I've been quite neglectful of my blog and emails these past few days because we've been busy canning! Last week, I was talking to Trina from Retro Fashion is my Passion about how I've been wanting to build a little pantry full of home canned foods. She gardens and cans her own and says that it's easy and really fun. We went to our local farmer's market for cheap, beautiful produce. We bought some exquisite home grown tomatoes, a huge watermelon, cucumbers fresh off the vine, pale yellow bell peppers and a few lovely peaches and boxes of strawberries. The Farmer's Market is in the historic district, right next to the Missouri River.




It took 7 hours of peeling, dicing, roasting, boiling and canning but by the end of the day yesterday, we had peach preserves, strawberry jam, fire roasted tomatoes, fire roasted peppers and bread and butter pickles. Today, we're making watermelon pickles, which I have never had before. They are made using the peeled watermelon rind with just a hint of pink flesh left on the rind. They had to soak in the brine overnight so we'll be boiling and preserving them today. Trina has me totally hooked on canning now! We're making some sauerkraut and green beans next week and I'm even considering making some sloppy joe and spaghetti with meat sauce. I'm a little terrified of canning meat. It doesn't seem like it would last but people have been doing it for ages so I'm going to try it. I have a new respect for old-fashioned housewives and farm ladies. Canning is a whole lot of work but wow, it is SO worth it!!
 

For our outing, I decided to try a 30's inspired look. It was 107F on the day we went out so I wore this light cotton dress and hair in a snood for comfort. I thrifted this vintage black handbag the day before. Since I was doing black accessories, I wore my 30's black celluloid brooch, which is one of my favorites. The 30's had such interesting lines in their jewelry. I did some last minute (wonky) waves. They turned out less-than-perfect to say the least, so I covered the silliness with this vintage straw hat, trimmed in pearls.
1930s fingerwaves hairstyle


Outfit
Dress- handmade by me (see it again here)
crochet collar- thrifted, St Vincent De Paul
30's celluloid brooch- antique mall
green plastic belt buckle-thirfted, salvation army
vintage black straw hat-won in a giveaway from Arthelia's Attic
black bakelite hat pin- antique mall 
black pumps-borrowed from mom
black patent bag-thrifted, St Vincent De Paul