A Rare Haul

Being that I am of a sort that usually adds to her wardrobe when she needs something, I have plumped out my wardrobe considerably since last Summer. You've already seen one of my Lindy Bop dresses and my pink knitted beret but there's more! Oh yes there is!

I shall start with knitwear ...

The first item was a hospice charity shop find in the summer. A lilac knitted top which I thought was very vintage appropriate.

 
Prior to December, I found myself a snuggly Christmas jumper which was no mean feat as I had so much criteria to tick off the mental list. It's burgundy.

Then I was back in the Hospice charity shop and found this very cute little cardigan! I think it's handknitted as there are no tags of any sort or any evidence that any have been snipped out. I am guessing it's old as you don't see this type of knitting in garments anymore, they were everywhere once upon a time.

Scarves.

My sister gave me this lovely purple hare scarf for my birthday. It was so warm, which surprised me, so when I saw this butterfly one in the same hospice charity shop as the lilac jumper, I snapped it up just the other week at the same time as I got the loopy cardi.

Dresses

A Lindy Bop dress from the summer sale.

 
My teapot dress which I sewed myself.

A new year Lindy Bop sale dress.

Skirts

A beautiful skirt from lovely Kezzie for my birthday.

Five Lindy Bop skirts for Christmas.

Round The House and Night Clothes

The brother in law and his girlfriend gave me hare socks and hare jimbers for Christmas, but the bottoms were too small, so I kept the hare print top and returned the bottoms and ended up with more jimbers. I am not a jimber wearer, I am a nightie lover, but alas they had no nighties and nothing else I could afford as an exchange. Plus this shop is rather, ahem, country set.

Randoms 

And I found a book in the Oxfam bookshop which was brand new and had an interesting cover.

The thing next to the book is actually a set of bunny/hare stitch markers for my crocheting, a birthday gift from my sister but I now can't figure out how to attach split ring markers on to my work, but wouldn't it make a fabulous brooch!

And plates! Coloured glass! From a charity shop.

I have been getting rid of things too, we started a declutter in January and a few things have already gone and I am being strong with a few clothing items I have been hanging on to for no particular reason, which I do not wear and won't wear again, so they'll likely go to the cat and rabbit rescue charity shop which supports where Bob and Belle were adopted from, there or the hospice shop which I have had some luck in recently.

Boo, Marie Antoinette and G3PO

Firstly, happy birthday to my wonderful, gorgeous furbaby Bob!
Happiest birthday to you Boo!

 

  

 

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Something a bit different on the outfit front for today.

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Hairband - retail 

Faux vintage pearls - nan me down

Top - retail

Black circle skirt - Lindy Bop
White Organdy Petticoat- eBay

Black ballet flats - retail

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This top reminds me of Marie Antoinette. I think it's the sleeves.

I used to wear it all the time but it's rather delicate now and a little on the snug side and consequently not that comfortable, but I wanted to take some pictures, just because.

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In other news, we have a new (old) telephone. Our cordless digital phone which we got about ten years ago keeps flat-lining when you try and use it. It's intermittent, very annoying and it often goes out in the middle of a call. We got it thinking a cordless one would have less wires to worry about with bunnies, but if anything, they have more. Also, if the power goes, so does the phone. So, I looked about on-line but the reviews of the new GPO rotary phones put me off buying. 

So, I forgot all about it for the time being and as we were dropping some donations off at a charity furniture shop (two large and rather pricey rugs we got when we lived in a bigger house), we spotted a 700 series rotary telephone, dating from I think, 1971, priced up at £15. We asked the lady there if it worked but she didn't have a clue, so offered to drop the price as she didn't feel it was right to sell us a phone for £15 if the workability (if that isn't a word, I think it should be) was in question. We were expecting to be charged £10, but she let us have it for £5! Charity shop karma?

Excuse the rubbishy photo and meet our new phone which I have been calling G3PO.

I love the fact that it still has the number of the original owner.

We ordered a conversion kit so it can be used with modern phone jacks. Cue a couple or three very late nights as Andy attempted to restore it.
It was given a good clean and the conversion kit was utilised, but although we could call out on it and it took incoming calls, it didn't ring. This made me sad.
I did a bit of research, found a few tips and after a bit more fiddling about, it rang! 
G3PO was alive!
Huzzah!

In use though, the voice on the other end was a bit quiet. We had already called the man who sold us the conversion kit as he offers after sale customer care. We were hopeful that he could help us get it ringing again but as it was already ringing by the time he called back, we had a little chat and I asked about the quietness and he sent me a spare part for free! How lovely of him. If you want a conversion kit for your 700 series, I'll let you know where we got our kit from, well worth the price with rare after sales service thrown in for free.  

 Now we have the job of rigging it up. It's never simple is it.
Our problems are thus:

• Bunnies.  They chew wires and do not like ringing phones. The digital one drives them batty so I can only imagine how G3PO would annoy them. It's all well and good if we are here to quickly answer but if we're out and it rings they will literally not be happy bunnies
• We have two phone sockets in the living room, one by the window and the other by the door to the hall which is right near where the bunnies sleeping area is.
• We have two double plug sockets, opposite each other and at the window end of the room. 

So ...

• The digital phone which we need to keep to call call centers and which has caller display, needs to be near a phone socket and a plug socket.

 This would mean:

• that G3PO would feasibly have to go across the other side of the room by the door, but as I said, that is the bunny area and besides I have a lovely little side table it looks so sweet on and I want it there. 
• So a phone extension lead was purchased and the digital phone will be moved into the hall and trunking will be utilised, carpets raised and wires hidden.

What a palaver.

Sylvac, Beads and Barbers

Have you ever seen a film or programme where the mother threatens to disinherit the son because of the woman he married? That's what I'm going through all the time. We've been together years now and still she won't accept the idea we are TOGETHER.  See why I couldn't go to Dorothy's funeral? It would have been impossible being in the same place as someone who hates me that much.

Anyway, Andy's aunt Dorothy was very organised making the job of going through her things when she had passed, a simple one for those doing it. But what was not so simple was the fact that Andy's mother (Dorothy's sister in law) was hot on anything leaving the flat and would make remarks like, "I noticed such and such was missing." or "I saw that you took that." when Andy took some photos from the mantle piece, knowing they would likely be binned by her. Andy was promised her photograph albums and his brother also asked us if there was anything else we would like of Dorothy's. Andy then asked me if there was anything I would like, but to be honest I only ever recall two items, a side table and a vase.

On Sunday when we knew that Stephen would be taking their mother to Portsmouth, we decided that we would go to the flat so I could have a look around, as we knew that if their mother knew I was there, her head would likely explode in anger. Never mind that Dorothy liked me, that didn't come into it. The flat was baking hot and Andy told me to have a look about and promptly left me in there alone while he spoke to a neighbour, which felt very strange and I was so anxious about being caught there by that woman, that I felt like I would pass out from heat and panic. I spent the whole time tip-toeing about carefully opening cupboards and drawers to see if I could find those photos Andy had been given but were left with Dorothy so she could still have a look through whenever she liked. Each time I heard a nearing voice or a car door close I panicked and ran to the window to check. I have never been so glad to leave a place. 

We found the photos and there are lots of them with pictures of Andy's hat wearing family (so many hats) from the Edwardian times onward plus some photos which make them look like a band of gypsies which amused him no end! 

I picked out the vase, which is the same as this one. It's Sylvac and I have always wanted something made by Slyvac -

And some beads which I think are from the sixties, but I really don't know. She always, always wore plastic beads; I used to call them her cracker beads as they looked like the type you got in Christmas crackers. I took these as they really remind me of her. 

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Also yesterday, before the funeral, we went to Portsmouth to a wonderful barber shop for Andy to have a hair cut. He looks nothing like Jim Carrey at all, NOTHING, but for some reason all the cuts he has had in recent years, all bar one when he ended up with something like Sinatra had when he was really young, made him look like Jim Carrey which was truly bizarre! He had been dithering about having a 1967 Keith Richards cut or a cut the same as a random sixties man on a magazine cover in a book I have about the decade. The random man won out and thanks to the reference picture and the expertise of Dan the barber, it came out so well! It's the best haircut he has ever had I would say.

The shop was incredible! I didn't feel ill at ease at all (I have something of a social phobia unfortunately) and felt able to wander about and have a look at things to my hearts content. They were playing a lot of rockabilly which I loved and the walls were covered in photos, in fact the station next to where Andy was, had framed pictures of Gene Vincent and Johnny Cash on the wall, as well as a collection of Batmobiles.

The door, I especially liked ..

Andy in the capable hands of Dan who was so nice.

New hair and new Harrington.

Groovy Coffee

Despite the fact that I don't drink coffee, or even like the smell, I do have a soft spot for coffee paraphernalia, so imagine my delight when I found this in a charity shop. I rediscovered it in the bottom of the wardrobe ..

it cost the princely sum of £4.

The Precious Things: Saved!

I seem to have a lot of things dotted about which were saved from the bin/landfill or from just rotting away somewhere, enough to dedicate a post to them.

I also have inherited pretty things, the fate of which, had I not taken them home, I dread to think .. and when I say inherited, they are from my grandmother, who I lived with and would indeed have been put in the bin had I not saved them when the house was being cleared as I am, I think, the only sentimental one in the family.

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Victorian jet beads, broken string, restrung since by me. The fate of these, was likely the bin.

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This Bush radio was actually taken out of a communal bin where we used to live, placed there because the battery had gone. We don't usually look in bins, it was pure luck.

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It beggars belief (as my nan would have said) that this original 1960's framed poster was destined for a horrid fate before my husband spotted it. It now hangs on our bedroom wall. I adore Mucha.

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This was saved from a damp garage.

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Playing cards .. no idea what might have happened to these.

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This was my nans. I just ADORE this.  Had I not saved this when her house was being cleared out, it would have gone in the bin.

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The bunny on the left was also in my nan's house, the other two were mine from my childhood.

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Teddy bear.

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My Silver Cross coach built dolls pram. I clung to this for dear life as it might well have ended up on landfill.

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1960's clock, given to me .. 

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The radio was kindly given to me (I know it wouldn't have been thrown away). The fan was a gift (though broken) and the Carnival glass bowl was from my nans.

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My CC41 inherited chair.

You can also just see my elderly sewing box under the chair and the chest of drawers is 1920's and cost £10!

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Salvaged from a house clearance and it works too.

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Inherited clothes horse .. little wonky but still works

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Tea set, maybe 1950's. Inherited.