The Journey Continues ... New Life from Old

A couple years ago I purchased an entire box of patterns at our annual church "garage sale".  It's actually held in the church basement, not a garage!)  I knew the lady who donated them had been a hat maker and excellent seamstress in her day, but now she was clearing out a lifetime of possessions and downsizing. I never really took the time to go through the box until recently.  It has been fun to check out the vintage styles.  It just seems like it was such a glamorous time, and I love the look, but I don't think I"ll be creating any of these for myself any time soon. So so Fifties!  The tiny wasp waist and the huge full skirt are amazing.  The halter dress is demurely covered up with the cute short sleeve jacket. This is labelled a half size Slenderette pattern.  I love the square neckline on the dress.  Unfortunately the hat is not part of this pattern.  This has never been cut out. Another full skirted dress, belted at the waist.  This dress ha

The Apple Butter Project I have been meaning to write about some of my fall canning projects.  I haven't finished ... more about that later ...  When I was out walking in the early autumn, I was dismayed at the number of people who were wasting the apples growing in their yard.  I saw countless apples rotting on the back alleys.  Such a waste.  I considered asking if I could pick some of the apples, but before I got up my nerve, my aunt asked if I'd like some apples from their tree. There was no saying "no" after I had been visualising getting some apples for some home preserving projects.  My only momentary hesitation was when I saw how small the apples were -- more like crap apples really.  Not that there's anything wrong with crap apples; I got some of them to work with later.  The thing was, I intended to peel the apples to make apple butter, which as far as I could tell is more or less "apple jam".  And peeling those apples was going to be a