Dress Of The Day with Angela

 I bought a pair of pink shorts only because they matched my pink hooded jacket. Before buying the shorts, I had dithered. I suspected I was never going to wear shorts with my favourite hooded jacket. I looked at the shorts and thought - I really need a skirt. If only I had a skirt. I wish I could convert the shorts. The price was only one pound in St Lukes. So I bought it. Why not turn the shorts into a skirt?  I cut the shorts up the A shape seam between the legs. That left a notch at the front and back. I found an old bra with lace and cut it up to fit. The colour was not quite right. Later I saw some baby clothes in St Luke's.  Perfect pink. Perfect match. Three for a pound. One was from Marks & Spencer. Two had patterns. One was plain. I cut the plain baby outfit in half and used safety pins to cover both gaps, lining up the hems. I sewed the triangular patches using matching pink cotton.  I was very pleased with the results. I had converted shorts into a sk...

 Sher with dress to impress new boyfriend, Kit, on Valentine's Day. Sher in sheer delight white outfit, with boyfriend Kit. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright. They met in Vancouver. This photo is of them was taken in Man o' War beachfront winery in New Zealand in February, New Zealand summer. She is wearing white. Summer white to reflect the light.  She is petite. The long skirt makes her look taller and can hide high-heeled shoes.  The bare midriff and cut-out shoulders and lack of sleeves give her body access to the sunlight.  Sexy. Huggable. Touchable.  Attention to the pretty face, and long black hair. As Kit is so tall, he would have to stoop to hug her around the waist. So the off-the-shoulder top invites him to hold her shoulders instead. New Zealand Dress Code New Zealanders wear shorts and short sleeved-shirts in their summer, the last of which is February when the schools resume. New Zealanders don't wear short sleeves and shorts only at lunch time. ...

  I was wearing a loose caftan. My Singaporean friend had said disparagingly, "Caftans are just for round the house. Nobody wears them out to the office or even for shopping. You look like you forgot to dress. They are house coats." Goodness, how things have changed in two years. Now everybody is working from home. They have their camera off because they are lolling around in shorts, pyjamas, who knows what.   I was on Zoom in a speech contest in London.  The President of my club was complimented on his smart outfit. He said, " I am dressed up because Angela told me I should dress to impress".  Yes, I had told him, "The club president should dress up to set the tone, and show he is president."  I meant wear a shirt and tie with a jacket. Not just a polo shirt with a jacket. Still, it was better than a tee-shirt. I remembered when a UK colleague who had gone to live in notoriously countrified New Zealand, returned to the dressy city centre of Singapore. On ...

I must confess this project did not go as well as I had hoped. First the good news. The project started well. Slitting the seams was straight forward. Some ends of the stitching were tough, well sewn. I had to admire the manufacturer for sewing down such thick fabric.  What size of sewing needle were they using! An industrial machine, no doubt. The thread and seams were very secure at the knee and crotch. No fear of your shorts pulling apart and sliding down.  Waist Size More good news. Despite the shorts being too tight for my husband, the waist fitted me perfectly, no need to tighten nor loosen it, nor move the pretty button.  Horizontal Patterns I rotated the resulting skirt, as you can see in this picture, to get the gaps at the sides instead of the back and the front. However, the result is that the pattern is slightly slanted.  I asked my husband what he thought. To my surprise he shrugged and said, "Nobody but you would notice (that the pattern wasn't matching...