26 April 2011

Day one vintage fashion fair

Hello everyone, this is a bit of a belated post but nevertheless I hope you all had a nice Easter :) If you're anything like me you're still revelling in the joys of leftover hot cross buns with real butter, yum! Over the Easter loooong weekend I travelled with a lovely friend to The Way We Wear vintage fashion fair held at the Burnside Ballroom to spend my Birthday money. The fairs are held in states across Australia and I believe the Gold Coast is up next so check the dates on the website. I highly recommend going if you can make it to one! This was the first vintage fair I'd been too and it was so much fun; Glomesh heaven I tell you!! There were two delightful levels full of vintage clothing, jewellery, homewares and other bits and bobs. Here's a picture I took from the upstairs level...


There was just so much great stuff to look at - I think I was having heart palpitations. You have to do at least a couple rounds to really have a good look at everything. All the stallholders were so friendly. One lady had a stall full of old and quirky buttons and was telling me how she sources them mostly from overseas. She had some really cute ones shaped like Jatz biscuits - I didn't buy them but wish I had taken a picture!

Now I know you're probably thinking that I must've gone slightly nuts with buying up Glomesh but I'm proud to say that I only bought a couple things that I'd be unlikely to come across in an op shop and didn't buy any handbags. I did, however, see a white Glomesh satchel that I'd bought in an op shop for $4 being sold for $75 so was a bit chuffed about that (although no one had bought it so perhaps is was priced a bit high). Anywho enough chat and on to the purchases!


My first purchase was a cute little umbrella brooch made of tin or something similar. The lady at that stall had lots of lovely brooches and jewellery set out as well as some small vintage handbags and sewing supplies. At the next stall I got a bit of a shock opening a trinket box with a cameo on top to find a lock of plaited hair inside (!) but quickly got over it in my excitement at finding this Glomesh sunglasses case. I didn't even know such a thing existed and snapped that up without hesitation. The cigarette case (to keep my imaginary cigarettes in), on the other hand, I went back to about three times before buying but am glad I did because I've been looking for one to add to my collection and this was in really good nick with the Glomesh sticker still attached inside.


My final purchase for the day was this beautiful lilac beaded chiffon dress. It was made by an old Sydney label called En-Ka Fashions and must be quite old because the sizing is labelled as XSSW and is marked as No. 15. The stallholder offered for me to try it on in the bathroom, which I found a lot of stallholders were happy for fair-goers to do. The dress was $90 and he must have seen me hesitating when I came back because he offered to knock $20 off the price to which I replied "yesplzilltakeit!". The colour and beading is just so lovely and I can't wait to wear it :)



So that concludes day one of the vintage fair. I didn't realise it when I bought the ticket, but a couple of the stallholders let us know that they could be used for multiple entries to the fair over the weekend. I cheekily asked my friend if I could have her ticket so I could come back with my Mum on Monday, which we did, so stay tuned for round two :)

22 April 2011

Vintage party

Thought it was about time I did a post on the vintage party I went to a few weeks ago. The party was run by a lovely lady called Rene who went to a lot of effort hanging clothing up on portable racks with nice wooden coat hangers and had a table spread with bags, purses and jewellery. I thought it might be a bit expensive and I was surprised at how reasonable to pricing was with dresses ranging from $20 to $60 and bags from $20 to $40 for a burgundy Glomesh handbag (which I resisted the urge to buy!). It was so much fun getting to rummage through and try on all the clothing and I was sad that there wasn't more that fit me because some of the dresses were so nice! I did however buy a small tapestry clutch and a sheer polka dot dress which I'm going to have the sleeves taken in on because they're a wea bit floaty on me.



That was the last party Rene will be doing for awhile but I definitely recommend you check out her online store In Love Again Vintage on facebook or catch her at the North Adelaide Vintage & Fashion Fair held on the second and fourth Sunday of every month :)

Raspberry coconut slice
Also wanted to share with you our attempt at Raspberry and Coconut Slice. Looks a bit brown here but it tasted good! I think it's better served in a bowl with ice cream though; not really what I'd call a slice. We made some muffins as well and cookies using ninjabread cutters but they turned out more like weirdly proportioned sumo men, oops!

Have a lovely Easter everyone :) I'll be spending tomorrow with my friend at a vintage fair, can't wait!

15 April 2011

Old fashioned letters

Besides op shopping and old things I also love stationary and was really excited to combine these loves in the form of vintage stationary! This first set is from Avon and contains 15 'delicate daisies gift notes' that you write on and fold into sealed envelopes. It also came with a scented talc sachet inscribed with a sweet message "This special perfumed talc sachet gives your gift notes the delightful fragrance of Delicate Daisies" and is meant to be left unopened in the folder.

Avon stationary
I also found two wonderful Peanuts letter sets from 1958 (same year as the mug in my previous post!). One of them shows Snoopy dressed as an artist painting "Have a nice day!" on his canvas, and the other has him following a trail of butterflies :)

Snoopy stationary
I can't wait to use these :) I don't often get the chance to write snail mail but I'm sure I'll think of something. I'm still keeping my eye out for some goodies to give away in celebration of reaching triple figures and have collected a couple things so far but for now they remain a secret ;)

Snoopy artist
Snoopy flower

06 April 2011

Dreaming of Snoopy

Snoopy mug
I found this 1958 Snoopy 'Sweet Treat Dreams' mug for 50c while rummaging at the dingy little op shop I sometimes refer to. It's made by Anchor Hocking Fire King from an ovenproof material similar to Pyrex (handy if I ever feel the urge to bake a mug-sized cake?). I did some research when I got home and found that these mugs are a bit of a collectors item and are especially popular in Japan. This one sells for around $25 on eBay while others like the Red Baron mug sell for upwards of $150 and even more than $400 for the rare orange version - how crazy is that! There's a matching bowl for this mug that I would love to find.

I should really stop referring to that op shop as the 'Dingy One' because I've found some great stuff there including more Snoopy-themed items that I'll be sharing in my next post! If you look closely at the photo you can see our pet flamingo statue in the background, keeping a watchful eye on our backyard :)