This weekend, my dear friend, Daffny came from New York to St Louis to hang out with me! We had the best time together. We met online through out blogs and have been chatting almost every day for the past 9 months or so. Meeting her in person for the first time felt like seeing a long-lost friend. Being stay at home moms is hard work and we both really needed the quality girl time. She arrived on Thursday afternoon and we began out St Louis adventure. This is Daffny's first view of the city.




 We took her to Sweetie Pie's for lunch. Sweetie Pie's is a local foodie landmark, known for southern style soul food. Sweetie Pie's kitchen has been featured The Travel Channel's Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. Sweetie Pie's is owned and operated by Robbie Montgomery, who was once a backup singer for Tina Turner. She cooks up the kind of fired, cheesy, gravy-covered southern comfort foods that her mother taught her to cook when she was a girl in Mississippi.


Daffny, Pj and I shared our foods with each other so we could have a taste of everything. We sampled the meatloaf, mac and cheese, okra, green beans, corn bread, battered and fried pork chop, mashed potatoes and peach cobbler.



After lunch, we went to one of my favorite thrift store shopping spots. I am not the kind of person to keep my shopping spots a secret but there is this one place that I only tell very close friends about!


We loaded up on purses, scarves, cardigans and a few dresses. Daffny bought 16 cardigans and I finally found a much needed grey cardi.


I also found this beautiful 1940's Corde handbag for $1.69! I have entirely too many handbags so this little lovely went home with Bunny for her date nights with her husband. For myself, I found this non-vintage leopard print handbag. Leopard print accessories was on my shopping list for the weekend so this was a win for both of us!





After shopping, we went home and ordered St Louis style pizza and toasted ravioli and sorted through our finds. Check out this beautiful rainbow of cardigans!


Stay tuned tomorrow for pics of our crazy Saturday shopping adventures and check out Daffny's blog to hear her side of the story :P

                                                                  Outfits
         Daffny                                                                                   Brittany
orange vintage cardigan-etsy                                       1940's style blouse-handmade by me
vintage earring and brooch set-etsy                             1940's skirt-The BaleOut     
trousers-handmade by Brittany                                    1940's repro Rug Cutter wedges- Aris Allen
blouse-thrifted
handbag-Goodwill outlet

This evening, I logged onto my blog and dropped a big "what the...*bleep* " when I saw my lovely pictures gone! A few weeks ago, I decided to switch over to photobucket after exceeding my upload limit through Picasa. Apparently you really really like me because I've exceeded my bandwidth limit this month and had to go ahead and upgrade to pro! Awww, you gals are making me blush! :P

So, my photos should be up and running, for your viewing pleasure very soon. In the mean time, please pardon the annoyance! When I return, I have wonderful stories, photos and adventures to share. I have another two whole days with Bunny Moreno and I will be very sad to see her go because we are having a blast.

 See you all again on Monday....and hopefully, I will be back with all of my images again!
x

Wow, I'm very late on announcing the winner of the Not at Viva Dress Giveaway! I have been so neglectful of my blog as I get ready for all kinds of excitement coming up but first...the winner is Sean MacKenzie

Congratulations! Please email me at brittanyvavoomvintage@gmail.com with your mailing address

Thank to to everyone who entered and please stay tuned for another fabulous vintage giveaway coming up in the next few weeks!!


In other exciting news,
On Thursday, my dear friend, Daffny from A Vintage Nerd is coming all the way from Queens, New York to see me!! I am SO excited to meet her in person. We're going to shop, do some vintage photo shoots and go to the World War II weekend here in St Louis at Jefferson barracks, where we will meet up with a few other vintage gals.
  Daffny is a housewife and momma like me so we are both excited to get some quality girl time together. We've been talking online almost every day for about a year so we are both SO excited to meet each other in person!

For Rhys's first birthday, we had a mustache bash at our house today. I really get into party planning and we had been working on a "little man" theme for a while. It eventually turned into an old fashioned mustache bash!

me with my best friend, Amanda

almost bearded ladies

best musatches in the house!

the birthday boy with his Aunt Chelsea (my sista!)

Chel with her husband, Andrew

We set up outside and brought our old dining room chairs out for lots of seating. Both mine and Pj's families are full of party drinkers so I made some delicious whiskey sour punch and fruit punch for the wee ones. I made mustaches on sticks, drink straws and set up a little photo booth for mustache pics. Pj's mom made a gorgeous, delicious cake and we all had a wonderful time!

manly goody bags

the kind of punch that knocks you out!

teaching toddlers to use a bubble pipe was....interesting . My phrase of the day was "blow out, not in!!"

 Oh, that's Olivia first vintage dress! I found it at Brenda Sue's a few weeks ago. It fits perfectly and has a rhinestone buckle to match one of my favorite dresses. Do I see vintage family photos in the future?

Now that the party is over, I'll be getting back to blogging this week. Daffny from A Vintage Nerd is coming to see me, all the way from the Big Apple. She arrives on Thursday and is staying with me all weekend.  I cannot wait to meet her in person and take her on a vintage tour of my hometown!

Today is my little boy's first birthday! One year ago, Rhys came flying into the world so fast that my doctor only had enough time to hold her hands out to catch him. I guess he was in as much of a hurry to meet me as I was to meet him! I really loved sharing my pregnancy, his birth and his first year of life on my blog. I'm so proud of my little Rhys.

just one day old and 6 pounds!

about 2 months pregnant

He's such a funny little person. He's a snuggle bug but loves rough housing and wrestling with daddy. He's climbing the stairs, learning to use a fork, walking (and running) and imitating funny things like sneezes. He loves peaches and doesn't like ice cream. One of his favorite things is when I build a tent out of blankets so he and Olivia can run in and out of it, shrieking like a couple of lunatics. Since Olivia couldn't say "Rhys" at first, she called him "Beets" or "Preetz" and both nicknames stuck.





Wearing vintage while pregnant was a challenge but I had a lot of fun with it! These are some of my favorite "maternity" outfits while I was pregnant with Rhys.

this nautical dress from an estate sale had elastic in the waist

a modern jersey dress with 30's jacket

pinafore and cardigan

50's dress from Amanda. Not meant for a belly bump but it works!

We're celebrating Beets's first birthday on Saturday with a family filled mustache bash. I've been working all week to get ready for his party, hence the lack of blogging. Stay tuned for pics of that!

On Thursday, I picked up some super cute 50's chairs for my dining room off craigslist and it got me thinking that I really, desperately needed a matching high hair. So, on to craigslist again and whaddya know? A retro red hair chair at a garage sale this morning. We woke up bright and early, tossed on some scrubby clothes and headed out for garage sale adventures. It was pouring by the time we reached our first destination and I thought for sure that someone would have probably nabbed that hair chair anyway but no! We got there, the sale was still open and there she was $20 plus miscellaneous sewing stuff for $3. I literally did a happy dance, in the street, soaking wet.


Off to an indoor sale at a local Moose Lodge- fill a trash bag for $5. Yes, please! I picked up these little owls to hang in the living room, loaded up on kids clothes, random Tupperware for bath time, a few tee shirts for moi, this old frame and silhouette and this adorable green suitcase, which the sweet ladies tossed in for free.





Next we went to the "Manly Man Garage Sale" as advertised on craigslist. It was all tools, shop stuff, some industrial junk, etc. Pj didn't find a single Manly Man item that he wanted but I left with two window panes and 2 huge blocks of balsa wood for making my own hat blocks for a grand total of $4! The window panes will be super cute when I'm done with them. I think I'm going to do something like this:

On the way to breakfast, I spotted an estate sale sign, so we stopped in just for the heck of it. It was an EPIC sale! This adorable 50's ranch house, loaded with all 50's furniture, kitchen ware, some fashion accessories. I found this amazing green swim cap (in great shape) for $4, this vintage Jamaica purse $5, vintage fur collar cardigan $18 and....drumroll.....totally fabulous 50's floor lamp which I actually did need to replace a crappy lamp in the living room for $15.





Wow, awesome morning!!

She was America's first sweetheart, co-founder of United Artists Film Studios,  and one of the most notable silent film stars in history


Mary Pickford was born Gladys Marie Smith in Toronto. Her father was an alcoholic and abandoned the family when she was three years old. Her mother worked as a seamstress and opened her home as a boarding house to support herself and her children. Mary gained her first theater connection at the age of seven, through one of the boarders staying in her home. She was a natural on the stage and began touring the United States with her mother and siblings as she performed in plays. In 1907, she finally got her break on Broadway in the play, The Warrens of Virginia. The play's producer had her change her name from Gladys Smith to Mary Pickford.
Two years later, she screen tested for a film with The Biograph Company and although she didn't get the role, the director adored her and was eager to hire her for other projects. She worked with Biograph, playing in 51 films in 1909. She said  "I played scrubwomen and secretaries and women of all nationalities... I decided that if I could get into as many pictures as possible, I'd become known, and there would be a demand for my work."
and she was right! Biograph soon featured her on advertisements as "The Girl with the Golden Curls" or "Blondilocks".  Finally she was noticed my moviegoers and became the most popular actress in the country.

On Tuesday afternoon, we went for a walk down Main Street and had dinner at Llewellyn's Pub, which is always very yummy. The building was a bank in the 1860's and still has the big vaults, which you can sit in while you dine

I've blogged a lot about main Street before. This historic site was once Missouri's capital and marked the beginning of the Lewis and Clark westward expansion expedition. The old buildings are now quaint gift shops and restaurants.



Goofing around with explorer and local historic hero, Daniel Boone