Frothy Skirts and Old Time Flirts....



Love stories are my best, call me a romantic or all those squishy names but I love nothing better than a good old love story.....I think all this romantic dreaming began with reading  too many Mills and Boons books as a teenager.. and has progressed from there, Pretty Woman, Dirty Dancing, The Notebook, August Rush, About Time are all movies that I watch over and over..... My favourite and ultimate love story must however be..... Romeo and Juliet! Yes!  I have waded my way through the book and I have see every version of this tragic yet beautiful love story... The Latest version with  Hailee Steinfeld, Douglas Booth is wonderful!

 

However in 1968, Franco Zeffirelli made the BEST version...starring Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting. I cannot begin to tell you how much I love this beautiful film... it is time less, it is riveting and it is above all else how LOVE should be! 

 

Now before I lose you all in a flurry of tears (if you are a romantic like me...) or a flurry of yawns..... I was recently asked to make 6 flower girl skirts for a friends beautiful little girls, who were to be flowers girl at a family wedding, ever the romantic... I of course said yes. We duly went to buy fabric and I was told the bride would be joining us! Great, I would meet her and ask her about her romantic story, then be swept away in the romance of it all!  

  

Cutting and Making

 

Imagine my utter delight and surprise when a lovely older lady walked into the fabric shop and I was introduced to the bride! Maria is a beautiful and eloquent lady, she is 70 years old and is marrying my friends father- in-law,  they are getting married after being together for 10 years.... When I asked her why after all this time, she simply replied I LOVE HIM! Be still my beating heart! Who says romance is dead!

Circles..... And More Circles!

And so onto the making of the skirts, the wedding wasn't going to be a big and fussy affair, but a beautiful family filled day! Maria was including all her future husbands  grand daughters - 6 little angels ranging from 1 - 7, once again be still my beating heart....Can imagine 6 little angels all in frothy little white skirts!!!

So here is how I did it! I simply cut out circles.... loads and loads of circles...
Each skirt needs -
1 lining circle
1 tulle circle
1  top circle (the heart tulle)- - do you remember how to cut out circles??  - if not look HERE
1 waist band from Lycra ( measure the child's waist and take off 3cm to make it tight)
2 m of thick satin ribbon per child

1. Cut out and sew the 3 circles together
2. Sew the end together so you have a circle then double the Lycra and zigzag it closed
3. Place the Waist band on the outside of the skirt and pin it to the circles - Stretch the lycra as you go
4. Sew the waist band to the skirt - I over locked them together
5. Thread the ribbon through the waist band. I never made any fancy opening for the threading through, I just made a small slit in the back of the band.( Lycra doesn't fray so it works perfectly!)  I then sewed the ends of the ribbon - to stop the ribbon ends fraying.
6. Roll hem the bottom with gut to give it a bit of kick ( I used 100 meters of gut)

DONE!

Frothy, Frilly, Twirly Bouncy Skirts

The skirts are beautiful and they are frothy(which I think I have mentioned about 40 times) and twirly and bouncy and frilly and  so sweet! I have asked my friend to please send me a picture of all of these little girls in their frothy skirts! I wish I could be there to see them and their antics as they walk up the aisle..... Can you imagine .... 

Waiting For Pick Up

 

Now please bear with me as I tell you another love sorry - it is a story of love that started in the trenches of  El Alamein in Egypt and lasted 55 years.....

 

My Grandfather Harry fought in World War 2, he meet a man named Jack Shultz who was fighting along side him, Jack saw my Aunt Edith's(Harry's sister) picture and asked if he could write to her.... They corresponded for 3 years while the war raged on, Jack and Harry were transferred to Italy and then France and still the letters flew back and forth! The Allies won and the war was over... Jack arrived back in Johannesburg, it was a Tuesday, he met Edith on the Wednesday, he asked her to marry him on the Thursday, they were married in court on the Friday.... They lived happily together for 55 years, spending a mere 6 days apart in all that time!  Uncle Jackie passed away having loved and cherished my beautiful Aunty Eddie for all that time...She was heart broken and passed away a few years later always maintain that he was the best thing that ever happen to her! She called him the LOVE of her life.....

 

You couldn't make up a love story like that  - now could you? xxx 

 

Jack and Edith Schultz