Mary Van Notes

I’ve been busy working at home – adding vintage to my etsy shop, cleaning and gardening.  When I’m not in my pajamas you can generally find me wearing vintage muumuus, light cotton sundresses or this recent acquisition, a 1940s nightgown.  When I first set eyes on it at the Sacramento Antique Fair I knew this gem would not be confined to sleeping in.  It reminds me of shabby chic, grandma wallpaper in a tea room.  If I had it my way, my bedroom would look like this nightgown – light pink, little rosebuds and lace.  Yup, don’t know how my boyfriend would cope.

And I can’t help taking campy John Waters-esque backyard photos.  This one is like the sister photo of this one.  Maybe it’s becoming a series of sorts.

1940s cotton shabby chic floral nightgown: $5 at the Sacramento Antique Fair
Miz Mooz wooden heel sandals: awesome hand-me-down from a friend
belt: thrifted

There’s a cultural/religious tradition that has been happening since the gold rush throughout California that was brought over by Azorean Portuguese immigrants.  Every year Portuguese communities celebrate Queen Isabella of Portugal for her generosity and care for the poor, as well as giving thanks and honor to the Holy Spirit.  It was a tradition I grew up with.  They’re called Holy Ghost Festas.  Part of the festivities includes a parade and free meal of bread, meat and wine.   There are baskets full of sweet Portuguese bread, a marching band that plays Holy Ghost hymns, and there are the girls that march in white gowns and impressive capes of velvet, trimmed with feather and encrusted with rhinestones.

1901 crown bearer (source)

Holy Ghost Queen in 1906 (source)

Holy Ghost Queen 1922 (source)

1940s (source)

Two generations: Queen in 1920 and her daughter as Queen in 1940 (source)

late 50s (source)

This is me last year at the Festa in Sausalito, CA:

wearing 1940s dress from the Alameda Vintage Fair, purse from my childhood, H&M floral socks, vintage Ferragamo flats from ebay.

The next Sausalito Festa is on May 27.  And I hope to attend this year as well.  You can find more info here.   I am especially fond of attending the Sausalito event because I was the Festa Queen in 1997.

I was lucky to be the queen for one of the most beautiful places in the world. Check out that view!

It was a pretty incredible experience, though I definitely made plenty of complaints of how heavy that cape was and how sweaty my armpits got wearing a suffocating lace wedding dress all day long in the heat.  But I love that I was able to be a part of such an amazing tradition and join an awesome lineage of beautiful ladies in wedding gowns, capes, and crowns.

All these can be found in my etsy shop.  And some will be added very soon.  Nothing says fashion lookbook like huge frizzy hair and crazy makeup.  Styling, makeup, photos and modeling by me.  Please enjoy.

40s fruit print playsuit coming soon, Margaret Jerrold painter shoes

80s red polka dot dress, black polka dot heels

cat cardigan, pink plaid dress

aztec print jacket, neon orange shorts, clear wedges, bikini

90s denim romper

70s red polka dot maxi dress, Margaret Jerrold painter shoes

60s lavender polka dot maxi dress coming soon, victorian bonnet, polka dot heels

90s floral suspender shorts

60s Hawaiian maxi dress, clear wedges

Please vote for me in the Chictopia Solestruck contest.  Favorite my look here: www.chictopia.com/photo/show/649781-daisies+upon+daisies-…

60s daisy romper: Thunderhorse Vintage, Sacramento
60s bow blouse: found on the street in SF
60s daisy flats: ebay
vintage bakelite bangles: thrifted
40s mustard tilt: Vintage Expo, SF

I’ve been wearing this romper/blouse, daisies upon daisies combo quite a bit these days.  Stuff I’ve been up to: adding more and more vintage to my shop, gardening, applying for jobs, stressing about money, feeling the encroachment of failure, trying to stay strong emotionally, bodyweight exercises, cheetos.

80s unique Norma B blue waves high heels 7 M

1940s carved wooden hand painted beaded platform sandals Philippines tiki

1960s chartreuse yellow shoes 10 S

NOS 1960s silver bow heels 9 1/2 A Joseph La Rose shoes

80s 90s paper bag high waist shorts floral bongo shorts

Aztec Navajo Ethnic Southwest Black and White print boho cropped jacket

1960s 70s Jantzen mod daisy print swimsuit

pinup nautical rockabilly pinstripe 2 piece halter bikini and skirted bottom

60s 50s pinup Peter Pan by Oleg Cassini colorblock moss green, pink and white swimsuit

I just posted a new pair of amazing shoes to my shop.

60s mod Lacy Afternoon by Shell Kepler gold ruffles and white lace shoes 7 1/2 B

Someone couldn’t keep away from them.

Puss is being played by Evel (named after Evel Knievel, my boyfriend’s childhood hero).  I hope you all are having a lovely weekend!

Nicole posted this amazing video on Facebook:

Can you believe that swim cap with faux bangs attached!?!  I want all of them!  And the fashion show taking place in a puppet stage?  Genius.  Watching this video made me go on a vintage swim cap search and I thought I’d share some amazing pieces that are out there for sale right now and a lot of them are from the same brand that is featured in that video: Kleinert’s.

The items on ebay I can’t swipe the photos but check out this cute pink one with a circles design, and black and white flower one, and 60s aqua blue ruffle one, yellow fringe one, amazing flower one and another flower one, those last four are all by Kleinert’s.  Check out this 1963 Kleinert’s ad also on sale on ebay:

And this ad from 1919 for sale on ecrater:

Here are some gems from Etsy that are mostly from the 60s:

1960s Spiky Flower Swim Cap by Fashy

Vintage 60s Swim Cap in groovy Pink Green and Orange

1960s Unused Retro Flower Power Swim Cap Kleinert’s Sava-Wave with Original packaging

Vintage swim cap in turquoise blue with ruffles and pleats

Vintage 50s Sea Siren Swim Cap with Flowers

protect your locks…VINTAGE salmon pink // coral SWIM or bathing CAP

Vintage Bathing Cap – Luscious Lime Take a Dive

Save The Hair Great Jantzen Swim Bathing Cap For Summer

swim/shower cap, black n white

And check out this amazing one:

Kleinert’s Vintage Bathing Cap Bright Pink Hair Like which I totally just bought right now because I love it too much : P  I always wanted pink hair, and now I can fool people at the gym!

And you can even find modern made caps in the vintage style like these for sale on amazon:

Pink W/White Flowers Vintage Style Latex Swim Bathing Cap

Vintage Style Colorful Petals Latex Swim Bathing Cap

I’m in the market for some new shoes.  The shoes I wear day-to-day have been well worn, and even my high heels have seen better days.  Ever since this post I’ve been more vigilant of buying American made.  Also, our country is at war and yet no one seems to act like we are.  I kind of wish more American companies were advertising “Buy American.”  It seems the kind of patriotism we had in buying American during WWII has been lost.  But even if we weren’t at war, there are many other reasons to buy shoes made in your very own country.

For instance, if you’re against China’s censorship policies then why not boycott China goods?  Don’t like seeing sweatshops?  Why not buy American where our government has some measure of control over human rights?  So political reasons, human rights issues, those are good reasons to buy American but even simpler than that – the carbon footprint.  Locally produced shoes that don’t have to travel overseas… that helps!  And when you buy American your money goes back into America.  We’re all struggling right now, why not support your neighbor?

Sure, there are shoes I covet that are not made in the USA.  Most of them aren’t.  But when it comes to basics, I’ve found some good Made in the USA companies that produce some cute everyday basics shoes and they’re competitively priced, so they are an affordable option.

Like those cute Salvatore Ferragamo bow flats that are oh so popular?  Well you can get a pair of American made bow pumps at usmadeshoes.com.  Same with these cute red bow shoes.

American Apparel offers shoes now like these Bobby Suede Lace-up shoes:

Tic-Tac-Toes is a company that focuses on dancing shoes and is very proud to make shoes in the USA.  They state on their homepage, “Tic-Tac-Toes shoes and boots for men and women are manufactured in our own modern factory in Gloversville, New York, USA!  We do not import uppers; we do not import labor; we do not import shoes!” They have dance shoes, and street shoes available and even boots.  If you don’t like the slick bottoms of dance shoes, you can take them in to a cobbler and have rubber soles added for a small price.  Check out some of these cute options:

tapestry floral flats

bow flats

Need some silver metallic boots made in the USA? Yep they got those:

Western boots

How about some sweet mint T straps, saddle oxfords and two-tone heels?

sweet bow heels

vintage style T strap heels (reminds me of the 30s)

And there you have it, some very cute shoes made in the USA.  Do you guys know of any other shoes that are made in the USA?  I’d really love to find more.

vintage 60s knit/crochet dress with balloon sleeves and high neck: Hattie’s Vintage, Portland
saddle shoes: Payless, thrifted
floral socks: H&M last year
60s enamel daisies clip on earrings worn as broochs: from my mom (the clip on earrings fit perfectly through the lace crochet and don’t fall out!)
flower bouquet purse: Nicole Eymard

This is the dress I was obsessing over when I went to Portland in January.  I saw it at a vintage shop, didn’t buy it, and when I went back to buy it the store was closed and I was leaving the next day.  Luckily the shop owner was kind enough to take my credit card over the phone and ship it to me.  It seems every time I go to Portland there’s one item I don’t buy and end up obsessing over endlessly.  The last one was a knit 50s suit that I paid my sister to buy and send to me.  And much like that suit, this 60s yellow knit dress I’ve worn tons since I got it.  It’s the perfect spring dress to wear in this in between time where it’s a bit nippy but nice out.

Ben and I celebrated our 2 year anniversary this past weekend.  We went to the huge book sale at Fort Mason (where everything’s a dollar and benefits the SF friends of the library), had sushi and went to where we went to on our first date, my favorite place, Musee Mecanique.  We took a photobooth pic on our first date, so we’ve gotten one for each anniversary so far.  Hopefully we’ll have quite a stack of photobooth pics in the future!

Ben and I went to the Antiquarian Book Fair in Sacramento this weekend.  We went last year and found some neat stuff, but most of the fun is just oogling over beautiful design, and old amazing first editions, and pawing over paper ephemera.

I was fascinated by this book, which I actually want to read!  Luckily they have reprints, but how neat to hold an original first edition in your hands!

We got to rest our eyes and feed our bellies with some yummy sushi.

And then it was back to the fair!

One of the coolest books there was this one from 1900 which basically teaches you how to con people, right?  Isn’t the cover amazing?!?!  $400 and it could be yours!

This is what I wore.  We were going to ride bikes, so I planned accordingly with some new pants I just thrifted.

J Crew top, Mossimo pants: thrifted, Jacket: H&M, necklace: handmade locally from a craft fair, Levi’s tote: from my mom, Vans sneakers

I’ve been kind of obsessing over toile du jouy lately, probably stemming from Dita wearing this dress.  So when I saw these pants in Goodwill in my size, I snatched them up.   I recently got rid of almost all my pants because none of them were flattering, so I’m slowing building that section of my wardrobe.  Now please notice the way my necklace matches my pants completely:

The Hello Kitty compact I’ve had since I was a girl.  And here’s the loot I came home with… a trio of vintage knit/crochet pattern booklets:

How amazing are those butterfly gloves/hat combo?  Ahhhh!