Friday, March 6, 2009

Vintage Lace

I meant to post these earlier, but the kiddos have caught a stomach flu this week. I am taking a breath of fresh air and thinking about lace! I found some lovely vintage lace at the Sew Expo last weekend.

My favorite is this beautiful tulle lace we found at an antique shop booth from Steilacoom. I had to fight Nona for it, but she got the last of the tulle lace from the Cotton Lace vendor, so all is fair in love and lace, right ;)?

There were some fun wagon-wheel lace strips that I am dying to try inserting into a petticoat with some tucks...

And some pretty edgings for the mounds of drawers and chemises I have yet to tackle!

I normally am not a huge fan of flowery laces, but this simple, pretty little lace made me feel so girly and may end up on some of my creations as well, depending on my whim!

Outside of sewing (which lately has been my creative outlet and stress relief), our family seems to be feeling squeezed. There is a tendency to focus on the best parts of life on blogs, but reality sometimes intrudes. Hubby has been working ridiculous overtime hours due to state budget cuts in other areas of social services. This places a maxiumum responsibility for everything else on me. In addition, the local community college system has cut all funding for the kids preschool and our parent education program, which was one of the primary places I went to take parenting classes and get support. Our church has had to lay-off pastors and other staff as well. So much of our community is affected, and we both feel like we are being asked to give or do so much more on less resources (which I'm sure is a familiar situation for many).

If any good is coming of all this meltdown, it is that we are having to clarify our family values. We plan to talk this weekend and set out "A Mission Statement" of sorts for our family. Because as much as I would like to help out every organization that needs volunteers as they lay off paid staff, it won't amount to much if our family goes down the drain while I am busy saving our community. I would love to hear from some of you as well. Have you been impacted by budget cuts in your communities? How have you personally adjusted to the "new reality" of the economy? Any input would be welcome as our family makes some difficult decisions in these next few weeks!

3 comments:

Sarah said...

What GORGEOUS laces! That first one especially - wow!

I'm so sorry to hear about the economic hardships in your community. :( David lost his job due his company cutting back (they lost their lease on the building they were operating in) so he is still looking for work after three months of being laid off. It's been an adjustment for us. . .it seems everything is in jeapordy but right now our lives aren't hugely affected beyond not having a steady source of income. It's just the not knowing when and how we WILL be affected greatly. Lots of little businesses have shut down it seems.

Lauren said...

Wow, things are getting bad everywhere. I just went through a horrible roller coaster like month at work. We had to make our goal or people were going to get laid off. Thankfully we did, but now we have this month. It's total survival mode. We are getting paid less, no bonuses, but are expected to work more. It's quite the strain right now. I will be praying for you guys as you are going through these hard times.

Anonymous said...

Awesome laces!