Archive for the ‘Photo / Video / Music’ Category

The dew on the strawberry leaves gathers into sparkling little droplets on the tip of each point. Amazing!

Click the image to see it bigger… Although it still doesn’t do it justice.

The happy interesection of a chilly night, a child who wants to wear those pajamas (even though they don’t have feet), and two orphan socks whose mates were eaten by the Bermuda-Sock-Triangle.

Join us on the journey – Seven Days in a Dress.

Here’s the links to the history, so you can read any of the previous installments:
Take the Challenge! (Introduction)
Day 1 (Sunday “Go To Meetin’ Clothes”)
Day 2 (Shoe Musings)
Day 3 (Family Photos)
Day 4 (Work Day)
Day 5
Day 6

Today is thus actually the eighth of nine postings for our seven days. The Introduction preceded it, and we will follow up tomorrow with the review and reflection…

As I mentioned, I am photographing the outfits one day ahead, for ease of posting – so this is actually Saturday’s outfits. I am also preparing this post Saturday, as we will of course be celebrating Sabbath tomorrow. Nick will be singing with the Youth Choir, so it should be any extra joy-filled service!

Tiffany is wearing a cotton print jumper (which is really, really NOT winter attire!) with a coordinating light blue long sleeved blouse. White head covering, socks, and Keds-like shoes complete the outfit.

Jewel is wearing a fun new (to us) winter jumper, with a white long-sleeved shirt, woolly tights, and black boots. She has colorful rubber bands in her ponytail, and a bright red headband.

Enjoy your Sabbath in a skirt… You are honoring the femininity with which the Lord blessed you!

Please use the linky to share a link to your blog post, a public photo, or an album – along with a thumbnail photo. We can all use some support and inspiration along the way!

Seven Days in a Dress. It’s never too late to begin your own Challenge!

Click to read any of the previous installments you may have missed:
Take the Challenge! (Introduction)
Day 1 (Sunday “Go To Meetin’ Clothes”)
Day 2 (Shoe Musings)
Day 3 (Family Photos)
Day 4 (Work Day)
Day 5

Today’s photo shows us – in profile! The bright sun was tormenting us, so we told it to “talk to the back”!

Tiffany is wearing a denim skirt (note that this is not the same as the denim jumper!), a navy/green/brown/cream striped sweater, a navy head covering, and brown socks and shoes.

Jewel also has on a denim skirt. She’s wearing a brown long-sleeved t-shirt under a pink sweater, with pink tights and brown boots. The pink knit cap is a popular item lately, too – she also has gloves! I’m sorry you can’t see the tights or the shirt layering in the photo… It’s really very cute!

Okay, hold on…

Well, at least you can see the tights!

So, how are you feeling? We’ve come most of the way through a week already… Was it harder or easier than you thought?

Please join our fellowship! Use the linky to share a link to your blog post, a public photo, or an album – along with a thumbnail photo.

Seven Days in a Dress. It’s never too late to begin your own Challenge!

Click to read any of the previous installments you may have missed:
Take the Challenge! (Introduction)
Day 1 (Sunday “Go To Meetin’ Clothes”)
Day 2 (Shoe Musings)
Day 3 (Family Photos)
Day 4 (Work Day)

It was chilly, I tell ya! But bright sun causing squints, sorry…

Jewel wears sporty pigtails with her blue skirt, and a black long-sleeved t-shirt under a colorful fleecy pullover. Black tight and her black dressy shoes round out the ensemble. We typically save these shoes for dressy occasions, but Jewel wanted to match with the tights and look good for 4H, so we went with it.

Tiffany has on a black/grey/white striped “cargo” skirt – not my favorite, but good for variety. I found a black tank top to wear under this black sweater, the very one I wasn’t able to wear last Sunday because I felt the weave was too loose to be modest. The accessories are a white head covering, black tights, and my white “Keds” sneakers (these are pretty beat up, and I’m trying to decide if they are a good thing or not worth replacing).

So, how are you feeling? We’ve come most of the way through a week already… Was it harder or easier than you thought?

Please join our fellowship! Use the linky to share a link to your blog post, a public photo, or an album – along with a thumbnail photo.

We had a cute idea for our family portraits this year, in keeping with our fun and wacky ideas from years past: Wolf and Nick in their uniform blues, and the Littles and I in ABU fabric clothes.

I got hold of a chunk of fabric at a great price on an online marketplace, and had a nursing jumper made for me by my faithful friends at Katie’s Mercantile.

At the base uniform store, they sell a kid sized “uniform” set – pants, “blouse” (jacket), and hat – for a quite reasonable price. I grabbed one for R.T., and I was thinking I’d get one for Jewel and split the pants out into a skirt. They didn’t have her size, though, and kept telling me it hadn’t come in with the order that week…

Finally, as the picture date drew neigh, I realized I was actually going to have to just sew her something from scratch. And she really, really wanted it to be a jumper (“like yours, Mama!”), not a skirt.

Enter I’m-not-actually-good-at-sewing panic, with a hefty dose of I’ve-never-done-that-before perfectionist panic.

PANIC, I tell you!

I pulled up a free pattern/tutorial for the “Juniper Jumper” that I had picked up from Ditty Pop on Etsy (although last time I checked it wasn’t listed, she’s promised to put it back up!).

Clearly, though time was short, I needed to make one out of “disposable” fabric first. I had no idea how the pattern would fit, on top of having no idea how badly I would mess it up.

Another part of me was horrified at the thought of a “throw-away”… I mean, if it comes out alright, you want it to be a fabric that she would actually wear, right?

So we picked out a fabric that I was willing to throw away if it was ruined, but that Jewel was willing to wear if it worked out.

Then, the ordeal began.

I do not fault the instructions in any way. After all, one has to assume some minimum level of competence to complete a project, or else spend dozens of pages defining vocabulary words like “scissors”…

Truly, I would not have thought it possible to make as many totally different mistakes as I did, on such a small area!

I completed the bodice, and the first tier, and tried it on my model. (Please excuse the pajamas and bed-head – I was on a time schedule!)

I had used a size 7, and it seemed like we definitely needed a size 6. I also didn’t like the way the bodice hung on the sides, though, and felt it would be easy enough to make the bodice a bit longer to give it more substance right there.

Oh sure, the lady who knows nothing thinks modifying the pattern would be easy!

Anyhow, I did this to double the length of the side pieces:

And then, without further ado… And without even sewing the bottom tiers on the “draft” jumper…

I cut the fabric.

I just cut out the bodice and the first tier. I had lengthened the first tier, and planned a lengthened second tier rather than the three in the basic pattern instructions – but I thought I’d wait and measure a desirable length once I got the first parts done.

Really, after making all those mistakes on the draft jumper, you would think it would have gone smoothly with the real one, right?

No.

Just… no.

Broken needles. Layers missed in joining. Ran out of thread. Could not get the serger working at all. Elastic breaking. Corners not lining up… I suppose I could go on, but you get the idea.

I did, eventually, manage to get it done. Literally while she was putting on her shirt and tights for the photo session!

There are things I would change, still, and things I may go back and fix…

But she looks adorable in the pictures, if I do say so myself!

I guess I need to go finish up that “draft” jumper, too, now that the pressure is off. It is, after all that, in the process of being eminently wearable!

Seven Days in a Dress. It’s never too late to begin your own Challenge!

Click to read any of the previous installments you may have missed:
Take the Challenge! (Introduction)
Day 1 (Sunday “Go To Meetin’ Clothes”)
Day 2 (Shoe Musings)
Day 3 (Family Photos)

Today is another work-around-the-house day, so not a fashion spectacular. I hope some of you young ladies with prettier clothes will post your photos for all of us to enjoy!

The denim jumper makes an encore appearance! Tiffany is wearing it with a navy blue and grey shirt, a navy head covering, navy blue knee socks (“Look, Ma! I got some cute winter socks!”), and – here they are – the sneakers. Hey, they have blue on them, so they match, right??

Jewel is wearing a lovely black and white herringbone dress, with black tights, and her crazy pink tennis-shoe-boots (she’s five, so we accept these things). She especially wanted to show off the hairstyle she did for herself today: a ponytail with additional rubber-band decorations down the length.

Not having appropriate winter clothing has made this challenge actually a challenge for me. Someone with more disposable income might choose to go buy a few items to add to their wardrobe and more easily overcome such obstacles.

But I guess what I want to say to any of you who are facing obstacles in your journey is this – if you wait to begin your trip until all the traffic lights between you and your destination are green, you’ll never leave your driveway. Just take that first step, in faith…

Come share the journey, and support our Sisters – Iron sharpens iron! Using the link tool below, you can share the link to your blog post, or to a public photo or album – hopefully this version will allow a thumbnail of one of your photos to be displayed, as well.

Seven Days in a Dress – are you joining us on this journey?

Click to read through if you’ve missed any of the previous installments:
Take the Challenge! (Introduction)
Day 1 (Sunday “Go To Meetin’ Clothes”)
Day 2 (Shoe Musings)

Today’s photos are slightly different (hopefully better)… We just had our family portraits done for this year, and I am sharing them instead of trying to take our own duplicate picture of the outfits. Thanks to the miracle of digital photography, there’s not a delay of weeks while we wait for developing and printing them!

We wanted to have Wolf and Nick in their uniforms (Wolf from the Air Force Reserves, Nick from Civil Air Patrol), so we thought it would be fun for the kids and I to wear “knock-off” clothes made from the Air Force’s ABU camouflage pattern.

Tiffany is wearing a custom-made nursing jumper, with a coordinating tan blouse. White peds and brown Sanitas on the bottom, a camo bandanna as a head-covering over a ponytail on top. (Boy, my legs were cold! But I didn’t have any tights or warm socks that matched.)

Jewel is wearing a jumper I made, with a tan blouse (same fabric as mine). She has on her favorite boots, and a camo headband (with ponytail). In a couple of the shots she also has on the hat that is actually part of R.T.’s outfit.

I got a great comment on my Facebook wall yesterday –

‎2 days in skirt & hose, lovin the compliments

Hooray!

So, how is your Challenge going? Are you noticing a difference in the way you feel? In the way people react to you?

Using the “Linky” below, you can share the link to your blog post, or to a public photo or album. Let’s share the journey, and support our Sisters!

Seven Days in a Dress – are you joining us on this journey?

Click to read through if you’ve missed any of the previous installments:
Take the Challenge! (Introduction)
Day 1 (Sunday “Go To Meetin’ Clothes”)

So, here is the photo we took of our outfits yesterday:

Miss Jewel is wearing a very cute red dress, with black tights and her very-favorite-shoes-in-the-whole-world boots. Her hair is in a simple ponytail. Yes, the dress is actually too short by our standards. It was given to us as a hand-me-down, and since she liked it so much, and it was at least close, I told her she could wear it once before we re-gifted it.

Tiffany is wearing a denim jumper with a gray polo shirt, black textured tights, and the black Sanitas shoes again. A grey plaid flannel shirt is standing in for a jacket. Ponytail and white headcovering round out the ensemble. (Gotta say it again: I adore my Nursing Jumpers and Hanging Veils from Katie’s Mercantile!)

Let’s talk about shoes for a minute, since it’s probably already obvious to you that my shoe wardrobe is limited.

There are a number of factors at play:

• When I began dressing more modestly, I got rid of a large portion of my shoe wardrobe along with clothes. Tough financial times, and other priorities, have kept extra shoes low on the priority list.
• I have hard-to-fit-feet. Being tall, and not a tiny person, shoes that fit are hard to come by. Even if I just want a pair of cheapies, Payless or similar stores have very limited options in larger sizes.
• I’m a homemaker, and the mother of small children. Ideally, this would not mean that one is frumpy, but it does make it more important that shoes are comfortable for the days’ activities, and less important that one’s shoes are “cute.”
• Weak ankles. Boy, that sounds like a cliche, eh? Seriously, though, I have badly sprained both ankles in the last few years, the left one twice. I’m nervous about my footing, especially if I may have to walk on slippery surfaces or uneven ground (which is always likely with little kids!). Frankly, most of the time I wear sneakers, and my church shoes are a black pair and a brown pair of the Sanitas.

Now, even with all that said, I am not entirely content with the state of affairs.

For one thing, I think my husband would enjoy the way I look more if I had some more interesting footwear – at least from time to time.

As part of my commitment to try and add a bit more variety to my wardrobe, beginning with this Challenge, I am also going to work on getting another pair or two of shoes into the rotation… But it may take a little longer to implement.

Please take a moment to share your journey with us!

Using the “Linky” below, you can share the link to your blog post, if you are blogging about your journey. If you don’t blog, you can leave a link to a public photo or album (this can be done on Facebook, Flicker, Photobucket, and many other free sites!).