Shoulda been born in the 40's

As you know from my Halloween blog I like to sew. I just really got in to it in the last two years when I decided that it was time for me to learn how to make my own clothing instead of my mom sewing stuff for me. I'm not the  best at it but I'm slowly getting better and thanks to my class at Sac City college I am leaving a tone of new and important things that I never knew before. I have always love the 40's and the 50's and wished that I had been born in that era. I love there clothing, the cars, how proper everything was and just about everything else you can think of. I loved that women just dressed up every day like every day was a special occasion and they dressed like lady's not hookers looking for spare change. I LOVED there jackets and capes I think that is one of my favorite fashion items from that era. I also love the hair it was so big and fancy and out there. I wish that society today wasn't so open and didn't leave anything to the imagination. Today there are 15 years old girls that walk around in mini skirts and crop tops and let everything hang out and I think its just trashy. If that was my child I would lock her in her room and make her burn her clothing (not literally). Thankfully fashion always makes a circle (sometimes its not so good) and ever since the TV show Mad Men came out women have been gravitation toward the 50's look.

For my fashion class that I am taking at Sac City College I am making one of the patterns below as my final project (I will specify which). I'm very excited because I wont just be making the pattern exactly how it comes cut out of the paper I will be modifying it and making it fit me perfectly. My teacher will be teaching me how to alter the dress and then the patters so the dress I make will fit me perfectly instead of having one part fit me well and the rest of it being to big. Patterns are make to fit imaginary people because there is no woman in the world that is a perfect 16 in every part of her body its just impossible but its easier and cheaper for the pattern company's to just make the cookie cutter patterns and expect you to fix them. So needless to say I am VERY excited to learn how to adjust patterns so I am able to make everything fit me just the way its suppose to. :)

The reason I am typing all of this is because I was looking through patterns the other day and stumbled upon a retro looking pattern in the Butterick book. I saw it and was shocked and knew I had to buy it. As I flipped through the other pages of the pattern book I saw a few more retro inspired patterns here and there and was so excited! I found something that I would love to sew and if it actually came out decent I would wear!! The one thing that I found that I will be making as soon as I get my hands on the perfect fabric is a retro jacket. I am in love with this jacket and cant even describe how excited I am to make it! I have always wanted a fashionable winter coat that wasn't covered in fur or made out of a crummy layered knit fabric and the only way I can get one that meets my standards without breaking the bank is if I make one of my own!!!!

I am going on and on when I should just be posting he pictures of the patterns below and just saying what I like about each one. I will warn you there are quite a few.

What I love about this pattern is the cape I think its so cute and I would defiantly wear it during the winter 

I LOVE the top vest like cover up. I love how the back is open at attached by two feminine buttons I think this would be so cute to make

I love this dress because it very casual and comfortable I don't like the fabric they used on the real person I think its an ugly shade of brown and doesn't look like a vintage dress. The dress was already on the modern side because of the flow it has so they should have made it out of something with more color

I thought these aprons were fun and cute i don't know if I will make one because the picture they have of the real product doesn't poof out like the drawing does and that's what I liked about this apron that's what makes it look vintage

THIS is the dress that I will be making for my sewing class. I am so excited and I have been looking all over the place for good fabrics and something that looks vintage. I don't like the real dress that they made. They turned it into a brides-made's dress and that's not what its suppose to be! Its suppose to be a summer like evening dress. I hate that they used a silk like fabric they should have made it out of a cotton.

I like the bow on the back of this dress which is mainly why I picked out this pattern but one again I don't like the real product. I think the fabric would have been fine if the pattern on the material wasn't repeated so many times its way to busy and hard to look at.

I thought that this would be a cute summer dress as well especially because I have a big floppy hat that I have been dying to wear just like she does in the picture.

I likes the triangle cut out on the front of this dress. I don't mind the fabric on the real dress I think that its a very pretty color and the pattern varies in size which is nice and makes your eye wander to different parts of the dress.

THIS IS MY JACKET!!! I cant wait until I make this I have been looking all over for the perfect fabric and I have had yet to find it. I want to make it out of a light wool or a tweed both of which are very expensive and I need about 4 yards of it which adds up very fast. I hopefully will be able to find the fabric and finish making this wonderful coat sometime in November so I can wear it the whole month of December :) fingers crossed!!

Move Vamp Madness

While shopping for some Halloween stuff this afternoon I stumbled upon something amazing. I saw this light up bar sign and immediately know that I would be bring it home and hanging it in my room. I love this sign and will keep it up all year even though it's just meant for Halloween :/ haha I can't wait to plug it in at night and look at it. They had a second design but I thought this one was way better. Not sure where to put it in my room yet cuz the cord is kind of short but I will figure it out :) so excited!!!

Decoration time!!! :D

I LOVE Halloween and I just couldn't help myself I had to decorate my apartment with the few Halloween decorations that I've bought the past few days. My mom has all of our Halloween decorations so I picked up some cheap things I could find it's not amazing but it works for now until I get my paycheck and can buy some cooler things :)

The Vampire Addiction

Yes that's what it sounds like I am kinda obsessed with all things Vampire. No in bot one of those crazed Twilight fans that worship David Patterson (I think he's ugly to be honest) I am just fascinated with Vampires and it's nice to have something that you can escape to once in a while. I have a tone of vampire books including the Twilight series, the House of Night series, Vampire diaries series, the original Dracula, Ann Rice vampire series and the Charline Harris (true blood) series. I have more random ones here and there but there are to many to list. I also have the movie Interview with a Vampire, The Vampire Diaries season one, and True Blood season one and two. I think that I will always love Vampires and I don't expect people to understand why I love it so much it's just like anyone else that is obsessed with collecting things my collection just happens to b different.

While shopping in the city with my mom one day we walked into Ross and I stumbled upon this little guy below. I saw him and I couldn't not buy him! He's so cute and fits in perfect with my weir obsession. My mom thought I was crazy but understands my weirdness lol. He does have a chip taken out of the back of his head from someone dropping him :,( but other than that he's perfect! I love Vladimir and will forever :)

Visual Merchandising

I use to go to Santa Rosa Junior College and while I was there I took a window display class and it was the best class I have even taken. I learned so much in that class and got to go some many cool projects and I got to do 2 windows displays one of which was in an actual store. I would take this class over again in a heart beat I got to be so creative and do the things that I love to do the most. At the very end of the class my teacher had us put together a scrap book of all the thing we did in class and the notes we took and the pictures of our projects and window displays. I still have that book and love it because not only does it show all of the cool and interesting things that I did in class but it will help me out later when I get a career in Fashion Merchandising. I hope you enjoy this and it makes you think about taking a window display class, I promise you wont regret it. :)

Below you will see a bunch of stuff in a black box. What these things are, are mini window displays or adds for a product. We had to take a product and make a background for it we had to sell the product and make the viewer know what they were suppose to buy within a matter of 30 seconds of looking at the display. I think my favorite mini window display would be the Jessica Simpson shoe in the clam or the Ugg boot. I loved doing these little projects because they make me feel so creative :) and they were super fun

 This was my first window display my partner and I thought it would be such a cool idea to line all the walls and the floor with news papers and have some black and white props in the background and the mannequin in a black dress with this super bright loud bag so it was very obvious what is the main product being sold in the display. I think it turned out really cool and I was proud of what we came up with.

 This was are second display in an actual store front window. We got to decorate a window for a vintage boutique in Santa Rosa and it was a lot of fun. The white Christmas tree in the corner was make out of different sized petty coats and we thought it was an interesting fun twist to the Christmas tree and work well for the shop since they also rented out costumes and the petty coats were something that were rented in the store. We decided again to keep the background very simple and classic white and have all of the color come from the products. We rapped some boxes with Christmas white and silver wrapping paper and used them as platforms for the beautiful hats and jewelry the store was selling. Then of coarse we had to add some hanging white snow flakes because it wouldn't be a winter wonderland without them!!! I had a lot of fun creating this and would love to do it again and cant wait until I own a cute little boutique of my own.

Halloween!!!!... Almost

I LOVE Halloween and will probably dress up every year till I'm 80! My mom has made my Halloween costumes since I was born. She would never go out and buy my a pre-made costume she would make it herself and they were awesome!!! When I was in Kindergarten I was a bunny with a huge carrot, when I was in like 4th grade I was a witch, in 6th grade I was an ice princess, my freshman year I was a cowgirl, senior year I was pebbles, the year after that a flapper, year after that poison ivy, and the year after that an old lady. Sadly I am not as gifted as my mother and my poison ivy costume was store bought :( and my old lady costume was jut some of my G.G's (Great Grandmother) old clothing. This year I have my costume all figured out and I'm super excited! I'm not going to reveal it till the day of Halloween but I might post pictures of my progress :)

my boyfriend and I went to a very last min costume party so he decided to dress up as a nerd and I just decided to steal his clothes and dress up like a boy lol

scary, I know hahaa

Fred and I at a PetCo Halloween costume contest he was a lobster and I was the chef that was gonna cook him for dinner!!!

playing dead wont work!!!

my little spider!! and yes this was home made

poison ivy

me and batman!!!

the steps of my flapper girl costume I sadly couldn't find the picture where it was finished

my sleeves

what the outside looked like but this is no where finished I added 2 layers of fringe to the bottom

the costume I'm working on for this Halloween!!! I'm almost done with it (not in this pic) but I might redo it there are a few mistakes that I don't like lol

I couldn't find all of my pictures from Halloween on my laptop but here's a few I hope you enjoyed them!

My Baby

This is my baby, my love and my amazing Basset Hound Fred. He is 9 years old but acts like hes 2. Every time I come home hes right there to greet me and always puts a smile on my face I don't know what I would do without him. I got him as a Christmas present when I was about 10 and he was the cutest puppy you have even seen (picture lower). When I get older I plan on having dogs and another Basset Hound is defiantly on my list. I currently live i an apartment where the pet weight limit is 25lb so he has to live with my mom in Bakersfield :( I miss him like crazy but at least hes in good hands. I hope you enjoy the pictures and that they bring a smile to your face and brighten your day. :)

-Brittany

Fred hates bath time and hes not the lightest boy to lift all the way into the tub (all 60lbs)

As you can probably tell Fred's foot in this picture is swollen and thats because he has crazy allergies and he licks his foot which causes it to swell so he doesn't like to put pressure on it so we pull him around in his wagon :) he gets lots of attention and enjoys the ride

Sick Freddy with a swollen foot gets to relax and snack on a popcicle

hes so spoiled

This is my precious boy as a small little puppy he was so cute and so clumsy!

Just relaxing on my leg

yes we do dress him up for Christmas and Halloween and hes such a trooper and lets us!!!

helping me with homework :)

CHEESE!!!!!!!