This is the time of year when I hand wash clothing that I’ve saved up for fair weather. I have two laundry lines and hang the clothes out to dry. Nothing quite like the smell of clean laundry-line clothes!
My July theme is a tribute to my clothesline and the summer breeze that dries everything so quickly and well. It’s a vintage technique that I can thoroughly endorse.
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And here I thought only my manatee understands me...I am bowled over by the understanding and support Rosie and I are receiving for Save the Manatee Club. Many thanks to those who have spread the word, donated money, or purchased from my vintage collections online. Bad hair day? I am having a bad hair life, so there’s nothing more handy to me than being able to compensate with a beautiful scarf. This look, glamorized by Sophia Loren, looks vaguely peasant-y while adding vintage je ne sais quoi.
I couldn’t resist adding the door knocker earrings...anyone need her fortune told?
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If you read my blog, my Facebook page posts, my tweets on Twitter, or know me personally, you are certain to be aware that I have a thing about manatees. I love the gentle giants, and am deeply concerned for them as an endangered species that is terribly vulnerable.
Photo © David Schrichte
Last year was the worst on record for Florida manatees, with an estimated 829 perishing. With no natural predators, their adversaries are humans. Every year many manatees are killed or injured by boat strikes. In addition, we encroach upon and pollute the manatees’ vital habitat.
With humans so responsible for the grave endangerment of the manatee, we must also be responsible for their survival.
Save the Manatee Club is devoted entirely to the survival of the manatee and its habitat. Manatees have no greater friend than SMC, and I support them whole-heartedly.
That’s why today I am announcing that 25% of my sales for the next month (June 17-July 17) will go to Save the Manatee Club, with a goal of raising $500. I have also set up a YouCaring.com
page for those who don’t find any vintage to suit themselves but who would like to help.
$500 is a lot of money, and a sum I could never offer up on my own, but my customers have always come through, and I know will want to do their part for the manatees again.
In fact, I’m confident enough to pose as Rosie!
Appropriately, I have just symbolically adopted a manatee named Rosie as the honorary manatee of denisebrain.com and this campaign.
Rosie is a beloved manatee, known to all who visit Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park. She is decidedly vintage, having first been brought into captivity in 1968. Rosie is not a suitable candidate for being released into the wild because she has an equilibrium problem that causes her to swim in right-hand circles. Instead, she is the babysitter to the orphaned and injured young manatees brought to Homosassa for rehabilitation, nursing the calves and shepherding them around the spring waters.
Rosie, photo © William Gavin
Rosie epitomizes all manatees, who are known for their great intelligence and gentle good nature. While Rosie may have a home safe from boats and other perils living at Homosassa Springs, most of the few thousand Florida manatees left do not.
For Rosie and all endangered manatees, please help me reach this goal. I know
We Can Do It!
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Any woman who was young in the 1950s probably had a chiffon scarf tied around her hair or her neck at one point. I chose Natalie Wood as my icon fort his because she had the perfect teenage look in that period.
The scarf I’m wearing today is a 1950s souvenir of Hawaii, and it could be worn the sock hop way, with a knot to the side of the neck.
Or I could go the headscarf route, which certainly shows off the design. (Darn, where is my convertible?)
I opted for a not-so-characterstic rosette made by twisting the scarf throughout its length. A pin holds the scarf together and a clip holds it in my hair.
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| Head wrap-tying icon: Rosie the Riveter |
Yesterday I was inspired by Grace Kelly’s iconic wrap, today I am tying my scarf à la Bianca Jagger.
I know you will recognize her white jacket, but she also wore a lovely choker made of a scarf with a pin front and center.
To emulate this, I took a small square scarf, folded it in half diagonally and rolled it to make a band. Because the fabric is on the bias, it has some flexibility and makes a comfortable choker. I added a pin to the front and tied the scarf in back.
This is a repost from a few years ago. My mother means still more to me today.
I know a lot of people say this, but sorry, I really am the one who had the best mother ever
...at least that’s how it seems to me. She was different from me in many ways, and in so many ways I learned and got to be a better person because of her. Not a single day goes by that I don’t think of her. I strive to do things as she would do them. Most every day I miss her and wish I had new times with her.
Marian Enid L. was born September 28, 1920 in the small town of Grimes, Iowa. Her father was a banker during The Depression, and it had to have had quite an impact on Mama that her father worked to keep farmers in business, and keep their farms operating. Eventually he was let go for not foreclosing as expected by his overseers.
Mama at age six
My mother always looked out for the less fortunate. She was the most open- and fair-minded person I have known personally. She did not apparently see race, class or gender as anything other than man-made obstacle or advantage, although she always looked after the underdog. Many mothers are naturally nurturing to their own children, but my mother had nurturing feelings—and took action on those feelings—for the entire world.
At Mama’s memorial service in 1988, there were many young people of all races and walks of life who considered my mother their honorary mother. She counseled, she listened, she advised, she taught, she made people feel welcome and special. She found people who needed her, and they found her.
Mama baked bread. She baked literally dozens of loaves per week and gave away much of it to neighbors, friends, and fellow office workers. The entire neighborhood smelled like a bakery on Saturdays. When she went to work on Mondays, she carried two big shopping bags full of bread on the bus. (My mother didn’t drive and was an intrepid mass transit user in Seattle where I grew up.)
Mama devised a recipe for bread that would offer as much protein as an egg in just one slice. She wanted to see this recipe be used to help feed people in need, as she figured it was about 7 cents per loaf to make. Her bread, and all her cooking, was unbelievably delicious.
Serving dinner to my father and his mother
My mother was adventuresome in her cooking, trying all kinds of new, good things. She remembered vividly the evening in the 1940s when she first ate garlic, and she was the first person to try many things at home. She read, watched and experimented with what Julia Child recommended. She was friends with the fish monger. She made a huge assortment of Christmas cookies each year, and made the most spectacular dinners any person could be privileged to eat. I created a cookbook of her recipes when she died, as I knew this aspect of my mother’s life was most tangible and cherished, and would be greatly missed.
Serving food at a friend's wedding in 1981
I learned to do so many practical things because my mother took the time to teach me to do them: I learned to cook of course, and to sew, and to garden. With her college degree in romance languages she helped me learn French, and as a top math and science student...well I needed all the help I could get! My mother was extremely smart.
Knitting... (ca. 1950)
...and gardening (1961)
She didn’t have fancy taste in many things, but she had refined taste in music and literature. She played cello through college. She was a devoted reader and history was her favorite subject. Lincoln and Jefferson were her favorite historical figures, and she read and re-read Churchill’s writings. My mother avidly recycled, but before she let a single newspaper go she made sure she had read every word of it. She was unafraid to be political, and caucused for her candidates, went door-to-door for causes and talked to friends, as well as those in disagreement with her. She insisted I take issues to heart, to others and to the street. She was brave and strong in her convictions.
My mother didn’t swat bees, but carried them out of the house by their wings. She once went a few days with a broken arm without going to a doctor, because “it just didn’t hurt that much.”
My mother loved to have fun too. She loved movies, games, laughing. Her laughter took over her entire body, with tears streaming down her reddening face. Even though she was older (40 when I was born) she was a lot of fun for me and my brother, always taking us to parades, the zoo, the park, movies—she put up with seven showings of Mary Poppins for me. She always bought us balloons and cotton candy.
After my father died in 1974, my mother had to go back to work, and reentering the work force at the age of 54 could not have been easy. She not only found work at a law office, but became invaluable, a paralegal in all but title and salary. During the last year of her life, when she could no longer make it to work, office staff came to her home to get help managing the business. She didn’t make a lot of money, but when I was choosing a college she said to go where I most wanted to go, and we would make it work. My mother said “money isn’t the only currency.”
On the last Mother’s Day Mama was alive, we went to a garden center where I bought the annuals she picked out, later to put them in the dirt around her duplex. If it weren’t for the shopping cart, she couldn’t have walked, as she had some serious health issues. Still, as usual, she didn’t complain at all, and spent the time telling strangers what great children she had. She said what she always said, “Mother’s Day is the day that I am most thankful for having such wonderful children.”
The feeling is mutual Mama! I love you so much.
