Friday, March 26, 2021

In Your Easter Bonnet!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: The pandemic has taken a lot from us, and one of the most trivial, yet most fun, has been fashion. We’ve all embraced our status as sweatpants nation (okay, yoga pants nation if you’re fancy, but we know you’re not doing anything other than the corpse pose in them, and it doesn’t count when you’re on the sofa.) I was thinking of this because I saw an old photo of my sister and me, age maybe seven and ten, in our brand new Easter outfits, and I thought well, that’s gone the way of the dodo


Spring has always been a time for new outfits, shoes, handbags and hats. Hats! Why haven’t we brought hats back for Zoom meetings? A hat would be the perfect fashion accessory when the only part of you anyone sees is your front half from the mid-chest up. We could have been wearing fascinators all this time, and we blew it.

 

 

 


Okay, sorry for the digression. Where were we? Spring clothing. After sweaters and plaids and wool all winter, we got to put on pastels, blue and white and sailor stripes. We traded parkas for trench coats and snow boots for wellies. As a child, I always got a sprightly new outfit this time of year, carefully calculated by my mother to last through the change in temperatures and any possible growth spurts I might have between March and August. I debuted it at Easter and wore it to church, the officers club (once a month dinner out) and any weddings, christening parties or other dress-up occasions that might include children. 


Even as a young adult, I would often buy myself something new for spring. Unfortunately, I came of age in the 1980s, so everything I saved from that period is A) too small and B) has eNORmous shoulder pads. I confess, I wasn’t as rigorous as my mother in getting my three kids new Easter outfits - expectations for children’s appearances have, shall we say, relaxed since the 60s and 70s. But I did kit one or the other of them up in the spring frequently enough for it to be a Thing and for Youngest to get put out if it wasn’t her turn to get a new outfit. 


Lately, I’m afraid the arrival of spring has been more about buying winter clothing and footwear at 50% off than about pastel jackets and starched skirts. And now I wonder if a year plus in seclusion, with few or no “occasions” for anything dressy, may have struck the death knell of  The Easter Outfit and The Spring Ensemble. 


How about you, Reds? Did you get something fresh and fancy this time of year when you were a girl? And are you planning on buying anything new this spring?

 

 


RHYS BOWEN:  I always wondered about the spring outfits I saw in the Easter Parades--always so spring-like and airy. Where I was growing up in England Easter was bloody cold. Churches were not heated and you sat and shivered. So it was still tweeds and woolens. I didn’t get many new clothes growing up. We wore school uniforms so it was one nice dress and one play outfit for the summer and the same for the winter.


For my own kids I think they got new outfits by necessity, when they outgrew and there was nothing to be passed down to them. I was good at finds in thrift stores and we had friends with older kids who passed along clothing. But I don’t ever remember new Easter outfits. 

This has been true for me, even when I could afford a nice new outfit. My choir always sings at the Easter Vigil, which is from 8-10 at night and thus cold. We stand outside as the New Fire is kindled and the Easter candle blessed (sometimes in a howling gale). Then we process into the dark church, carrying candles lit from the New Fire. it’s very lovely but quite chilly. 


This year I’ll be with family in Arizona and I see from the weather forecast it’s going to be 90 degrees. So a new Easter bikini? I may have to buy a sundress.

 


JENN McKINLAY: You had me at hats, Julia! You’re right. That was a major oversight! We are not a churchy people. My parents’ idea of Sunday worship was to take the entire family for a long walk on the beach or in the mountains and find God in nature, and we went every Sunday come rain, shine, snow, or what have you - big environmentalists my parents, so there weren’t any Easter outfits. Also, I grew up in Connecticut so Easter was usually on the chilly side. Spring outfits were bought by necessity - weddings, school dances, etc. Now that I’m in AZ, spring means sundresses! I think I own at least twenty because that’s all I wear once the temps are over 85 until they drop back down, which will be in October. Hmmm, I think I have to go see if they’re on sale yet because the hot days are a comin’!

 

 

 


HALLIE EPHRON: This is bringing back memories. My sisters and I each got a new party dress at Easter, and my mother walked us over to Beverly Drive to watch the parade. Yes, an Easter Day parade in Beverly Hills. I have no memory of what paraded. It wasn’t memorable. But I do remember the scratchy dresses, ungrateful child that I was.


I was just reading an on CNN article that the Easter dress this year is a loose fitting cotton frock, a “nap dress”… what we might once have called a “house dress.” 

 

 

 

 

 


HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: New Passover outfits are not a thing, at least they weren’t when I was a kid.

And I have seen the new spring clothes,Hallie, and whoa. I am going to save a LOT of money, since Little House on the Prairie is not my look.

Anyway, new spring clothes? Here’s the thing. I HAVE new spring clothes. They’re the gorgeous ones I bought last year at this time, and they STILL HAVE THE TAGS on them.

Not that I’m going anywhere.  

 


LUCY BURDETTE: Oh we had new outfits--and hats--for Easter every year. I know I’ve dragged this photo out before, but I love it so! It’s my family and the family who lived next door. The lady in the red coat next to my mom is her best friend, Mary Jane. Mary Jane became our stepmother many years later, so we came full circle. Usually we three girls had matching dresses--in this pic my sister Sue and I had the matching hats too. Speaking of church, we adore our Easter sunrise service here in Key West on the beach. Didn’t have it last year, and won’t have it this year either. Oh pooh.

 

JULIA: Lucy, I love the little guy in front who looks like a short Frank Sinatra!

 

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Hats, yes, please! Why don't we wear hats in the US like they do in the UK, where you don't need a special occasion? Lucy, your photo is totally adorable. I had Easter dresses, too, with the ouchy starched petticoats, worn with the patent leather shoes. But my parents were never more than C & E Presbyterians, so by the time I was in grade school Easter had fallen by the wayside, replaced by their devotion to golf.


This year I am desperate for dresses--and for a place to wear them. My daughter has booked us a very posh champagne afternoon tea for Easter Saturday, and just this morning I ordered a dress from Anthropologie, quite ruffley in bright blue.. Cross fingers it fits!  Hank, I think the designers are going for Little House on the Prairie because they're afraid no one will be able to get into fitted clothes after this pandemic year.

 

How about you, dear readers? Did you-do you-will you get a new ensemble for spring? And what about these prairie styles and "nap dresses?" Hard to imagine Marjorie Reynolds or Judy Garland wearing one...


99 comments:

  1. When the children were little, there were always new outfits for Easter Sunday. And it’s great fun to buy fancy new things for the Little Ones . . . but I don’t see a new spring dress in my future. Hats? Now that’s a great idea . . . .

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    1. I see an organized pro hat movement in our future, Joan!

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    2. DEFINITELY MORE HATS !! I nearly always wore one to church (Episcopal) until last year when everything stopped. More often than not I was the only one wearing a hat, but I didn't/don't care...I love 'em. Some with brims some berets, and when I didn't wear one, I got comments ! Looking forward to going to church with my hat on hopefully sometime in the Fall. As to special and new Easter clothes...always when I was growing up. It was something look forward to, and often Mom and I sewed our own new Easter fashions, always fun and always pretty. Thanks for the memories...

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  2. NOPE, no new outfits for Easter growing up as a kid, probably because we did not celebrate this holiday at all. We embraced Thanksgiving and Christmas meal traditions in Toronto, but my parents were Buddhists.

    And now living in Ottawa, I am definitely in the same camp as Julia. I search for and buy winter clothes at 50% or more because I get sick of the ones I had been wearing from November-March! My spring clothes are basically the same as my fall clothes: thinner long-sleeved tops and switching from the Columbia omni-heat thermal pants/winter boots to jeans and running shoes.

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    1. Grace, I'm really waffling on whether or not to buy some new winter things. On the one hand, I do get sick of the old ones. On the other hand, I am still wondering exactly how many people are going to be seeing me next winter?

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  3. Easter was the only time we got new fancy dresses, shoes and little handbags to wear for church when I was younger. The process stopped when I turned 14 and decided church was not for me.

    As an adult, nah, I buy clothes when I need to.

    But I do remember Buster Brown shoes. They were so cute and I loved their commercials.

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    1. I'm Buster Brown and I live in a shoe.
      This is my dog, Tige, and he lives there too!

      Lordy, how old are you, Dru, to remember Buster brown shoes? xo

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    2. I vaguely remember some Saturday morning TV show my brother watched. Don't know the name but there were noisy elephants and the commercials were for Buster Brown.

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    3. When you went to the shoe store to get your new Buster Brown shoes, they had a special gizmo to measure your feet. I can't remember what it looks like, but I remember thinking it was very technological!

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    4. I certainly remember Buster Brown shoes, and the measuring gizmo! And I had the Buster Brown hairstyle to match!

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    5. Laughing here, Debs. The haircut was really a pip! We wore Stride Rite Shoes. A trip to that store was very special! I used to twirl in the mirror with my new shoes.

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    6. I remember X-ray machines in shoe stores when I was little. I loved looking at the bones in my feet. Then someone figured out there were serious issues with that and the machines disappeared

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    7. Deana here - Buster Browns for this family. especially for my sister. I think the gizmo was on it's way out at our local Buster Brown store. Or maybe they just didn't like it.

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  4. Yes to the new dresses, but my mother would have sewed them for my sisters and me, and new hats. I raised my sons Quaker, so no big deal is made out of Easter. For the last fifteen years I have thrown an Easter brunch, and for the first one I got my boys pink Oxford button-down shirts. They still wear them!

    I would love some new spring clothes, but I hate buying clothes when my weight is up, so I probably won't.

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    1. Groan! I hear you on that last part, sister. At this point I'm just hoping to fit into last springs wardrobe...

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  5. I always had an Easter dress, usually a new spring coat, too, which was just about the most useless garment ever invented. The last one was while I was in college, lightweight basket weave wool, white, with embroidered satin lining, also in white.

    My children also got Easter outfits, new pants and blazers for the boys and the most adorable dress I could fine for Melinda.

    My friends and I did pass children's clothes around tho. I remember one plaid blazer that every little boy had a pass at, and we had the pictures to prove it.

    Love the idea for ZOOM fascinators. The last time I was in Canada I looked for one to wear to my granddaughter's wedding. I didn't find one I liked and the wedding went south anyway. Sigh.

    We live in a mixed neighborhood, and many of my friends will be celebrating Passover. On my bucket list is to attend a Passover seder. But that isn't happening again this year. Nor will we be going to church. Julie is in the Novavax study, doesn't know if she's had the vaccine or not, and we won't be taking any chances, not to mention the difficulty of getting me there in the first place.

    I get the splint off today, sutures out, and, I hope, graduate to a boot. I doubt if weight bearing will be allowed for another month. So I'm very limited as to where I go, can't get out of the house without considerable expensive help!

    I so miss those days when Julie sang the Triduum at the Shrine of St. Francis in San Francisco. It was long and exhausting for her, but the music was awesome.

    Happy Pesach to Hank and Hallie and anyone who celebrates.

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    1. Ann, here's hoping the weight-bearing comes sooner for you--sending healing thoughts! I remember hobbling around in two boots and feeling ecstatic to be 'mobile'.

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    2. Ann, I was just thinking about coats this morning. I have this very nice white coat trimmed with black that is only really useful for about two weeks a year. My friend, the first time she saw me wearing it, asked, "Is it a raincoat, or a spring coat?" Perfect distinction.

      Fingers crossed that you get to "graduate" today!

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    3. OOH, Karen, raincoat, or spring coat! Hmmm. And thank you, Ann! It'll be another Zoom event, but that's okay. xxx

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    4. First, that collegiate white on white coat sounds utterly impractical and I want it desperately. Secondly, and, do you find out at some point if Julie was vaccinated or got the placebo? I mean, if the ladder, she does need to get the shot at some point, right?

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    5. What Julia asked! When will Julie know if she was vaccinated?
      And Ann, good luck with getting the boot!

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    6. Novavax is cross-blinded, which means everyone gets the opposite of what they got to start with. I think she got the vaccine, but if she didn’t, she gets it in April. Win/win. She could have asked to be unblinded but preferred not to. NY is vaccinating everyone 45 and over as of this week. Our system is honed and working.

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  6. Thanks Ann. Passover begins tomorrow night and I haven't begun to cook, but it is going to be Passover for 2, so no rush. I may wear a dress for our mini-seder, we'll see. Ann, it would be a pleasure to have you and Julie at our seder! I so miss the friends we used to celebrate with who have moved away.

    Growing up in a small town with a pretty good sized Jewish population of first and second generation families and some Holocaust survivors, there was one synagogue, orthodox. It was a small wooden building where the women sat upstairs on a balconey that overlooked a central platform where the torah was read, and the holy "ark" where the scrolls were kept was at the front. The men sat downstairs and the first few rows were reserved for the children, boys and girls of the junior congregation.

    My mother always bought us new clothes to wear to synagogue and the pictures that Julia shared today really brought it all back. My father's mother always came to services on Passover and we would visit her upstairs and sometimes my mother would be there, if she was well enough to climb the stairs. I particularly remember the full skirts on the dresses, but especially the patent leather shoes. Oh, my! I think I got a hat one year, too. In Connecticut, it could still be quite cold at Passover, so, as Ann recalled above, spring coats just aren't enough.

    As an adult, I bought new clothes for conventions and meetings and for special occasions, not really for holidays. I wore the same size for about 40 years and just started to change dimensions about 10 years ago. Most of the dresses still fit anyway and I have lots of sundresses because they are such a joy to wear in summer. So, yes, I'd buy more sundresses and knit dresses for in-between seasons, too. I frequently wear dresses for zoom meetings. I love dresses.

    Happy Passover to all my friends who celebrate the holiday.

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    1. Judy, that's a wonderful word picture you've painted. Happy Passover!

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  7. Easter dresses and hats! My mother made us dove gray coats with white collars. When I was a choir girl, we'd vote on whose mother had the most extreme hat as they walked past us for communion.

    Fast forward to our years in NE Ohio, when the church choir would process behind a bagpiper on Palm Sunday. With snow flurries. Every single year, no matter if it was mid-March or the end of April.

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    1. To be fair, margaret, I edited out a lot of Easter's where there was still snow on the ground. Usually not covering it completely, but definitely there in freezing loss! I have a picture of the Maine Millennial at age three or four hunting for Easter eggs in our backyard. Ross and I had carefully placed an Easter egg on each snow pile, and she is wearing her new floral Easter parka!

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    2. The Easter Bunny gave our kids outdoor toys--bikes, scooters, and basketballs--because by Christmas, we already had our winter snowpack. I remember egg hunts in winter jackets and rubber boots.

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  8. I didn’t get a new dress for Easter because , in Quebec, it was usually still cold and depending of the date, more like winter than spring.
    Nevertheless, you brought back the memory of the beautiful dresses I had for warmer times (May to September ), some with crinolines. I liked the way it moved on me when I walked or when I turned.
    I still love to wear dresses but only in summer. Time passing, I feel cold more easily.
    And being almost bald, when outside, I always wear something on my head, tuque in the cold and hat in warmer time.

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    1. I remember having a dress or two with crinolines, Danielle. I recall always being torn between delight at how poofy they were, and consternation at how itchy they were. I was a child who had very little tolerance for lace and hard elastic.

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  9. When I was growing up, all four of us kids got new outfits (dresses for the girls, shirts/clip-on ties/pants) for the boys at Easter. Of course, growing up in Buffalo, we were just as likely to have to wear winter coats and snow boots with the new finery. Easter was one of the days we were definitely in church (our attendance was spotty in my childhood).

    I also love to attend the Easter Vigil service (our new parish does the full seven readings, all the fancy ceremony, the baptisms and the confirmations, so it's a 3-hour service). This year, I have no idea what we'll do. Catholics are still under a dispensation from attending Mass and the Vigil is one of the more popular services (two years ago there were a over 900 people there), so I don't know what the sign-up will look like. And I just don't think livestreaming it will be the same.

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    1. Live streaming is definitely not the same, liz. At my church we are opening for a limited number for Easter services, but I'm not going to go, not having had my vaccine yet. As much as I love our showy, incense laden Easter services, I don't want to risk getting ill so close to the finish line.

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  10. When times were good, we had new clothes for Easter until we were older and opted out of my dad's church. The dresses were always pretty--but Hallie, always scratchy too! I was too much of a tomboy--best part was getting out of my finery and into play clothes again.

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    1. In first grade I came home from school one day with my petticoat on top of my dress. It was too scratchy!

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    2. Going against the tide from an early age!

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  11. Love these memories! I have lots of photos of my sister and me in our spring finery, complete with hats and cute little coats, attended by my tres chic slender mother in her lovely spring getups, as well. My brothers also wore the clip-on ties, Liz! My eighth grade graduation photo is hilarious, with all the girls in their white dresses they would have worn at Easter, and all the hats. Mine was a white roller, very cute, but my best friend Ellen's looked like someone painted a pot and upended it on her head.

    When my kids were small my sister-in-law in Marin had two best friends. One was married to an heir to a paper company fortune, the other was the wife of Bob Haas, CEO of Levi Strauss. They all had daughters at the same time, and all three of them sent me boxes of clothing from their own, older girls for mine. I distinctly remember utterly lovely spring coats made of wool (worn once, or possibly not at all), beautiful dresses, and one gorgeous pair of emerald green satin Mary Janes that took the particular fancy of my youngest, who tried to wear them everywhere she went.

    We were spoiled by all the pretty clothes that came from California, but that was the 80s and 90s, and just about the end of the dressing-kids-up-for-Easter era. When we went to church on Easter when the girls were older it was almost depressing to see people wearing jeans.

    I hope I am never depressed enough, though, to wear those dreary Little House on the Prairie/early Sister Wives dresses. Shudder.

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    1. Karen,

      thanks for sharing your stories. The Business School at Berkeley is named after the Haas family.

      the Little House on the Praire clothes are for kids, I think. When I was a kid, I loved wearing clothes that I saw in children's books like a bonnet. I also loved Holly the Strawberry Girl ? clothes. I also remember Princess dresses like what Snow White wore.

      Diana

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  12. Happy Passover, to all who celebrate, by the way.

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    1. Thanks, Karen. Just made my chicken soup and some applesauce. No I'm feeling like I'm getting a bit more in the spirit. Oh, and while cooking, I am listening to Heirs and Graces. What a wonderful Audible book. Rhys had the best reader in the world for most Georgie books and it is such a pleasure to listen to her voice so many accents, one after the other. Sigh. I know she is missed.

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    2. Sounds like a peaceful day, Judy.

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  13. I do remember new dresses for Easter and hats! Since my birthday sometimes fell on Easter, not this year though, my birthday gift was often new shoes.

    But you saying petticoat brings back memories. I once tried to feed a thin wire through the hem of a slip (remember wearing slips?) to make a hoop skirt. I wanted that skirt to stand out, not just hang there. That really didn't work out well. But the next year I asked for a crinoline for my birthday. I saw them in the Sears catalogue. The one I wanted was advertised as 75 yards! I was beyond thrilled to get it. It may have been scratchy - I didn't care. The problem however was I didn't have any skirt big enough to go over the crinoline. I didn't let that stop me; I just pushed the skirt down and did the best I could. I often think that my seventh grade teacher must have thought we girls were hilarious.

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    1. That is SO cute! We used to wear the crinolines and tights and leotards and pretend they were tutus.

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    2. I had a hot pink crinoline that I wore as a tutu--and not just on Halloween! Good times.

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    3. Proving there is no problem a determined fashionista can't overcome!

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  14. Crinolines! Now there's a trend that I am happy to say has not made a comeback. Too scratchy. Too silly... What about the cinch belts we wore with them?

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    1. And what about the tiny waists we had!

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    2. Those pictures from that time! Everyone had tiny waists!

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    3. Small waists. Girdles. Girdles, ladies. Can't say how much that fashion trend needed to end!

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  15. Seriously? Bing drove a horse and carriage with his legs crossed at the knee?

    Okay, never mind that. (But, seriously?) My grandmother was an excellent seamstress who used to get fabric remnants at some clothing factory up in Kansas City, where she lived, and figure out ways to piece them together into elegant princess-seamed couture for her granddaughters. Mom would send her our measurements in February and just before Easter some new confection would show up for each of us. I particularly remember a very cool pink linen dress and over-jacket that was Jackie O sleek and tailored--no ruffles, no bows, no scratchy petticoats. I did like hats, but we would have had to buy those, rather than depend on the generosity of my grandmother, so that was a no-go.

    These days I look at the offerings that I get in my email every day and think, "Nope. Nope. Not gonna wear that, either." Seems like every new outfit has tiny cap sleeves and, not being Michelle Obama, those are a definite "nope" in my wardrobe.

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    1. Gigi, my favorite part of that clip is the expression on Margery Reynolds face. I don't know what the director told her; maybe to look happy but not adoringly at Bing? Whatever he said, she comes across as lobotomized!

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    2. I agree. She looks totally moronic.

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    3. Well, Bing was casual. I much prefer Fred Astaire and Judy Garland strolling down 5th Avenue singing.

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  16. Oh, forgot the Prairie dresses look--saw a hilarious set of photos online--don't remember where--people are buying those dresses and then posing in farm and prairie and mountain cabin settings--men and women. Gut-laughs galore!

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    1. The prairie look was huge when I was a kid - inspired by the show Little House on the Prairie, no doubt. I saw the dresses online the other day and thought “No, just no.” LOL.

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    2. if any are interested, look for #targetdresschallenge for spoofs on the prairie look

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    3. Oh, yes, Jenn! The prairie look of the '80s. Lots of lace and pastels as I recall. Remember those Gunner Sax dresses everyone wanted? I almost got one, but I think my mother managed to tactfully convey that a squared off sailor collar with lace was not the best look for a busty young woman.

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    4. Flora, thank you for sharing the #targetdresschallenge! I found an article on Bored Panda collecting some of the best photos, and I laughed so hard I nearly fell off my chair. Everyone, google this right away - you won't regret it.

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    5. Oh, yes! Gunne Sax! I loved the look, until I put one on. Somehow "sweet, vriginal maiden in a meadow" on the catalog page translated to "just rolled out of the haystack for the third time today" on me. That's what comes from having the non-waifish figure of an adult woman. I think Jessica McClintock died just recently.

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    6. OMG, Gigi, I just choked on my coffee!

      Yes, Jessica McClintock died just a few days ago.

      Whenever I think of Gunne Sax I remember that someone in one of the Outlander books wore one to go through the stones so she would look more 17th century.

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  17. I think if there were lines for talents for the preborn I decided to skip clothes and headed for the reading line twice. I hated shopping or being forced to go shopping for clothes. I remember painfully ill fitted patent leather shoes for Easter, which added to the dress up angst. At university I pretty much wore what everyone else was wearing but secretly longed for tie dye. Now, as you know, the less said about my wardrobe the better. Ladies, I did try. I bought a caftan from India. I made it as far as Memphis and disappeared into the blizzard of '21. Maybe next Spring.

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  18. Dang auto correct. The caftan made it to Memphis, I stayed in Tampa.

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    1. Okay, that makes more sense, Coralee! The first one sounded like the beginning of a country song. :-)

      If the caftan doesn't work out, there's always the nap/prairie dress!

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    2. Coralee, now I'm having flashbacks to patent leather shoe blisters, and white cotton socks slipping down into the shoes and making them worse. Good times.

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  19. We didn't get new outfits for Easter when I was a kid. We were always on a budget and I'm sure Mom thought whatever she made for me in September was just fine in March or April. She did buy me new Sunday school shoes, mary janes, each September, along with a frilly bandeau/hair band to wear to church. Later I graduated to a doily-thing to wear on my head. Not wasting money on kids' hats!
    Margaret reminded me of an adult memory. When we lived in NE Ohio we attended the Episcopal church and we processed in on Palm Sunday behind a bagpiper too. Think that was a Western Reserve thing?

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    1. Pat, no. Episcopalians LOVE bagpipes. We process to one on Palm Sunday as well, and I've seen the bride piped in at Episcopalian weddings. Some churches have a big St. Andrew's Day celebration with kilts, pipes, etc.

      Which is odd, because the actual Scots have traditionally been Presbyterian.

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  20. May have been a Western Reserve custom. We lived in Hudson.

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  21. Oh, yes, new outfit for spring. Loved the photos today and I certainly remember those days. Respectfully disagreeing with Hank, we did get new Passover outfits. Perhaps because all our friends were getting Easter outfits? In a chilly town near the Canadian border, this meant new "spring" coats. They have disappeared along with hats and gloves - they were lightweight wool in pastel colors. One year - and I have the photos to prove it - my sister (14 months younger) and I got navy capes instead, very Madeline looking. We loved them! Family did not have money to spend on extras like clothes, but one new dress outfit, and a seasonal coat, somehow appeared spring and fall.

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    1. Triss, when we lived in Germany, one year - probably NOT for Easter - my mother bought my sister and me the most beautiful Bavarian cloaks in red (for me) and pine green (Barb.) They were beautifully made and kindled a life-long love of tracht. I wish I knew what happened to them.

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    2. One great thing about buying cloaks for children--it takes longer to outgrow them. I had a fabulous cloak that I begged my parents for when I found it in a bargain basement at age 13. I wore it all through college, then handed it down to my niece. She put a new lining in it and wears it still.

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  22. Deborah, I thought C&E were separate from Presbyiterians?

    Diana

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    1. It just means Christmas and Easter churchgoers, Diana.

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    2. Sometimes referred to as "poinsettias and lilies" because those are the only flowers they ever see in church!

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    3. OOps I thought C & E was in reference to Church of England.

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  23. HANK,

    I am laughing because I have never seen Passover outfits though I have seen Easter outfits.

    And I thought the Little House on the Praire look was for kids, right? I used to love these clothes when I was a kid.

    Diana

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  24. RHYS,

    Yes, I remember school uniforms when I was a kid. When I went to a Catholic school, which was the best education offered for a Deaf child at that time, I remember that we wore tartan plaid uniforms with forest green sweater jacket ? It seems that in America, only church schools and private schools have school uniforms? I am trying to think of a public school in the USA that would require kids to wear school uniforms.

    Diana

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    1. Diana, many charter schools and public magnet schools require uniforms for the kids.

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    2. KAREN in Ohio,

      Never knew that. Thanks for sharing.

      Diana

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  25. JENN,

    Hats are gorgeous. I love wearing a hat during Easter because it is very festive. Though my family is not churchy either. I used to joke that if I married into the British Royal Family, it is because I wanted an excuse to wear a pretty hat. LOL.

    Diana

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  26. JULIA,

    Easter clothes reminds me that Spring is here. I love the colors of the Spring. Some pastel colors look good on me though yellow is not my color. I love wearing Irish cable knit sweaters and sometimes it is really cold during Easter.

    Diana

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    Replies
    1. Diana, yellow is no white woman's color. I've only ever seen it look good - and it looks very good! - on people of color.

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    2. Julia, yes! I was telling my stylist (Nordie's Trunk Club) that if I looked like Meghan Markle, I could wear Yellow. LOL.

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  27. The Target Dress Challenge photos are hysterical!

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    1. It was the comment that set off the challenge that grabbed me: What was Target thinking? That in the pandemic we all should look like we're about to lose the farm after locusts ate all the crops? Very funny responses, for sure!

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    2. A young friend who is a costumer for a college theater department loves the look and posted an adorable photo of herself in hers. It might be a matter of attitude.

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  28. My grandmother was a very dressy lady who wore lovely dresses to church and
    Easter Star events and she bought equally lovely things for her two daughters.
    Fortunately for my sister and I these costumes came down to us. I bet we
    were the best dressed girls in our small Ontario village.

    Chris Wallace

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  29. Eastern Star! Darn autocorrect.
    Chris

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  30. OMG. Is Target serious about those dresses? Another reason I don't shop there.

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  31. Oh, this takes me back to growing up and the yearly Easter photos in the front yard. My older sisters, especially the oldest of the children, Arretta Ann, looked so stylish in their Easter suits and hats. My brother was less interesting in his guy suit, but he was still dressed very nicely. And, me? Well, I seem to always have my hat crooked in the pics. My favorite Easter photo of us is the one where my hat is crooked and I am frowning (pouting is probably a better description) out of some displeasure that I don't remember. I was not a happy camper. Oh, and the white gloves were always a part of the girls' outfits, too, and the patent leather shoes for me. The pictures I still have of Easter are special to me. Of course, as a mother, I realized just how hard my mother worked to get all four of us outfitted just so.

    I haven't done Easter clothes since my kids were growing up. I no longer look for the perfect spring dress to start the season. And, this year, I dread shopping for new clothes after a year of being in and cooking more and eating more.

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  32. Somewhere there's a photo of us five dressed up for Easter. My sis and I wore gloves and hats, and dresses Mom made, matching, I think. She made the boys' shirts also. Definitely not play clothes, with slippery shoes and those scratchy underskirts. I remember once, nervous about being asked at the last minute to recite an extra Bible verse for an absent child, I was chilly, and my Sunday school teacher wrapped the overskirt around my arms as I sat close to her. It's amazing how memories of kindnesses stay in mind, nurturing long past the time received. <3

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  33. I started this then had to leave for work, which required me to hook into the a new WiFi so hopefully I'm not duplicating myself... Easter dresses, hats, new white patent leather shoes, new white ankle socks (sometimes knee socks) and sometimes white gloves - all part of the Spring/Easter ritual in the Dale home. The dresses were usually matching in everything but the color. I primarily wore every shade of blue out there and my sister wore all the other colors of the rainbow. Grandma would come up with the style/pattern and fabric, she and Mom would sew them at her house while we were at school and then we had to stand on the dining room table to be measured for the hems. The hats were replaced by choir hats/bennies and finally both were no longer used. I remember how grown up I felt the one year I got to have red shoes without ankle straps. That was also the year we got suits, made by grandma and mom, instead of dresses.

    Our Deacon, Pamela, set a "challenge" this year to see how many would wear hats whether they attended Zoom church or in person, outside, at a distance church on Easter Sunday.

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  34. tinyurl.com/78jpw3u5 -- This picture of me and my cousin Betty was taken for sure at the wedding of my Aunt Vivian, my father's baby sister. Probably closer to June, although I need to research this with one of my other cousins. This and one other photo (me in the same outfit) are the only pictures of me taken in Sunday finest below the age of 10.

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  35. Ahhh, I love that movie (though I fast foreward past a LOT of cringy parts). But, sigh, when I started watching the clip, my first reaction was, those people are all so close together!

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  36. Every year I would get a new Easter dress with matching shoes and I always wore white gloves to church. 😊

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