Winner to be Announced on October 1st!

On October 1st one of my beautiful scarves will be leaving me to go to a lucky follower. 

Will you be that lucky person?

I hope so. 

If you are not already a follower, it's not too late!!!

The follow button is to the right, at the top of the page.

Summertime Memories

With the passing of summer I found myself reflecting on the summers of my youth.

When I was nine my family moved from the city of my birth to a neighboring one. Both cities were in the suburbs.

The city of my birth was largely white collar, upper middle class, with large playgrounds, beautiful green spaces, tennis courts, statues, a small lake for swimming, and lots of tree shaded streets.

This was the entrance to the playground.

The new city had factories, the only playgrounds were attached to the schools, and were utilitarian, with very little equipment, and no trees.

I missed my old playground with its abundance of swings and tall slides, so one day I convinced the girl across the street to join me on a bike ride to my old neighborhood.

We packed a picnic and headed out. Our little legs pumped up and down hills and through traffic. We had to stop often and sit on rock walls to drink our water. (Back in those days we didn't have cool, unbreakable bottles, we had to use thermoses that still held the old milk smell in them from our school lunches. Back then primary schools didn't have cafeterias. You ate your lunch out of a cool lunch box if you were one of the lucky ones, or old scrunched up brown bags if you weren't.)

We rode for hours (most of it uphill) and never made it to the park. Donna really wanted to go home, so we headed back.

We both got into trouble that day for being gone so long, and Donna wouldn't make the trip with me again. 

But I did make it there before the summer was over. I spent a lot of the summer being punished, but I made it to my park with the brook flowing through it, and the swings that brought me close to the tree tops.

I never gave up until I had reached my goal.

That is the way I have always lived my life. Some goals are easy to achieve, you can complete whatever task it is in a matter of hours. You do it today, and unless it is childbirth, you forget about the journey in a week or two. 

Some goals may make you start over and over again. Your muscles might ache from the strain, your lungs burn from the pressure. People may call you foolish and try to dissuade you, but if the goal is really, really important to you, you never give up, no matter what the obstacles, no matter how long it takes.

It doesn't matter if no one else believes in you as long as you believe in yourself. 

If you don't believe in yourself, you will never succeed, even if you have thousands of people who do believe in you and are cheering you on from the sidelines. If you don't believe you will never be able to get off the ground

So hang in there and believe. Then spread your wings and fly.

Fairy dust only works if you believe.

If you are not already a follower of the Spell Room, please click on today. The button is right here ====>> below the links for The Misplaced Bride.

There is a contest that is only open to followers and it closes on September 30th!!!  (See the blog below for more details.)

You pick one.

Contest!

Sometimes I'm good and I talk about writing subjects, and sometimes I'm bad and I spout off about other things. You just never know what is going to be the topic in the Spell Room.

I am running a contest for my followers. I you are not already a follower it is easy to become one . . . just click the button on the right -> (Below The Misplaced Bride.)

The prize is a beautiful hand made scarf, worth $30. (I made it myself!)

Black Lace.

 It will make a great fashion accessory or gift for someone. (After all, the holidays are coming up.)

Purple Snakeskin

Ocelot

The contest ends on September 30th and the winner will be announced on October 1st.

Peacock Blue Lace
The winner gets to pick which scarf!

All followers (old followers and newbies) names will be placed in a hat and the LittleGuy will randomly choose one. Remember to check back often and see what is happening in the Spell Room!

Summer and Clothing Choices

I was driving down Main Street the other day and I saw a young mother pushing her child in a carriage. The young woman had on a lovely black dress with a halter style neck and cutouts around the back arms and shoulder blade areas. From the front it was modest, no deep cleavage, in the back you could see most of her black bra with neon blue trim.

My thought was, "Wow! She looks great!"

Back in my day I would have had to go braless or not wear that dress." And as a young nursing mother there was no way I could go braless!

Now all you young women are wondering what the hell is this old crone is talking about.

Back in the day, most bras were utilitarian and ugly. Unless you did your shopping in a Frederick's of Hollywood catalog (only, there were no stores in the malls, and Frederick's was notorious for it's cupless bras and crotchless panties) you were stuck buying the same bras your mother and grandmother bought at the local department store.

There were no Victoria's Secret stores in the mall. There were barely any malls in those days and going to one was a major adventure in driving and shopping.

Our exterior clothes were sexy, but our "foundation" left a lot to be desired. (I find it ironic that there are erotic pictures of women in the old industrial girdles and bras plastering some sites on the internet. They never looked that good on the average woman back in the day.) There were no thongs. G-strings were something only a stripper wore. And if you did have one, you didn't advertise it by having it hang out of the back of yours jeans.

At my last occupational therapy session a woman came in for her session and the therapist complimented her on he tank top and she especially admired the way no bra straps showed. They then went into a long discussion on how horrible women looked with their bra straps showing.

Old dingy white bras look terrible, but bras now come in a wide variety of colors and strap types, 

Most tank tops come with straps ranging from halter, spaghetti, crisscross, to industrial strength. If you want to wear a bra under most tops you will end up with straps showing. 

I would rather you show your straps than your nipples. Because most summer tops will show your nipples if you do not wear a bra.

What do you think?