Silk & Wool

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“I was so anxious to make him believe me that I leaned towards him, across the table. He looked at me, right into my eyes. That queer, veiled expression in his -- that I fear I used to call his daft look -- was suddenly not there; there seemed to be a light in them and yet I have never seen them look so dark. And they were do direct that it was more like being touched than being looked at. It only lasted a second, but for that second he was quite a different person -- much more interesting, even a little bit exciting.”  

 

Extract from I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith, via 1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Outfit:

Vintage 1940s Silk Tea Dress: passed down from Granny Penny

Pink Wool Stockings: old from the high street

Vintage Brown Patent Mary Janes: passed down from Granny Kiki

Vintage 70s Does 40s Blue & White Tilt Hat: from Ebay

Vintage shawls: passed down from both grannies

  

 

All photos taken by me using the self timer on my little camera.

The vintage framed patchwork and vintage patchwork bedspread were both made by late Granny Kiki out of scraps of her dressmaking fabrics.

The framed still life was painted by me in my teens, an approximate copy of a Matisse painting.

 

Just got to get to next week and then life will calm down in time for Christmas, big yay!

 

 

 

Femininity

 

 



“Like no one else,' I told him in a letter written at the end of July, 'you share that part of my mind that associates itself mostly with ideal things and places....The impression thinking about you gives me is very closely linked with that given me by a lonely hillside or a sunny afternoon or wind on the moorlands or rich music...or books that have meant more to me than I can explain, or the smell of the earth after a shower or the calmness of the sky at sunset....This is grand, but still it isn't enough for this world, whatever it may be like "when we're beyond the sun." The earthly and obvious part of me longs to see and touch you and realise you as tangible.” 

 

 

Extract from The Testament Of Youth, by Vera Brittain via 1

 

The Outfit:

Vintage 1940s/50s Crepe & Satin Cerise Sheath Dress: bought from lovely Jill the Vintage Baroness at Adeline's Attic Vintage. Thanks again Jill!

Black Lace Peep Toe High Heels: old from New Look

Amber Earrings: my Mother's

Amber Bracelet: gift from a friend

 

 

The Soundtrack

Nina Simone: See-line Woman 

 

 

All photographs taken by me using the self timer in my parents' beautiful garden.

 

 

I'm delighted to link this post to Shoe Shine, a great event hosted by Bella of The Citizen Rosebud, click on the website to see her cute shoes and those of many others.

 

 I am also pleased to be a part of the next Visible Monday, hosted by Patti from Not Dead Yet Style, click on the website link to see her outfit and those of many others.

Meet Me Under The Ballerina Tree

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have been taught never to brag but now

I cannot help it: I keep

a beautiful garden, all abundance,

indiscriminate, pulling itself

from the stubborn earth: does it offend you

to watch me working in it,

touching my hands to the greening tips or

tearing the yellow stalks back, so wild

the living and the dead both

snap off in my hands?

The neighbor with his stuttering

fingers, the neighbor with his broken

love: each comes up my drive

to receive his pitying,

accustomed consolations, watches me

work in silence awhile, rises in anger,

walks back. Does it offend them to watch me

not mourning with them but working

fitfully, fruitlessly, working

the way the bees work, which is to say

by instinct alone, which looks like pleasure?

I can stand for hours among the sweet

narcissus, silent as a point of bone.

I can wait longer than sadness. I can wait longer

than your grief. It is such a small thing

to be proud of, a garden. Today

there were scrub jays, quail,

a woodpecker knocking at the white-

and-black shapes of trees, and someone’s lost rabbit

scratching under the barberry: is it

indiscriminate? Should it shrink back, wither,

and expurgate? Should I, too, not be loved?

It is only a little time, a little space.

Why not watch the grasses take up their colors in a rush

like a stream of kerosene being lit?

If I could not have made this garden beautiful

I wouldn’t understand your suffering,

nor care for each the same, inflamed way.

I would have to stay only like the bees,

beyond consciousness, beyond

self-reproach, fingers dug down hard

into stone, and growing nothing.

There is no end to ego,

with its museum of disappointments.

I want to take my neighbors into the garden

and show them: Here is consolation.

Here is your pity. Look how much seed it drops

around the sparrows as they fight.

It lives alongside their misery.

It glows each evening with a violent light.

 

 

Happiness by Paisley Rekdal, via 1 

 

 

 

 

The Outfit:

 

40s/50s Style Floral Chiffon Dress With Silk Lining: bought from the sale at Toast years ago

 

Vintage 70s Does 40s Blue & White Tilt Hat: from Ebay

 

Black Lace Peep Toe High Heels: old from New Look

 

 

 

The Soundtrack

 

Anita O'Day: All The Sad Young Men

 

 

Photographs taken by me, self portraits using the timer on my little digital camera. 

I've had an eye infection for over a month now, which means I'm allowed to wear neither mascara nor concealer to cover up those dark shadows under the eyes. But I've decided to think of the gorgeous ambassador for dark shadows, Jeanne Moreau, and celebrate my dark rings as seductive, maybe even intellectual looking....

 

 

Apologies I've not been visiting and commenting on your posts much lately due to overwork, looking forward to popping by your lovely blogs this weekend!