Slow Day in Sydney

After all my grand plans to catch up on posts in Sydney, we have moved to a new hotel where sadly, there's no crew room with internet and no nearby McD's with free wifi for the cost of a cheeseburger ;)

I'm in my old haunt of Woolworth's using the internet cafe to catch up as there's only so much I can do using the browser on my 3DS or on my phone. So it's very timely that Skype have launched wifi for Skype, where at participating hotspots you can use your Skype credit to pay for time online with existing connections. Hop there's one near my new hotel.... :)

Unusually for me, I actually slept when I arrived. I intended only to sleep until the shops opened at 10, but ended up sleeping through until 2pm. Feeling very hungry I wandered to Pitt St mall where I was pretty sure that the Westfield there would be open. tucked into a cheese Kransky sausage & rustic potato wedges then browsed the shops. Sadly for me, Zara proved fruitless in my quest for the White Jacket in a medium (they told me last time I was here they'd get more size M, and if not then in a "few weeks") That was 3 weeks ago and now they tell me that they had no plans to get more in. Darn it! If I hadn't thought more sizes were coming in I would have just suffered with the size S. Oh well! If anyone has one and wants to sell it, drop me a line!

I dropped by Priceline to pick up a few things (mainly hair colour which was 50%- if you use L'Oreal Excellence Creme or the new Mousse one). The "Savvy by DB" stand is still sadly filled with all the unwanted shades of Orly nail laquer. Come back, Savvy, we miss you!!

Cruised by Dotti to eye off the dress I'd been wanting, but had disappeared from their online catalogue. Lucky I did, because it was on sale from $70 to $30. Score! I was in two minds between the size 10 and the 12, and while the 12 is a little big I figured I'd err on the side of caution as I'd rather it be too long than slightly too short for Dubai. There's always leggings of course but sometimes I like to wear just a dress. My penchant for dresses continues.

Still feeling in a shopping mood, I hit up Gloss Cosmetics (2x BYS blushes in Coral and Fierce Fuschia), Woolworths for groceries and stockings for work, and of course more chocolate. Violet Crumble block, I'm talking to you.

Lady Sybil

The past few days I've been obssessed with watching the BBC drama "Downton Abbey". It has everything I love- plenty of drama, interesting storylines and of course lovely costuming. I'm planning to post mor on it later but I stumbled across this "Which character are you?" quiz. This is what I got:



I like Lady Sybil so I'm pretty pleased with that, though I'm not sure I'm entirely like that. Then again, these things ARE just for fun! I remember doing tons of quizzes back in high school, and sharing with my friends!

Doesn't hurt that I love Sybil's clothes too =P

Do the Polka

Okay, so I'm a sucker for polka dots. One of my favourite dresses as a kid was a white summer dress with rainbow polka dots and a big bow on the back. I've always like a classic black and white polka dot print, but something about red with white dots also speaks to me. Maybe it's a throwback to 'Pretty Woman'- I always liked that outfit which Julia wears to the polo match.

Here's a couple more dress patterns from Etsy. How cute are they!





(Top: Cottage Lane Treasures and Bottom: The Craft Portal on Etsy)

Parisian Pink

Yet another dress I'd love to have. I can just imagine this with a white cardigan, for a day of strolling Paris, seeing the Louvre, sitting in a cafe watching passers-by and taking pictures near the Eiffel Tower.



(Pattern from Kallie Designs)

A Little Bit Audrey

Further to my pattern-browsing adventures, I saw this cute pattern & just had to share. I'm not really a fan of plaids, but this outfit is quite cute.

Do you think the 'model' looks a lot like Audrey Hepburn?

(Pattern from Bluette COurt)

Flight Pattern

One lazy night at home, I was browsing on Etsy and got to looking through all the listings of vintage sewing patterns. I've always liked the artwork on the pattern envelopes, especially on vintage patterns.

I remember as a little girl when my mum would take me to the sewing store. She'd put me on a seat at the pattern book table and I'd happily look through all of the pictures of the clothes, while she went to buy the things she needed. I'm actually quite surprised then that at that time, I had no desire whatsoever to actually sew. At that age I was more interested in a) playing in the sandpit with my trucks and Legos, and b) in drawing & painting then sewing.

When I was in high school, I preferred Edwardian and 1940's styles to anything later, though a nice full skirt would ocassionally get my attention. Of course, since becoming a flight attendant - and researching the history of my profession- I've fallen in love with the late 50's/early 60's fitted pencil skirt/dress style.

Here's a few patterns that I like from Etsy. They could easily be used to make an outfit for a costume party or Halloween if you wanted to go as a traditional "stewardess", or even for a 60's/"Mad Men" themed party.


This blue dress on the right would be perfect with a jaunty hat.
(From RRebelGirl)


(Bluette Court)


(ClayFletch)


(Studio G Patterns)


(Wildrose Primitives)

Finally, this cute Misses Pattern from Historically Patterns.


Oh, now if only I could sew!!

(I'm hoping to learn at some point, what with the days off we get in Dubai- especially in the reserve months)

Snapshots From Bangkok

Now I could have sworn I already posted about Bangkok, but for the life of me I can't see the post in my archives. For once, the flight over to BKK was about half full, a welcome relief from our usually chock-a-block aircraft and never-ending service. We actually got time to sit down and eat, and being the geek I am, I even got in some "cockpit appreciation time" in the flight deck. I love sitting up there and watching the clouds go by. (And secretly geeking out by seeing how many of the instruments I can actually read and remember how to use)

On to the pictures. On arriving, most of the crew made plans to either eat, shop or go for massages. I was starving, so went with about 5 other crew to a local eatery for some late dinner. Of course I ordered fish cakes, my staple item whenever I eat Thai food. They were pretty good, about a 7.5 out of 10 I must say.

For the mains I ordered this mango/pineapple chicken rice dish. It actually came presented IN a pineapple!!!! How cool.


After dinner, a couple of crew decided they wanted to visit some night markets. While they shopped for what they wanted, I decided to check out some clothing stalls. I like the atmosphere, it's busy and all the lights are on at night. It reminded me a lot of Bali, only less stinky.


As is my habit, I made sure to visit a supermarket to get some snacks and bottled water. I was very happy to see this:

Oh the cuteness!!! I also got some Pocky. (On opening the packs later, it wasn't the traditional Pocky, but pre-dipped Pocky sticks. Still good but not quite the same.)


There's pink taxis everywhere!!! "Ladies' Taxis" I believe they're called, though I don't know if they're really for ladies only.


Me at the night market area. (Yes, I'm drinking a Coke. It's either that or bottled water; 2 things at least that I know are safe to drink.)

While at the night market & waiting for the others to come back, I spotted this neat vintage-style dress. Snapped it up after a bit of hesitation and was glad I did. Just waiting for the weather to cool down a bit so I can wear it.

It was quite a late night so I went back to the hotel & slept. In the morning I met up with a few crew to go to the famous MBK department store. While everyone else bought DVDs, I just got some food and a few little souvenirs. I saw the cutest little sailor outfit, really wish I had bought it for my nephew but he'd be way too big for it now. After MBK, everyone wanted to go for massages, but I wanted to explore a little bit. Next to the hotel were some markets, so I went for a look around and bought a few things.

We took a tuk-tuk to MBK. At first I thought I was going to die, but then it was fun. :)

Small temple altar outside the hotel. I like seeing these traditional type things when I travel.

Street food. Even though this was just coconut I was too scared to buy something from a street stall. (I really need to harden up.) I dislike cocount so maybe next time I'll look out for other fruit.



I went for a walk to a little arts "village" down the road to buy souvenirs. I found this cute little shop with all kinds of things to buy. I loved the stone cat figurines but by this point didn't have much money left, so I got a card to come back next time. The lady was so nice and cute.


It's a giant cat!!! (I'm a sucker for kitties!) I also bought a card holder for all my licenses at a store just near here. It's really popular with all the crew for buying shoe and makeup bags, and all that kind of stuff. It appeals to my inner OCD-ness as you can buy matching sets :P


More supermarket haul. I always go for the cute stuff, not caring how it actually tastes. Have discovered some really cool things this way!

Another vintage-style dress. Wasn't sold on the colour originally but now I really like it. (Less than US$10) Fits great too.

Thai sweets from a stall in MBK. Crispy cashews and some jelly-type lollies.

Was very humid so I bought this fan, it's much sturdier than the Chinese ones & pretty too. I got this from the same arts village where the cute shop was.


My favourite thing of the whole trip. This little wooden frog figurine is actually a musical instrument! You use the "drumstick" stored in his belly, and run it along the spikes on his back. It actually sounds exactly like a frog. I fell in love with these immediately, and as he was the only green frog in a basket of brown ones, I knew he was the one for me! (He now sits on our tv cabinet)


Yes, those are Thai Twisties!!!!

All in all, I really enjoyed Thailand. Can't wait to go back, and when I do I hope to get to see some more traditional sights around Bangkok.

Pearl Harbor Style...

A few days ago I posted about a plane trip I took in a vintage aircraft. (You can read about it here.)

For that outing, I dressed "1940's style" to celebrate the occasion and the fact that you don't get to fly in a beautiful classic aircraft like this every day. (I also wanted to bring back a bit of the glamour to flying, hehe)



My outfit was inspired by Kate Beckinsale's character in Pearl Harbor, I simply loved all her clothes in the movie and knew that a black and white outfit was the perfect choice and would be fairly easy to achieve in the short preparation time that I had.



I already had the dress, a B&W bird print frock from Target. The suede platforms were borrowed from my sister, the bag was vintage reproduction and the hair flower (frangipani like Kate of course!) was found in a hair supply store.

Here's some photos of Kate in the film.





Since the plane ride, I purchased a dress from Alannah Hill that has a strikingly similar ribbon print to the dress that Kate wears in the film.

From a distance it would look almost identical. Of course, the shape on mine is different but adding some small shoulder pads could make it more 40's-authentic! (Of course, the model is way taller than me, so when I put it on, it falls just below the knee, the way it should for the 1940's look)

If you're a fan of 1940's style as well, and like Kate's "off duty" 1940's beach bunny look,


check out this cute sarong-suit pattern from Wearing History patterns! How adorable is it...

(Photos: from Fanpop website, copyrights are owned by the filmmakers and are for inspiration purposes only)

Classic Wings

A year or two ago, I had the chance to take a flight in a vintage airliner. A former colleague of mine had set up a sightseeing business with his father, taking people for flights in this gorgeous aeroplane that they had restored. Sadly, due to the economy they were forced to sell the plane and so had a "last hurrah" champagne flight over the city to say goodbye.

To celebrate the occasion I decided to dress in the era of the DC-3. As it was short notice the outfit wasn't as accurate as I'd hoped, but I think I got the overall 'look'. (My inspiration was Kate Beckinsale in 'Pearl Harbour'- post on her outfit to follow)

(I have to apologise in advance for the formatting of this post, I'm not sure what went wrong but I couldn't fix it without starting over and it's taking AGES to upload photos)


I already had a cute shirt dress in a black and white bird pattern which would do nicely, and I found a frangipani hair flower (favourite of pin-up girls) and I think tropical enough for the Hawaii part =)



I would have loved to wear a suit and hat but as it was the height of summer it jsut wasn't possible. At this point I hadn't yet learned to do victory rolls in my own hair, so I made a quick trip to the hairdresser. It wasn't exactly what I wanted, but as the girl had no experience with vintage hairstyles I thought it wasn't too bad, and had the right 'feel' for 1940's.






It was a gorgeous day for flying and the view was beautiful! A really neat feature of the plane was a 'bubble window' that was specially installed to allow people to take unobstructed photos of the views. You could sit right out into the bubble and be about a foot outside of the fuselage of the plane. How cool!

I just loved the retro seats with the white vinyl trim and the curtains. Flying at least LOOKED more glamorous back then! In reality I'm sure there was a lot of airsickness, oil stains and windswept hair on the ladies :P

I would have loved to fly as "stewardess" on this flight, and had the sale not had to happen so suddenly, they would have let me do it. Can you imagine, how NEAT would that have been?! I still have hopes to maybe do this in Melbourne when I come back to Australia to live.









Outfit details:

Dress: B&W bird design from Target
Bag: Thrifted (sadly ruined in storage last year)
Shoes: 1940's suede platforms borrowed from sister
Hair Flower: Price Attack
Cherry Earrings: Diva







Certainly was a great day, I had a fantastic time and also checked off one of my "bucket list" items at the same time. If you ever have the chance to do a historic scenic flight, I highly reccommend it!

"Gooney Bird" flights with ShortStop Charter Melbourne