume the carcasses of creatures of like appetites, passions, and organs as our own,
and fill the slaughterhouses daily with screams of pain and fear."





 
 


from here....

last summer Mark and I went to the Greg Kucera Gallery, and this is part of what we saw....


It looks like driftwood, but many of the horse sculptures are really made of bronze and copper. Cast into metal, they were first made of wood. some were...Madrone.....  that tree is one of my favorites. It's a West Coast native...like me. Others were first made of tropical woods...then cast in metal.
 the artist: DEBORAH BUTTERFIELD
Seven Bronze Sculptures,was the show, and the artist.

Friday, March 30, 2012

It's New to You....

Quite a few vintage separates this week ...including a weird and wonderful fringe sweater jacket from the 70s....and quite a few vintage dresses....and oh my! sizes from XS to XL...

60s jacket with fabric roses....



with fringe and crochet balls....a 70s extreme textures thing going on....



Oooh shiny! 70s mini-trench in shiny black nylon....like a windbreaker, but with STYLE !



70s boho pink plaid top...



and Vintage Dresses! are you ready for Spring? Cause it's ready for you!

cutwork halter with BUTTERFLIES !


MOD. dress.



all of these are in the etsy shop, Right Now!
well, you know, unless they are sold...wink.




Crazy metallic wild print dress....with rhinestones......cause it just needed a little bit more....




Malia Hawaiian dress........Bright and Happy !



70s calico peasant dress.......



Black silk party dress !!



Rockabilly 50s style Halter dress..........pretty pink flowers !

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Handmade

gun totes, utility pouches, adjustable messenger bags.... anchor clutch bag, vintage stenciled bleach dyed, vintage denim, old lace, vintage buttons....Where can you get all this handmade goodness?
Here.
When I was designing these bags and pouches, it was really important that they be washable....so many I've looked at have to be dry cleaned ($$$) and toxic, and/or only spot cleaned! Hey, life can get messy....all my bags are washable. Gently, like you would wash a cashmere sweater. Yes, you can and should hand wash cashmere...use Woolite or shampoo. With one of my bags, regular laundry soap is fine, and then hang to dry. Easy Peasy!

Sailor Red Anchor stencil Tote pouch Bleach dyed vintage denim







Road map Lace and calico tote bag






Anchor Star Flag Tote Bag Commodore Boat yacht club







Stripe Tote Bag Cotton canvas rope tie Nautical Sailor





Old hand stencil Tote pouch Bleach dyed vintage denim




Nautical Anchor angel wing small Tote pouch Bleach dyed vintage denim




all at funkomavintage......








Monday, March 26, 2012

Who thought of that first?

who gives a shit! this  curatorscode....is being talked about in the blogosphere..... at  http://www.thingsmagazine.net/..

I first heard of this nonsense on NPR on Sunday..Sometimes I can point to the exact person/mood/light/food/blog post/magazine/book passage/snippet of poetry/ 3 martinis/ hangover.........but mostly, what we think...is a long brewing mish mash of life and death. I'm all for linking back to a blog or website if I can, and I do now always link to a pic source if I can at all.....
It is very important to protect copyright, and internet linking to a source should be practiced.

.....And really now...I've been alive a lot longer than the little girl that thought of this CC thing...and I'll tell you...most of the time I cannot pinpoint the exact thing that made me think something, make something, or write something.

for instance....Say you write a post about raising chickens in your city yard....Do you need to link to the first blogpost back in the 90s that talks about chickens? Do you need to reference all the city people back in the ancient times that raised chickens in the cities??
Do you have to link to all the hipster "urban pioneer" bloggers that talk about their chicken coops and egg recipes??
No. But you can share a link to blogpost someone did that was really cool....especially if you use their pictures, you better link the pic (don't steal. Share!)

Hey, you young kids you did not invent--- 1.   good food 2. good housekeeping 3. vintage !! 4. messy bun 5. sewing 6. knitting 7. art 8. craft 9. writing 10. sex 11. babies 12. getting married 13. writing books 14.decorating with used/junk/found 15. DIY  16.gardening 17.chickens 18. kale.......but you may have invented being self-satisfied and narcissistic....
and this is after I found a few shitty scraper blogs that stole hundreds of my posts and pics. Blogger has to pay them ad revenue, yet are not very helpful in shutting them down. I have to send 700 requests to Google with the DCMA violatons One At A Time ! meh. Only Disney will really benefit from the DCMA when they threaten a little suburban mom that makes Disney  Princess hair bows.

so, Mark and I are working on TONS of new projects....the goal is to make a dozen or 2 new handmade items....Yeah! In addition to the vintage we list every week........
Here's some pretty pictures on my workroom shelves......they are very inspirational to me, and maybe to you....




Sunday, March 25, 2012

Who sewed the clothes you wear?

"And never meet the man whose name is on the label"

 

Triangle Shirtwaist Fire in New York City

 



American workers have turned their backs on Unions over the last 30 years, but work protections such as the 40 hour work week, the paid vacations, the sick days, the medical insurance many workers take for granted is because of the work and the deaths of people who fought for these workers rights.


 here

 Over the last 30 years, so many US workers have forgotten what the workplace used to look like. One of the most horrible workplace disasters was  the Triangle Shirtwaist Company factory fire on March 25, 1911.
 Located in Manhattan, the fire killed 145 workers. The owners of the factory, Max Blanck and Isaac Harris, had a history of suspicious fires in the Triangle. It was a fairly common practice to burn your business to collect insurance payments.



The Triangle was the classic sweatshop. It employed 600 young, often teenage women, in a very cramped space. They were mostly  immigrant workers, with little English. Does this sound familiar?
Blanck and Harris paid the women as little as possible, and worked them for 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. The women earned only  $15 a week, despite working 12 hours a day, every day, about 85 hours a week

When the International Ladies Garment Workers Union led a strike in 1909 demanding all things we now take for granted such as a livable wage, higher pay and work hours that are humane the Triangle owners hired police to beat the Union women, and to arrest them.





Much like today, Blanck and Harris paid off politicians to pretend the Union women were criminals, and that the working women were to blame for not getting out sooner when the fire struck.
Blanck and Harris were tried on manslaughter charges but went free.




What was the cost of living in the early 1900's?  The Wright Brothers had just flown the first plane, and William Howard Taft was the president.


shirtwaist and factory pics from here, here, here,


Millworker

written by James Taylor, for the play, Working, based on the book by Studs Terkel.
 ----------------------------------------
Now my grandfather was a sailor
He blew in off the water
My father was a farmer
And i, his only daughter
Took up with a no good millworking man
From massachusetts
Who died from too much whiskey
And leaves me these three faces to feed

Millwork ain’t easy
Millwork ain’t hard
Millwork it ain’t nothing
But an awful boring job
I’m waiting for a daydream
To take me through the morning
And put me in my coffee break
Where I can have a sandwich
And remember

Then it’s me and my machine
For the rest of the morning
For the rest of the afternoon
And the rest of my life

Now my mind begins to wander
To the days back on the farm
I can see my father smiling at me
Swinging on his arm
I can hear my granddad’s stories
Of the storms out on lake eerie
Where vessels and cargos and fortunes
And sailors’ lives were lost

Yes, but it’s my life has been wasted
And I have been the fool
To let this manufacturer
Use my body for a tool
I can ride home in the evening
Staring at my hands
Swearing by my sorrow that a young girl
Ought to stand a better chance

So may I work the mills just as long as I am able
And never meet the man whose name is on the label

It's me and my machine
For the rest of the morning
And the rest of the afternoon
Gone for the rest of my life

Saturday, March 24, 2012


for all my salt, I am a hopeless romantic, and I hopelessly hope people will stop being dumb. I adore this artist in full bloom......the dreamy Bouguereau. Long long hair....I flirted with short bobs from time to time, but I always default to Mormon sister-wife long hair.

 another Bouguereau, Childhood Idyll, with a braided do, first with the top half of hair pulled back in a barrette or tie, and then the bottom half of hair.....braided. so pretty !





Braids...braids...and braids are in style ! so by default I might actually be in style (because I care!).
Here I am impersonating....Hunter Thompson

Here's how to style, an learn to do zillions kinds of braids.

The Hunger Games
 pic from.... Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss Everdeen in the movie.....
 Linda D. Flowers is listed as Hair Designer, so she designed all the 'dos
....guess I gotta go see the movie and brave the teens.....Love the huntering...remind me to tell you about my brother the falconer, and the fact that I can only stand solitary sports, like Archery ...which I was quite good at in High School.....


Katniss in The Hunger Games....has the most sweet braided do's I've seen in moviedom for some time...well, since the last Historical chick-flick I saw....The Addams Family !!

the last time we got this excited over braids was the ones Wednesday Addams sported in all the incarnations of The Addams Family.

 summer camp, Addams Family Values






Alicia Keys


Native American braids  here  and here


a simple braid pulled to the back, and a small loose braid falling down the left side......so pretty.
and this one....2 tiny braids on the front sides.....since my hair has been parted in the middle all my life, I often braid like this, especially if I really wanna keep my hair out of my eyes without a barrette.
click the links for the pics and site.

Friday, March 23, 2012

Sun ? In Tacoma ?

Postcards in the style of linen texture are so colorful ! They have become an iconic image...those big block letters that curve across the front......the sweet and bright colors they're printed in on high-rag content cardstock. 
Look at how pretty Tacoma was....this was printed by C P Johnston and Co. Seattle Washington. "No other county in the nation boasts such varying altitude and climate---from 14,408 foot frozen heights  of the giant mountains to the quiet, warm bays of Puget Sound".
No way, Jose, are the waters here "warm". Ice cold ! even in August. Tacoma, you will not lure me and tempt me and fool any more. It's Over!



Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Jon Stewart said WINNEBAGO

"Places you can get to in  a Winnebago, go to Santorum"....
said Jon Stewart when Sexy Santorum won Alabama and Mississippi on March 14. See it/hear it at .08 in the video at the bottom of this  post.

My last trip in my Winne...was not to a redneck location, unless by redneck you mean, where boats are docked that cost more than all the plasma TV's in Tuscaloosa....


Leaving Tacoma.....checking the windsock !

Like a Kodachrome.....









nightfall....

Packed up and ready to go....


...and back in rainy down-trodden Tacoma....


wherein Jon Stewart says: WINNEBAGO !