Vintage Link Love: April 2014

Can it actually be that we're an entire third of the way through 2014? No, really, I mean, that seems almost impossible to believe, and yet...it's true. As we sit on the very first day of May, the fifth month of the year, we're waving good-bye to the first third and getting ready to usher in the warmest (or coldest, depending on which hemisphere you live) portion of the calendar.

The birds are chirping harmoniously, the bees are buzzing, the blossoms are blooming like mad, and everywhere you go, the world and those in it seem to have lighter hearts and more cheerful spirits. This is such a stellar portion of the year, mid-spring, and one that I'm so very glad we're experiencing again. I wasn't feeling winter this time around and the fact that it lingered later than usual almost felt like Mother Nature was adding insult to injury.

{Hip-hip-horray! Spring has sprung and the world is awash with it's striking beauty and wondrous rebirth once again. Image source.}

All that snow and ice and need for fifteen layers (okay, not quite, but almost!) is done with for a few glorious months and I'm not even going to give winter another thought for quite some time. Right now I'm focusing on the all the awesome things, big and small alike, that lay ahead for the coming months, on the blogging front and in life in general, and there are lot of them.

In fact, as quick as this year has been, and though it hasn't been without its share of stresses, unexpected expenses (two surgeries, one completely unplanned due to an emergency injury, this past month for our dog, Annie, for example), and worries, it has also been really great in a lot of ways. I've been diligently plugging away at the twelve things I hoped to do or get better at this year, and my life (and psyche) have been reaping the benefits of them immensely.

Between the good in my world right now, the sublime springtime sunshine, and my super exciting top secret vintage plans (which will be revealed next Tuesday), things are - knock wood - not too shabby in the slightest and that is really helping to give me the energy I've been needing lately to plough ahead, day in and day out, on those plans and still keep my blog going strong and other areas of my life afloat as well.

Though I haven't read quite as many blogs and news stories this month as I typically do for the reasons just discussed, I did still manage to stay more abreast on that front than I'd honestly expected when April kicked off and as such, I'm pleased as punch to present you with another round of engaging, interesting, eyebrow raising, and/or just plan fun vintage related posts and articles that have really captured my attention lately. I hope you'll enjoy them as much as I did!

♥ Top Five Tips for Buying a Dress Online that Fits and Flatters: By way of marvelous online vintage and reproduction clothing site, Blue Velvet Vintage, comes this handy guide to shopping for a frock that is very likely to fit you well once it lands on your doorstep. I was struck by how these points mirror many that I've talked about here as well over the years, including the importance of ignoring the size label, as vintage clothing sizes are not at all the same thing and their modern day counterparts.


♥ Are you too old for vintage?: Recently Kate (a passionate fellow dog mama and vintage fan alike) of Retro Rover asks a question I think many of us reflect on as we had notches to the belt of life, and concludes with a stance that is much in keeping with my own view on the subject (as well as several wonderful examples of ladies over the age of thirty who are rocking vintage fabulously!).


♥ Recreating the Roman Holiday Look: Jenny of Singing Bird Vintage has done a splendid job of gathering fashion ideas together in this post which will help you channel your inner Audrey as you recreate her iconic style from this classic 1950s film (a look, I should add, which suits the warm season that we're entering into now so delightfully well).




♥ 11 Delicious Facts You Never Knew About Girl Scout Cookies: As someone who sold case upon case upon case of Girl Guide cookies, the Canadian counterpart to US Girl Guide cookies, as a youngster, I couldn't help but smile over, and then share, this post I recently read that highlights some charmingly fun facts about everyone's favourite door-to-door desserts.


♥ Bangle Storage Idea: As many of you know, bangle bracelets are amongst my all-time favourite and most frequently worn vintage accessories, so I was extra touched when Julie from the blog Sum of Their Stories recently contacted me to say that she'd included a link to my post on storing bangles in her on the topic, which features her own lovely (and very budget-friendly) idea and a few from fellow bloggers as well.


♥ Great places to shop for plus size rockabilly clothing: One of my favourite rockabilly ladies, Deborah of Hellcat Vintage has put together a terrific two post list of places to source plus size rockabilly fashions from. Here's part one and part two, both are chocked full of online resources that curvaceous vintage loving ladies, too, will be thrilled to discover or reconnect with as well.




♥ Drive-In America: A Photographic Road Trip Kickstarter campaign: In April I shared with you about how fashion designer Gina was using the social funding site Kickstarter to raise an investment in order to launch her vintage inspired loungewear company, Maddy James (which still needs, at the time of writing, about $4,000 more to reach its goal, so if you haven't donated yet, I highly encourage you to do so - no amount is too small and every pledge is immensely appreciated), and today I'd love to let you know about another wonderful vintage related project that is also using this site to help get further off the ground.

As you may recall from this post back in 2011, I'm more than a little bit passionate about classic drive-in movie theaters, an important mid-century legacy that all too frequently, and very sadly, have gone the way of the dinosaur. I feel it's important to preserve, or at the very least document, those that are still with us while they are and to that end, Portland, Oregon resident Lindsey Rickert recently launched a Kickstarter campaign to help raise the funds she needs to travel around North America doing just that by way of photographing many of those drive-ins that still exist. She hopes after her exciting travels to turn the images she's captured into a coffee table book which will help today's generation, as well as those that follow, continue to enjoy the charming memories and sense of wonderful nostalgia that vintage drive-in movie theaters instantly impart. If you're a fan of these good, old-fashioned institutions, then by all means give Lindsey a helping hand by donating to her worthwhile Kickstarter campaign.


♥ Does this 19th century dress deserve a place in a museum?: In this thought provoking Two Nerdy History Girls post, the author raises the very valid question of if commonplace clothing deserves a spot in a museum as much as fancy, formal, or otherwise ornate sartorial pieces from the past do. I'm personally of the mind that the answer is a resounding "yes!", as these fashions, more so than the costly or ostentatious ones, were what the bulk of the population would have worn during a given time period and thus are a truly important element of history that needs to be preserved.


♥ Horror and Goth: There's always something about spring's return, odd as it may seem, that puts me in the mood for autumn and in turn my favourite holiday, Halloween. I think it's the fact that we're seeing the world in colour again, not just a muted, snow covered palette and also that, let's face it, I'm positively wild about fall and wait for it with immense eagerness every year. We've got a ways to go still there, so for now I've been busy enjoying this frighteningly fabulous selection of vintage goth lady related images that Johanna Ost put together on her blog a few weeks ago.




♥ Famous Words of Fashion's Greatest: Care of, entirely fittingly, Harper's Bazaar comes a memorable selection of 50 style related quotes from some of the most important sartorial voices of the 20th and 21st centuries. This piece is a must bookmark for the next time you're writing on a fashion related topic and need a instantly impactful quote to include in your post.


♥ Nine ways that bloggers are like drunk people: Brittany, of the wonderful blog Va Voom Vintage, posted this link recently in a Facebook group we're both a part of and I simply had to re-share it here, as I think just about anyone whose been blogging for any length of time will find themselves, as I did, smiling and nodding in vigorous agreement the whole way through this witty post.


♥ Women Homesteaders of the 1940s: Few of us, especially those who weren't raised on a farm or in the country, I'd venture to say, rarely associate the word "homesteading" with a decade as recent as the 1940s, instead correlating it with the earlier days of pioneer settlers. However, then as now, homesteading existed and in this captivating series of vintage Life magazine photos, we get to look at some very stylish, very hard working women who were diligently creating homes and farms the good, old-fashioned way that so many of their, and our, foremothers have done for centuries.

{All images throughout the list of links above come by way of the post that they are displayed directly beneath the write up of here. Please follow the links provided to learn more about these images.}

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As we get ready to kick off the second of the year’s thirds (May through August), I hope that you each have lots of things that are making you feel excited to wake up each morning, fueling your creative fires, and getting you more and more excited about the season with each passing day. I'd love to hear about them, if you do, so don't hesitate to share what's bringing you joy with me in the comments here today (or anytime).

Here's to an amazing, fabulously happy and exciting month of May, my dear friends!!!