Exactly 11 months to go...

So far we have the location, photographer and... as of last week, the dress!! I purchased a store sample off E-bay of the exact Maggie Sottero dress I wanted, in my size, for less than half the price I would have paid if I had bought it new! Fabulous!

It arrived in the mail last Wednesday and I was thrilled. I ran right upstairs after camp to check it out. Mike was confused by the deceptively small box, but there it was in perfect shape! It will need a few alterations, but then it will be perfect!

I'm a winner! (again!)

Wow. I really must be lucky... or maybe its just the enormous amount of blogs that I read that have contests I enter. I'm a little obsessed, but came you blame me? I keep winning! Now, I just need to win something for the wedding.

So, Thank Yous to:
VintageGlam Weddings and {sweeter than me} designs (a great Etsy seller!) for these two pairs of great earrings! I wore the ones on the left for my graduation. They both have the romantic vintage feel that I love! Thanks so much ladies!

My second round of thanks goes to Focus Organic and Niagra Conservation for this lovely little house...
filled with eco-goodies!It includes a whole bunch of things to help make our house more energy and water efficient. We definitely could have used these in our crazy old house this past winter! I think we're going to hold on to the stuff and install it in our next place, once we find out where that will be!

Thanks again for all the great giveaways fellow bloggers! Keep it up! :)

Nostalgia

I'm nostalgic for the 30s and 40s..... a romanticized version of course. Recently, I watched Kit Kitterage, an American girl movie with my mom and sister. I wasn't sure I would be interested at first, but it ended up being a really good movie. It takes place during the depression. There were many heart wrenching moments showing the struggles people had during the depression and I was moved by those, but I have to say I was most interested in the life style. Firstly, I love the clothing that was worn. Women's clothes were very femine and flowy, yet practical. Then men were tailored and classic. The young girls clothes were pretty, but could stand playing outside. There were even some very stylish clothes made from chicken feed bags! I could totaly see myself wearing alot of the clothing that was worn, and I see my wardrobe moving in that direction. Not to mention my new love of vintage jewelery!
Here are some examples:


From the movie, aren't these girls outfits adorable! I would even wear them.




This is Kit and her Mom. I love the dresses!

Aside from the clothing, there were lots of other great things from this time period that I would love to incorporate into my life in the future: having a kitchen garden, doing lots of cooking, and sewing and crafty things inexpensively, and having genuine connections with neighbors, community and family that can be drawn upon in times of need.
Now I understand that there were a lot of awful things that happened during this time period, and this Thanksgiving I intend to ask my grandmother, who lived during the depression, to tell me about what it was really like. At this time though, I think I can say that this is my favorite American time period. What's yours?

These are a few of my favorite things....

There are a lot a great websites out there for me to stare at when I don't want to do work and don't want to go to bed yet. One favorite is Etsy. I don't remember how I first found it, probably another blog about pretty things, but there certainly is a lot there for me to drool over and be distracted by.
Etsy is a website that is all about things that are handmade. Sure, there are the expected things like art, knitted things, knick nacks, but there are some other amazing things that you wouldn't expect! For now, i've just been favortiting all the things I love, and some day, when I have the money maybe I can get some of these pretty things:)
Here are a few examples of the great stuff I've found!
Beautiful Vintage Jewelery from Sweet Vintage


Cool Vinyl decals for putting everywhere from Tasty Suite

Beautiful, PLANTABLE cards from Grace Graphics (I actually bought some of these :) )


Fun and funky pins from Button Empire (though I can't quite buy these ones yet...)




There is tons more great stuff on the website, and everything is continually changing. They also have this great feature called Alchemy where you can request something be custom made for you. You include the details and a suggested price and sellers can bid on making it for you. With such a huge community of creative and truely skilled people you can end up with something really great for a cheaper price than you might find else where. I haven't tried it yet, but I've heard of it being used for all sorts of things, from wedding dresses to toys.
Now that I've gotten the idea of putting images into my blog (yay!) I'll try to occasionally post some of the cool stuff I'm finding in my internet wanderings. Maybe I can get someone hooked on these things like others have done to me!