British Columbia bound!

Fans of Canadian folk music may recall Gordon Lightfoot's classic 1970s song, Alberta Bound. It's something of an anthem for those headed to the land of open prairie skies, and its lyrics have been wafting through my mind for the last few days, as we've buzzed around like busy bees in preparation for our cross country move this week.

This time around though, our journey does not lead us to Alberta. Instead, as many of you know from my recent posts here, come late tomorrow evening, my husband and I will be touching down on British Columbia soil, ready to call Canada's most westerly province home (once again for me, first time for the mister).

The past several weeks have been ones of immense activity, planning, energy, fortitude, and a little bit of good old fashioned luck. Elbow grease, packing tape, and lengthy lists have abound, as has the enthusiasm that one could practically see hovering in the air around our place.

By this time tomorrow (assuming all goes as planned - and goodness, it better, our schedule for Thursday is so astronomically tight it makes a Victorian corset look like a muumuu!) the movers will be here, loading all of our earthly belongings (save for those in our suitcases) on to their large truck.

Somewhere, we're told, between 7 and 14 days after that, our household contents will reach us in beautiful British Columbia, and it is at that point that my husband and I will take up residency in our new home.

{Long haul moving, a service which this 1940s Canadian moving company offered, is on the agenda for us this week as we trek - by air! - across the breadth of Canada from Ontario to British Columbia. Image via the Saskatchewan Council for Archives and Archivists.}

In the meantime, we'll be staying with some of my relatives who live in the same town, and thus I suspect that this will be my last post for the next little while. If circumstances permit, I may post during the next two weeks, but if not, I'll do so once we've settled into our new abode and have the good ol' interwebs hooked up once more.

I want to thank you all sincerely for you wonderful support, encouragement, and positive words over the past couple of months, as we've been preparing night and day for the move. They’re really helped to keep my batteries charged during this endlessly hectic period.

It is with great eagerness that I look forward to blogging next from my home province, and sharing in the joys of living in B.C with all of you.

Know that I'll miss you dearly, and that with all my heart, I'm wishing each of you every bit as much joy in your own life as I'm experiencing in mine right now. ♥

Grooming tips for the 1950s flight attendant

Cheerful Thursday morning greetings, my sweet dears, thank you all very much for your lovely, supportive comments on my last post regarding our upcoming move. Today marks the start of the official one week countdown until the big day itself arrives.

As you can imagine, this week has been a three-ring circus of activity, with scarcely a second for my husband and I to stop and catch our breath. Though we're certainly teaming up for some tasks, generally speaking (during these last few pre-move days), he's tending to jobs that need to be done outside the house, and I'm going at the speed of light inside the home.

Even at my busiest though, it's hard not to steal away a few quick moments to recharge my batteries and uncover delightful vintage images and inspiration (maybe it's just me, but the day doesn't quite feel complete if I have devoted at least part of it to my love of the past).

Earlier this week, I spotted a recently uploaded image on one of my favourite old school image filled Flickr streams, that made me smile ear-to-ear. Not only was it bursting with yesteryear charm, but it was beyond fitting, given that I'll be zipping through the air on a plane myself next week.

These days the rules and requirements involved with becoming flight attendant are significantly different then they were during the earlier decades of aviation (and, over all, this is a good thing, because there's much less discrimination involved with the candidate selection process and flight attendants themselves have more rights within the scope of their job).

However, I'm always a sucker for a great list of vintage "dos and don'ts" when it comes to any profession, and as the list in the image below clearly demonstrates, there was no shortage of such points for airline stewardesses (as they were often called back then) to adhere to during the 1950s.

{A lovely vintage flight attendant from 1957, smartly attired as members of her profession were required to look during the golden era of airline travel. Image via alsis35 on Flickr.}

From the expectation that one would (or perhaps had to) wear a "well fitted girdle" to the fact that platinum nail polish was out the question, it's fascinating to look back at this list of dos and don't and think about what airline hostesses of days gone by had to comply with in order to keep their jobs.

I'm certainly no expert on the requirements of being a modern day flight attendant, but I think it's safe to say - while standards regarding certain elements of one's appearance are still in place - the rules have relaxed substantially (for better or worse, depending on your own take on this topic).

Like many of us, I long for the days of airline travel when passengers and staff alike were better attired (I for one always dress up to a certain extent when I'm traveling by plane, but have observed that few other passengers tend to any more, save perhaps for the occasional businessman in a suit and tie or well-to-do lady jet setting off to some exotic location), and perhaps (as I like to imagine at least) friendlier.

Long gone are the fabulous forties, fifties, and early sixties (think Pan Am era) though, and with them a certain kind of airline travel glamour that will likely never be recaptured again outside of a Hollywood studio.

Nevertheless, when I board our flight next Thursday, I'll be thinking about old school flight attendants and passengers alike. Daydreaming that perhaps we’ll somehow fly through a warp in the space-time continuum and transport back to the mid-twentieth century.

Ridiculously wishful thinking, I know, but hey, a rather knackered vintage loving gal can always hope!

Less than two weeks to go until the big day!

Over the past several years there have been quite a few dates, known often weeks or even months in advance, that I was anything but eager about. Many were the sort of days that you try in vain to stare at the calendar and hope will somehow magically vanish before your eyes.

While I'm not certainly not saying every day was cringe worthy, it's been a rather long time since I was bursting at the seams with excitement and anticipation over a date's arrival. Our moving day, February 23rd, is just such a date – and I’m elated about that point.

Though it's fraught with things that I'm concerned about (our schedule that day is so astronomically tightly packed, you couldn't squeeze a pin into it anywhere if you tried!), such as the fact that our darling cat, Stella, will be flying on an airplane for the first time, the joy and eagerness that is accompanying this move go a long way towards pacifying such concerns.

The fact that my husband and I experiencing this move together, that we can comfort one another when worries crop up or lend a helping hand when the other person grows exhausted from packing or planning, is an important blessing unto itself, too.

As we cross more and more dates off of February's calendar this year, I know that these last few days (before the move) will likely be the busiest we've faced over the past couple of months.

{A sweetly charming vintage calendar page from February 1954 featuring an illustrated Victorian era couple. Image via cindyiscrafty on Flickr.}

 

I'll be posting here whenever I can, and (fear not!) certainly won't hop provinces without (very temporarily) saying goodbye to all of you. Your support and enthusiasm about this wonderful step in my life has really helped give me energy and comfort during this hectic, exciting time in my life.

I hope that your Sunday and Valentine's week ahead is one of loveliness and felicity, and that you'll join me, sweet dears, in continuing to count down the days until I get to once again call beautiful British Columbia home.