Today is Juneteenth, so I have the day off. Slept till 7am and hiked the local state park before noon. Now we are safely home in the AC and I am planning to sew. In the park we saw this amazing family of Pileated woodpeckers tearing up a dead tree. They were large and unfazed by our presence. Bark was flying everywhere. I could not tell if one was a juvenile or not, they seemed the same size. Maybe these are the FLDS of the bird world since I don't think woodpeckers are gregarious. I don't have a good long lense on this point and shoot camera, but you can see two red heads and the profile of the third bird on the tree. Very cool birds!
I have cut out a vintage dress pattern using vintage cotton fabric. The pattern is from about the mid-40's during the war I think. Those patterns always seem to have a distinctively solemn tone in the drawings on the envelope. 
The pattern is unprinted - just tissue paper cut to shape and some perforations to indicate where to put gathers and zippers (or "non-separable slide fastener" as the pattern says). Other than that, the construction is pretty much the same as modern patterns. I am using silk organza for interfacing and this dress has a self or matching fabric-covered belt with buckle and eyelets and all. I bought some hat buckram for stiffening the belt so that it is more authentic. It used to be sold on a roll in fabric stores in several belt widths when fabric covered belts were more widely popular. I did not find buttons yet that I thought worked with the fabric, so I might make covered buttons, still thinking about it. If I am lucky, I will finish this before the weekend.
I created Flickr mosaic for the Flickr Meme that's been going around. If you are interested in the image sources, you can check my Flickr page.
Happy Juneteenth Y'all!
Love your meme... Can't wait to see your dress!!
Posted by: Vicki | June 19, 2008 at 04:47 PM