From Grandma’s factory to my new shirt

Meet my new favourite outfit.  I have been searching for a decent pair of khakis for a while- a good cross over pair for anything from picnics, teaching, and going out, to studying- and found them the other week for $4.

 

(If you pay close attention to this blog, you’ll notice that my “two weeks” in the US has turned into two months. An expired visa has kept me here a bit longer than I expected. It’s strange to know that governments think of our ‘home’ as the place represented by a passport rather than where one’s partner, pets, living room, team mates and studies are.)

The shirt is also a charity shop find- it was on the mannequin and I asked to try it on.  It is oh so very soft and I love the colour, but the v-neck was just too low for my standards.  Luckily, since I was still at my childhood home, I had plenty of lace to choose from.  We have a lot of linen napkins both in our flat in Scotland and waiting here to be transported.  There are several lace type napkins, however, that I think are more suited to furniture protection under objects.  They  have thus far stayed in the US.  The napkins are special because they are all from Quaker Lace when my maternal grandmother worked at the factory in Philadelphia. I found one with a badly stained corner and used the opposite corner to update this shirt.  I measured where it should fit, made a cut, machine hemmed the top, hand stitched the triangle to the shirt and machine satin stitched the edges of the lace inside the shirt. 

Next up, is a necklace I made the other day.  I was returning extra yarn at the craft store and something told me to turn back around once the money was in my hand…the same ‘something’ guided me down the bead isle and I left with the charm and beads. The clasp was in my mom’s box of crafts so I like to tell myself I ‘saved’ money. Still, I have worn this necklace a lot recently- and I like the green flecks in it since I wear a lot of that colour as well!