Sewing Rewind: Grandma Edition! ~ Diane's Vintage Zest!

Sewing Rewind: Grandma Edition!

Last week I promised it was my last sewing rewind and that I would focus on my future projects. I have to admit that I always planned on featuring a couple of my grandmother's old projects, some of which inspired my love of sewing.


Unfortunately, I was a terrible planner before my trip, so I only have 3 different projects to share. She made sooo many things for us before she passed, and I could only find a few items and/or photographs of items the day before I left. Oh well!


Wine Bottle Tuxedoes

This is obviously something that my mom asked my grandma to make. Back in the day, my parents used to host wine tastings, with mystery wines that the guests would have to guess. How bourgie!

Anyways, my mom wanted something to cover the bottles that would look cuter than a paper bag. I'm not sure who had the idea to make the covers into little tuxedoes, but they are definitely cute!






Impressively, they've held up over the years, probably due to the high quality work of my grandma. :)

Look at how many of them she made! She was a one-woman wine bottle tuxedo-making machine!



Travel Shoe Bags & Garment Bags

Once again, my mom was in need of travel bags for our shoes and enlisted my grandma. We still use them to this day!


They are seriously made very well and held up for the last couple decades of travels. Once again, she made a bunch for each member of our family, and my mom decided to puffy paint our names onto them. (One day I'm going to post about my mom's puffy paint embellishments on my childhood clothes). Yes, I was definitely a child of the 80's and 90's.

After I began to sew, I started to examine clothing and other sewn items meticulously. My grandma produced some quality work!


Also, the garment bags that she made were the inspiration for my vinyl packing cubes. I was totally excited about using vinyl like my grandma, and although they function pretty well, mine aren't perfect. I am especially in awe of her fine work, now more than ever!

Will provide the photo later!


Halloween Costumes

A few times, my grandma sewed up our Halloween costumes. Here is a terrible, terrible example. A few of my cousins and I decided very last minute to be a band of pirates, obviously from the 1990's.

I had to hide our faces, because I'm afraid my cousins would come after me for sharing such a terrible photo...

I could have decided to not share these tacky costumes, but I wanted to include this in a post because I am amazed that she whipped up these last minute costumes in different sizes. It's not her fault that we designed such awful costumes!


Pajamas

Some of my grandma's best work was on the pj's that my sister and I wore. Sweet little lace details, puffy sleeves (my favorite!), and the perfect print and design combinations.

Once again, I am a dolt and couldn't find any pictures of these pajamas, and of course they were donated a long, long time ago. I did find a picture of a dress that is very similar to one of the sets of pajamas that she made for us.

Here I am wearing a dress with lace at the sleeves and hem, a cat appliqué, and cute bow details. I would wear this now in a heartbeat! But seriously, my grandma made cute little dresses like this all the time, but this isn't hers since I know that she didn't use appliqués.



Hopefully when I get back, I can go through some old pictures and find more of her work to share.

What sewing inspiration did you have growing up?




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