June, June, and Victorian Elegance

What a lovely time we had!

My mom, June, (in the blue), and her friend June, (in the rust) flew from San Diego to Houston last Thursday, Feb. 15. I had to dash off to work almost immediately afterwards, but we did manage to dine on King Ranch Chicken (a chicken layered dish served all over Texas by fine cooks to the favorite guests.) Bernie had created a wonderful Sweet Potato pie for Valentine's Day, and I had picked up a King's Cake as well for their "Welcome to Texas" this visit dessert.

Friday morning we loaded up the car and drove to Dallas area, stopping on the way for barbecue beef sandwiches and a glass of sweet tea. I wanted to take them to
"The Ribbon Gardner"

in Arlington, a town outside of Dallas. Please take a look at their web link, especially the classes, as I didn't take pictures there.

It is an amazing ribbon shop, and it is up for sale.

The inventory is worth 1.3 million dollars, so if you have the cash and love ribbons, this might be your little slice of heaven on earth.

We pulled into Richardson, north of Dallas around six, and had dinner at the hotel with my cousin Pam, her husband Ellis, their daughter Kim and her husband Paul. Paul is currently enrolled at Dallas Theological Seminary, and I had not seen the couple since their wedding about four years ago.
The drive took us seven hours, so we were tuckered out and went to bed shortly afterward, in order to be up and ready for the Victorian Elegance 1930's era Style Show the next morning.

The show was FABULOUS!!!!

All of the dresses in the show, and the accessories were authentic 1930 era, and all were available for sale.

Oh to be a size {something tiny}

I took over seventy pictures of the Style show, and the Victorian Elegance show itself.

I can not bring myself to attempt to put that many pictures into this post, knowing how cantankerous posting pictures can be in my world for some inexplicable reason.

SO....

what I've done is put all the pictures into a web album!

Yes! You can see them all, one by one or in slide show format, and I have added comments to the pictures as well.

Just click HERE

(And yes, you SHOULD be envious of me and my mom and June.)
As I said earlier: It was fabulous!

(Make plans now to come visit me and go with me to the next show!)

After the style show was over we wandered around the Richardson Convention center looking at all the wonderful antiques.

For seven more hours.

Didn't see it all.

Whoa!

At lunch Bonita, a dear friend who is part of the Dallas Hat Band (a sister organization to the Houston Hat Net) was able to join us. Bonita (the seated blond in the black hat in the picture in the previous link) is a treasure, and this is the third time we have wandered this twice yearly show together. Words fail me, really, to describe Bonita. The best I can do is to say she is a one of a kind fun gal, who enjoys life to the fullest. You may enjoying peeking around the Dallas Hat Band pictures from other events, some of which I attended as well.

After lunch there was another presentation, this time about the costume designer Edith Head, and "The Celluloid Crepe Scandals", a paper being presented about costume forgery and authenticating costumes from motion pictures after the designer had pulled some rather sly moves back in the 1960's. A very authoritative and interesting lecture and power point presentation.

You know, for five dollars to get into the Victorian Elegance show, and a five dollar donation to charity to see the style show, I got more education about historic costuming than I did in college when for each HOUR I figured I was paying about $40 to attend.

That evening Mom, June and I headed over to "The Black Eyed Pea", a Texas based restaurant chain, where the mash potatoes are cooked fresh every hour, corn bread and honey comes with your meal, and June could get Black Eyed Peas AND Fried Okra AND Banana Pudding with Vanilla Wafers just like she enjoyed as a child as part of her heritage from her southern born father.

When we first moved to Texas, this local chain was visited weekly by us as we worked our way through Texas traditional foods. You might enjoy looking at the menu items on their web link. (Gosh, now I'm hungry again!)

All I can say is:

Good Food.
Go there if ever and whenever you can.

Sunday morning we slept in, then returned to the show. With a stamped card, we were able to attend the second day for free. June was smitten by the crazy quilt, while I succumbed to a book and an apron.

Mostly we had returned to the show on
Sunday in order to attend the Tasha Tudor presentation. Tasha Tudor has illustrated over seventy books, and is now 93 years old. She has released her collection of 1830 era dresses for auction this upcoming fall, and selected pieces of the collection was on display. Additionally there was a DVD presentation of her life.

Mom, June and I sat through the hour long presentation with our jaws dropped. What an amazing woman, what an amazing life, and what a unique individual.

May I recommend that if you have an opportunity, suggest to your local librarian that the first DVD on that above link be purchased for your local library collection. I can almost promise you that your library owns Tasha Tudor books, as she has won so many awards for her illustrations.

We finally pulled ourselves away from the Victorian Elegance show to attend an exhibit at Southern Methodist University in Dallas of Spanish fashion designer
Christobal Balenciaga designs, and other designers who were inspired by him. Be sure to click on each of the fours groupings when the link opens to see a representative collection of his works, as there were fifty dresses in the show, and at least that way you will get to see sixteen of them.

What a fantastic designer. The show goes through May, so if you are in Dallas, BE SURE to head over to SMU's Meadow Museum Gallery.

Then we drove three hours home.

Monday we lingered around the breakfast table, and enjoyed looking at the garden, then took a spin around Kingwood, exploring our garden center's pansy collection, (curly pansies!)

the local shops and the HEB grocery store, where the ladies enjoyed sampling MORE of our local cooking, as demonstrated in the in-store kitchen. Texas Pecans and King Cake was purchased to tote home to Southern California.

I had to work that evening (again....), but Tuesday morning we shared a nice breakfast and talked about life as it was when I was growing up and they were becoming friends.

Someday I hope to write a book about Mom and her friends, some of whom have been dear friends for almost fifty years now. The stories they have, and the times they have experienced as first young mothers, then grandmothers, and now some are even great grandmothers.

Wonderful stories so very worth telling.

I took Mom and June through a new model home a few miles from my house. It was so beautiful, with a formal area, dining room, breakfast room, huge kitchen, family room, game room, office, master suite, three upstairs bedrooms, AND a theater.

June thought it would have cost about 2 million USD.

She's lives in San Diego, and she is right, that house WOULD sell for 2 million there.

Here?

$270,000.

Oh yeah.

Sometimes it's fun to be here in Texas.

If I didn't have to say good bye to them at the airport, and know it will be months before we see each other again, living in Texas could almost be said to be perfect.
What a time we had.

Victorian Elegance continued

Gayle, Suzanne, aka "The Hat Goddess", Rhonda and I met for dinner Friday night. And as Millinery Guru Kate always declares, ladies in chapeaux are seated in the window as it is good for business.
We could scarcely eat for having to receive compliments from other diners.

At the show we went for a group photo. We were amazed to see ourselves on a poster as we entered the show, our group shot from last February's show, at which time there was an ice storm...hence our bundled up appearance.

Bonita is in the pink. Don't we look like we are having fun? You would never guess what serious and business-like professions we ply the rest of the time!

Suzanne hat's are her own creations. I'm in my own newly purchased hat...which later received scathing reviews from one friend and one husband. Can't please everyone...I liked it, bought it, so there! I'm also wearing the peach silk bed jacket, cute, huh?

Our Feb 2006 group photo, no we are NOT more antiques!

Victorian Elegance is held twice a year in Richardson Texas, just outside of Dallas. Shall I just say that it is a "must" for lovers of Victorian, Edwardian, Roaring Twenties era items?

This show began with a lecture on "The Jazz Age". My favorite tidbit was seeing the garters with a little compact/powder puff attached, used for applying rouge to the newly revealed knees! There was even a song about this, something along the lines of "roll my stockings, hem my skirt, rouge my knees".
Two days of wandering through the show was only a beginning. I acquired two hats, a peach silk bed jacket (perfect for wearing over a tank top against Houston pervasive air conditioning), a stereo optican slide, a darling book from 1903, Wanted: A Chaperone, teas, five small velvet millinery roses, and longing for a lot more money and time!
These three pictures will give you the idea of what it is like to be there. EVERYTHING on display is available for trying on (should you happen to have a 19 inch waist in some cases...), and for purchase. EVERYTHING is authentic...no crafty fix ups, reproductions, or cutsie junque allowed.
Buyers for top designers like Ralph Lauren etc. haunt the place for inspiration pieces, as well as private collectors. One woman flew in, swooped in at 3, and in one hour purchased several thousand dollars worth of jazz era clothing.

The lecturer had just published a book, and showed a picture of a Worth gown that had been purchased at Victorian elegance a couple of years ago for $1,500, and resold shortly after for $25,000.

Nice profit, eh?

Now wouldn't that be more fun than watching number rise and fall on the stock market?