For Charlie’s Aunt, it’s time to photograph and list new patterns, vintage fabrics and treasures for the shop”
I’m delighted to say the weather has, as last, turned distinctly autumnal in rural Suffolk. November has arrived – my favourite month, in the midst of my beloved autumn. Famously the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, but also for me the time to start digging out my boots, tweed coats and hats in anticipation of the cooler weather.
It is also of course the season of acorns, berries and colourful leaves. I love the pink morning skies, the mist lingering a little longer after dawn and the evenings beginning to draw in, offering longer spells of creative time. Beautiful sunsets stretching far across the vast East Anglian skies and more cosy time for reflection on happy times past. But it’s not just the evenings snuggled under a blanket indoors that I love. I relish being outdoors in October and November, when the refreshing greens suddenly start to transform into flame reds and oranges, rusty browns and burnished golds.
For Charlie’s Aunt, it’s time to photograph and list new patterns, vintage fabrics and treasures for the shop.
Autumn in the garden
We were fortunate to have a run of dry days (before the torrential rains and recent high winds) to enable us to photograph some fresh autumn stock in the garden. Although the leaves have only just started to turn, there is much to admire in the garden. The tail end of the produce from this year’s vegetable patch, planted and tended by Charlie, has now all been consumed (by all of us). This year, the sunflowers grew incredibly tall, the pumpkins swelled to enormous proportions, and there was a seemingly never ending glut of courgettes (zucchini) – all down to the manure added to the soil, according to Charlie.
I think my love of the countryside in general comes from time spent with my granddad, who was incredibly knowledgeable about all things ‘nature’ related. I would spend hours walking around the garden asking him questions about the trees, birds and flowers, not to mention the vast array of fruit and veg he grew. Such was the way for his generation of country dwellers, who were very largely self-sufficient. I just loved being engaged with my rural surroundings and busying myself making and doing. I was lucky to have my sister and numerous cousins living nearby, so there was always someone available to play and explore with. We were always active, always making and constantly chattering.
By contrast, I recently saw three very small children sat outside a seaside café, all looking at their phones and not making a sound. Not a hint of mischief – just silence. I really wished they’d had at least some child-like interaction or made some sound, not least a bit of excitement at being at the seaside!
Family photos and memories
It got me thinking back to my childhood and more of the simple things we found so appealing. You may have noticed that I have been using old family photos as a backdrop for my button and ribbon stock. My family were not ones for taking loads of pictures of us (largely because it wasn’t as simple as taking lots of images on a mobile phone), but dad did take several on black and white film with a camera, now vintage, that Charlie’s nan recently rediscovered and gave to my partner, Jim. I really hope he can get it working again. How wonderful it would be to get some Charlie’s Aunt photos taken with dad’s camera.
Two of the pictures I found show my sister and I, with dad in his tweed cap (above left) and mum in her very stylish coat (above right) in the garden by the pond, sat around a garden bonfire – a regular late autumn occurrence. In the picture, I am sitting on a little wooden chair which dad made. The old shed in the background, built by my dad complete with proper roof tiles, has since been replaced by a newer model. We took some of the hat and bag shots for autumn in the same location (see image below).
As children, a favourite thing for us to do was to find a very long stick, poke it into the embers of the bonfire and watch as the tip turned orange and begun to smolder. We would then wave the sticks around (at a safe distance from each other of course) and watch the thin smoke trail cutting through the grey autumn air. One time, my cousin and I made a ‘fish and chip shop’ where we served each other fish (leaves) and chips (sticks) from a shack created out of two old trestles and some planks of wood we found near the bonfire. It took us a full day to set up, but gave us hours of fun.
My ever-inventive dad made a leaf sweeper, complete with brushes and wire basket, much like a garden vacuum cleaner. One of us would pull the leaf sweeper (pretending to be a horse) and the other pushed, as it was quite tough going. Our imaginations turned performing a very useful task of clearing away the avalanche of leaves tumbling from the oak and ash trees into a game. Of course, ‘health and safety’ would probably prevent many of those fun activities these days, but I can’t help thinking that more than one generation of youngsters since we were children have missed out on finding the simple joy in ‘doing’ and letting their imaginations run free outdoors.
Autumn fabrics, buttons and more…
The wool-rich fabrics are making up so well, and offer a much more cost-effective way of achieving the Charlie’s Aunt style without as much expense. I’ve made the Lynford Hat (pictured above) in one of the lovely retro weaves in camel, Airforce blue and chocolate brown, and bound the brim with velvet bias binding in caramel.
I’ve relisted a lot of the basic Charlie’s Aunt buttons – all vintage deadstock from the 1990s and earlier – and will be adding some one-off vintage buttons and buckles over the coming weeks.
As always, keep up to date with new listings at the Charlie’s Aunt Etsy shop and if you have any questions, please email emma@charliesaunt.com or contact us via our Facebook page.
Happy autumn sewing (and memories)!
Emma xx
