Cinema Tuesdays {Pin Up Girl}

In this short 1944 musical, America's favourite pin up, Betty Grable, plays Lorry, a sweet but compulsive liar from a small town who by the end of the picture ends up as a big night club singer and wins the heart of a war hero while maintaining some impressive hair styles that could only be achieved with the help of several studio hairdressers. It also stars Martha Raye and Joe E. Brown. The film itself is rather fluffy and silly, but it has lots of peppy musical numbers and Miss Grable showing off her morale-boosting million dollar legs.

My favourite outfit from the movie

Forties Streetwalker Chic!

Here is a deleted number that I found. I prefer her embroidered dress and the song to the "Don't Carry Tales" number from the finished movie.

Daily Outfit

Yes, I really did get this cardigan at a thrift store and I haven't altered it in anyway, it just came like this. Sometimes I think I have too many cardigans, but how could I pass up this ribbon detailing? Besides, cardigans are so versatile and warm, it makes up for the creepy comments I get on Flickr (you've got them too, I know you have).

I also love this vintage brooch I found. It isn't a pipe either. That's a bit of humour for you fans of Surrealism out there. I've decided to start seriously collecting novelty shaped brooches as they're funner than normal brooches. Funner is a word, you stupid red line.

In other news, I've decided to start growing out my bangs. I just haven't been able to get used to them and I miss being able to do the faux victory rolls that I used to do. I also got this wonderful book for my birthday last week and I now really want to start setting my hair again and possibly see if I can find a place that does Rita Hayworth perms. I actually used to set my hair every morning in high school, but I stopped when I started going to college and university because I didn't have enough time. But I do now. I hate growing out bangs, it's so dashed awkward.

What do you think? Should I grow out my bangs or keep them?

At the moment it's cold and raining outside my window, which made me think of this song from Merry Andrew with Danny Kaye.

New Haircut

This weekend I realized that my hair had gotten frightfully long and I needed a trim. My hair grows so slowly that I only ever need it cut three or four times a year, usually when I suddenly notice how long it is. I normally have a medium length bob and I've been debating whether to have bangs or not for about six months, so I just decided to go for it and try them out for the spring/summer. I haven't had bangs since elementary school and I'll try to dig up a picture or two to scan and share. In the mean time, what do you think?
Anyone else like watching Doctor Who? What do you think of the new Doctor? I'm reserving my opinion until the next week's episode, which looks like the new companion Amelia Pond will be spending the hour doing an impersonation of Arthur Dent (ie. wondering around the universe in a robe and pyjamas). But so far, it looks like the Eleventh Doctor is modelled after the Fifth Doctor, my favourite Doctor.

Since it's now April, the new theme for Cinema Tuesdays shall be How-To movies. So check back tomorrow for the origins of Mad Men!

Sweater: thrifted

Skirt: vintage

Scarf: vintage

Belt: thrifted

Tights: H&M

Shoes: Jeffrey Campbell

Earrings: eLmTree on Etsy

Over the past month or so Lily and the Muse has been posting a lot of stop motion short films. I love stop motion shorts and the first one that I ever saw as a child was Neighbours made by Norman McLaren in 1952 and it won an Oscar. Norman McLaren was an experimental animator and film maker who worked for the National Film Board of Canada. I saw a retrospective of his work at the Film Festival a couple of years ago and it was lovely to actually see his films on the big screen instead of the television, but if you type in his name on YouTube, you can spend several happy hours marvelling at his sheer inventiveness.

My First Vintage

These are the very first vintage items that I ever bought in a store. When I was about five or six, my Mum took me shopping in Gastown and we went into a vintage store (I think it was DeLuxe Junk) and one of the few displays that I could actually reach was the stand of plastic jewellery and hair stuff and I saw these three hair slides from the late Fifties (I think) and I then wheedled her to buy them for me. I wanted them because they reminded me of the blue feathers that the wizard used in The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship that PBS aired as part of Long Ago And Far Away. Remember that show? I miss it terribly! Anyway, I have worn one of the barrettes almost every day for the past fifteen or so years and I have never found anything else which secures my hair as well as these do.

What was the first vintage item you bought or had a grown-up buy for you? Do you still have it and wear it?