Vintage Style, Modern Twist

What to do with family heirlooms, particularly jewelry, always seems to be a tricky topic. So often grandma's jewelry gets passed down to children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren that truly want to have a memento to remember their loved one, but they just don't know what to do with it. Sometimes grandma had a very different build or style and the pieces just don't look right on the recipient, sometimes they are so dated they don't fit with anyone in the family, and sometimes there's a beautiful piece that has some damage that makes it unwearable.

I was in this situation a few summers back, when I received a collection of jewelry from my grandmother's estate. There are some pieces I love, and wear as is. Many others I wanted but didn't know what to do with. They have been in a cedar chest through two years and a move- lately I've been really thinking through what to do with them... I want to create something that I will use regularly, and that will really showcase the pieces.  We (Christine and I) came up with some fun ideas that we're sharing with you! 

Some pieces are an easy DIY project, you can alter them yourself in a non-permanent way. I received a set of blue ceramic beads, to which I added a vintage enamel brooch - it made the perfect July 4th accessory.

Christine has a collection of vintage milk glass and metal necklaces that she has knotted off and wears for a modern, casual look.  Rather than buying "new" accessories, check out some local thrift and antique shops, or search around on e-bay, etsy, and poshmark for fun vintage finds. You never know what's out there just waiting to be found!

Vintage Jewelry - Out2LunchDesigns

Some pieces, on the other hand, require more work to make it into your wardrobe. For this you need professional assistance- which we have just added to our repertoire! We'd like to introduce the Out 2 Lunch custom line! (Not sure why it took so long to come up with this - probably because it's a little scary to work with other people's heirlooms, and we want to make sure we get it right). Our clients can be as involved, or not, in the design process as they choose to be. Some people just know that they want to use certain pieces- maybe to create a set of gifts for all the children and grandchildren, or maybe to enhance a special day with a sentimental or special heirloom piece.

Fabric Swatches - Out2LunchDesigns

Once we receive the jewelry we sort through our fabrics and come up with fabulous combinations that suit the pieces. Other folks have in mind a color scheme or a certain style they want to capture- in that case, we will work (in person and or via email) to find the perfect fabric to meet their vision. Once we have the design elements in place, we create one of our high quality, handmade clutches - seamlessly incorporating their family pieces. When we are done, everyone has a memory that they can incorporate into their life! 

This can also be a popular wedding option. For a few years, the "brooch bouquets" we're popular. Though beautiful, they were often very heavy and not useful for anything but decor afterwards. We are now offering the chance to create a wedding keepsake you will use for years!

Incorporate family jewelry as the "something old" on a clutch for the bride, create a set for the bride and her mother, or create a bridesmaids set - using your jewelry or ours. Our design style and attention to detail will help you to create a keepsake that will be treasured for years.

Check out our website www.out2lunchdesigns.com/home/custom-orders for more details, we'd love to help plan something special for you!  Plus, show us your pics of vintage jewelry used along with today's styles! (tag us on Instagram!)

Happy Creating and Styling!
Stacy and Christine

National Cherry Blossom Festival

We haven't had a travel focused blog in a while, so I wanted to share one of my favorite springtime trips. Nothing says spring to me like the National Cherry Blossom Festival in Washington DC. We have been several times during the 5 years we have lived in Viginia and it has been breath taking each times For our family, the Cherry Blossom Festival is usually a REALLY long day trip. We leave early in the morning, driving to the furthest south point on the DC Metro line, and return home after bedtime with kids sleeping in the car. If you want a more relaxed trip, or are coming from further afield, there is certainly enough to do and see to make it a weekend trip. I love taking this trip because there is something for everyone. You can enjoy the the beauty of the blossoms, or delve more deeply into history or science- depending on your personality. And for the shoppers, there are plenty of souvenirs to be had. 

The first 3,000 of these beautiful Japanese Cherry Trees were planted in 1912,  a gift from the mayor of Tokyo to celebrate the friendship between two nations. First Lady Helen Taft and Viscountess Chinda, wife of the Japanese Ambassador, planted the first tree. This cemented a connection between the two countries that has lasted over 100 years, and has weathered some very trying times. In 1915 the US returned the gesture, with a gift of Flowering Dogwoods - a favorite tree across southern climates. The original trees were planted around the Tidal Basin, with an additional 3800 gifted in 1965.  In 2012, additional trees were planted, expanding into the area around the Martin Luther King, Jr Memorial. 

We were not able to make the trip this year, due to to the combination of an early spring break and wonky weather patterns. The trees were primed for an early peak bloom, due to an especially warm February, but they were then stalled by snow and freezing temperatures last week (when we were on break). Unfortunately no one can predict entirely how this will effect blossoming, but those in the know (horticulturalists) believe that the majority of he blooms were past their critical period, and they expect peak bloom to be sometime in the next week and a half. So if you don't have weekend plans, or are lucky enough to have Spring Break next week (it's much less crowded during the week), head to DC and enjoy! 

When you arrive- we take the subway into the National Mall / Smithsonian area- head first to the large white tents along the Tidal Basin. Here you can gather information, watch performances and speak with members of the National Parks Service that oversee the festival. For our children, one if the highlights of the Festival is the opportunity to earn a special cherry blossom park ranger badge.  If you complete the ranger badge workbook, you will have seek most of the monuments on the Mall, and all of the peak cherry blossom areas. It includes a chance to learn about the history and science of the trees, as well as stretch your creative skills via art and poetry in the Japanese Haiku style. 

We normally pack lunch in a backpack so that we can spend the day in theTidal Badin area. When you have finished your time with the blossoms, DC has restaurants sure to please any palate and budget category. 

For more information, check the Official National Cherry Blossom website!

Looking Forward, Looking Back

As the year draws to a close, it is a natural time for looking back and making plans for the future; a time for reflecting on experiences and lessons learned, a time for making resolutions. 

New Year's resolutions have been a staple of numerous traditions and cultures throughout history.  From the ancient Babylonians to the ancient Romans, and even through modern celebrations of the Jewish new year (Rosh Hashanah), many times the resolutions have a religious component.  Although the timing of these New Year celebrations differs, they all include a component of seeking forgiveness for wrongs done and vowing to do better in the coming year. Similarly during Chinese New Year the ill fate of the year before is literally swept away to make room for good fortune to come.  In modern American culture, resolutions have taken on a largely secular focus, often revolving around changing health habits or eliminating negative behaviors.  Available data seem to indicate a higher success rate for resolutions that are written down and/or shared. In that vein, we (Stacy and Christine) would like to take this time between Christmas and the New Year to reflect on where Out 2 Lunch has been this past year, and share some of our plans for the future...

2016 has been an interesting year for Out 2 Lunch and we have grown professionally and tried some new ideas. We have experimented with both product lines and sales venues, we have had some successes and some failures and learned from them all. We debuted some new products - most notably pendants created by disassembling and combining multiple pieces of vintage jewelry- and we have retired some of our originals as we streamlined our offerings. We now have a product line - clutches, jewelry and hair pins- that reflects where we are going as a company. We are focusing on those things that feed our artistic spirits; creating one of a kind items that meld the past and future, that combine beauty and function. While we plan on test marketing some new products in 2017, they will be sub-lines of these categories. 

Cheers to the New Year!!

We have also enjoyed exploring our passions this year, and sharing them with you via our Instagram account and this blog. In 2017 we hope to expand our Instagram account to create a virtual community of like-minded artisans, internationally as well as in our local markets of Richmond, Virginia and Raleigh, North Carolina. We have enjoyed finding and supporting other fabulous artisans and creators, and look forward to sharing the best of what we find. We are also continuing to develop this blog, and will be bringing you some fabulous guest bloggers in 2017- that share our passion for the beauty of vintage and hand made. We have found that, generally, things that have stood the test of time have a quiet quality that we prefer to flash in the pan trends. 

Over the past several months we have also been researching and trying some classic, vintage cocktails, as a counter to the trendy bar drinks that have been making the rounds. We will be sharing these drinks on the blog the 1st of every month, beginning on New Year's Day. Some of the drinks were in our common awareness, but we had never tried them, others were lost gems that we were thrilled to discover! Each post will share the back story (or stories in some cases), the recipe for the drink and other interesting information we have discovered. 

Make sure to follow the blog and our Instagram so that you don't miss out on any of the fun!! 

Instagram: out2lunchdesigns

Blog:  Well & Truly Out 2 Lunch

Happy New Year! and Cheers!
Stacy and Christine 

Lights in the Darkness...

Advent Wreath with Candles

As my 7 year old is fond of pointing out, we now get up for school in the "pitch black darkness".   Hearing her say this amidst the candles and Christmas tree lights in our house, got me thinking - where do all the traditions involving lights during this dark time of year come from? There seem to be so many different celebrations that include candles, coming from diverse backgrounds- from the Menorah (commemorating the miraculous burning of the oil for 8 days following the victory of the Maccabees over the Greeks - read here for more information) to the Advent candles used by our family (used as a reminder to focus on preparing for the birth of Jesus - read here for more details) to the relatively recent Kwanzaa celebrations (focusing on the struggles and hopes of Africans in diaspora - read here for more information). While these celebrations all have a clear religious and/or cultural basis, there seem to be so many other seasonal uses for candles that have less clear or less publicized origins.

Santa Lucia Figurine

My eldest daughter has long had a fascination with "Santa Lucia" or St. Lucy - owing no doubt to our set of Holiday Celebrations around the World figurines.  Since toddlerhood she has enjoyed hearing, and then reading the story of young girls dressing as Lucia and bringing breakfast to their families in celebration of St. Lucy's feast day on Dec.13th. We never went beyond that though, to find out why St. Lucy was wearing candles and bringing food, or why an Italian, Catholic saint was so popular in predominantly Lutheran Scandinavia. Being me, this meant it was time to research, and share! The first question was easier to answer - St. Lucy was a young girl martyred in Rome, around 304 AD. She was killed because she was bringing food to the Roman Christians hiding in the catacombs and wore candles on her head to provide light to her path, as her hands were full of food - practical girl!  The answer to the second question is a bit dicier, but after reading multiple sources I would summarize it like this.... December 13th was the Winter Solstice in the old Julian calendar, and as such the darkest day of the year.  Scandinavian countries in particular have an extreme shift in their number of hours of darkness due to their closeness

St. Lucia Day at our house

to the polar region, and as such naturally had pre-Christian rituals and celebrations surrounding this transition from darkness to increasing light. When Christian missionaries from Italy arrived and brought with them stories of St. Lucia it was natural for the locals to connect that story to their traditions and she became something of a icon in that area, even following the Protestant Reformation. Also, as my daughter can attest - its fun to dress up in candles and deliver treats!



Vintage inspired candles on a tree

The tradition of tabletop candles dates to medieval times, and continues today in various formats worldwide.  In Ireland families gather around a large lit candle on Christmas Eve and pray for loved ones, In England and France, families often use a large candle with 3 wicks to honor the Holy Trinity, and in South America a candle is often placed in a paper lantern depicting scenes of the nativity. Among Eastern European nations, the candle is often blessed by the local priest before being lit at the family table. But the German tradition is perhaps most interesting of all.  Traditionally the German Christmas candle was placed atop a wooden pole decorated with evergreens or as a part of a triangular structure with other smaller candles. These traditions were replaced in the 1600's with earliest examples of our modern Christmas trees! These trees used candles as their primary source of light and decoration until the late 1800's when the earliest electric Christmas lights were used.

Window Candles

The custom of lighted candles in windows was brought to America during colonial times.  It has its roots in an old Irish custom, although it's unclear if it was brought to the colonies by the Irish or by English settlers that had adapted the tradition (which seems more likely to me for a number of reasons...)  During a time of English persecution that outlawed their religious observances, the Irish began burning candles in their windows to let the local priests know that their home was a safe haven to come in from the cold night, receive a warm welcome and celebrate the Christmas Mass. In order to justify the candles to English soldiers in the area, the candles were explained as a symbol that their home was open to the weary travelers of Christmas - Mary and Joseph. This generalized in colonial America to a tradition of lighting candles in the window to let traveling family members or other weary travelers know that they could find a place of friendship and welcome.  It also let neighbors know - during a time when houses were more widely spaced - that families were home and welcoming visitors.

Over time, the history of many of the these customs has been lost from general knowledge, but we have retained the feeling of warmth and welcome associated with candles.  I hope that you have learned something interesting, and will share it with others.  Please share in the comments if you have other holiday traditions that involve candles - I always love learning about other cultures and traditions!!

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a joyous celebration of all your traditions!

Stacy

Hydrangeas...Pass it on!

Today we're talking about plants, specifically hydrangeas; and the idea of "heirloom" plants, passing pieces of gardens on from one place to another and one person to another, or through generations of a family.  We've all heard of heirloom roses, but in my family, the tradition developing appears to be
heirloom hydrangeas.

If you've ever seen the old mop-head hydrangeas, huge bushes bursting with enormous round clusters of blue, pink, purple, or white blooms, you know what I'm talking about!  These plants are Gorgeous!  And here in the south, they are an absolute classic.

Hydrangea bush starting to bloom

Growing up in North Carolina, our house had a whole side of it lined with big blue mop-head hydrangeas.  They were stunning!  Hydrangeas are rather large bushes and they do spread and fill in an area over time.  When our family moved to Maryland in my teens, my parents dug up some of the hydrangea shoots/clusters and took them along.  They were planted at our new home where they continued to grow, thrive, and spread.  Many years later, the process was again repeated as my parents retired back to North Carolina, and brought some of those original hydrangeas with them.  Their yard is currently full of numerous varieties of hydrangea, including those original mop-heads from my growing up home.

The newly planted Hydrangea Row (as we're calling it)

This past summer, my husband and I started doing a lot of overdue renovation to our yard.  We decided we needed some large bushes (that could tolerate some shade) to line our back porch, and naturally my thoughts turned to hydrangeas.  Upon mentioning this to my family, they offered to thin some of theirs.  Free Plants?  Yes Please!!

We thinned mop-head hydrangeas from various parts of their yard, but I must admit I was most excited to get some "sticks" my father cut off those old original hydrangeas.  Now, when I say "sticks", that is exactly what they were!  Some of the hydrangeas we received were small clusters with roots, but these were literally sticks, cut off the plants.  I had heard that you can propagate hydrangeas that way, but never having tried it, was a little skeptical about their future growth and development.  I am certainly not a garden wizard.

Planted hydrangea shoots (sticks)

Never-the-less, I brought the plants, (and sticks) home, and set about getting them into their new location.  The plants with roots were immediately planted in the ground.  As for the "heirloom sticks" (as we now referred to them), I first trimmed or freshly cut the bottom parts.  Then they were wet with water, and dipped into rooting powder (or had powder (rather liberally) sprinkled on them depending how big the stem was).  After that, all the "sticks" were planted in the ground in a large cluster and watered - a lot.  Hydrangeas need lots of water, especially when new. 

For the next couple weeks I diligently checked my sticks - somewhat unconvinced of their survival, as I saw their sad, wilted leaves curl up and turn brown.

Then suddenly a few weeks (and some hurricane rains) later - buds!  

And a few weeks after that?
Leaves!! They grew Leaves!!

The heirloom hydran- geas might just make it to carry on; and maybe someday once they've grown and spread, I can continue the tradition and pass them on again! 

In the mean time, I can't wait to see them grow and fill in.  And maybe one day, my children will remember those large mop-head hydrangeas all along their back porch growing up.  Pass it on!


Cheers!
Christine