Eurovision Family Fun

We've been watching Eurovision as a family together since 2004, it's great fun!! We prepare comment and scoring sheets which we fill in as we view the performances. There are many disagreements regarding scores and comments which can get somewhat heated but it's all in fun ;-). Aggregating our scores these were our top 5:

Norway

Ukraine

Finland

Iceland

Azerbaijan

My favourite songs were
Estonia - beautiful combination of voice and cello
Norway - cheeky lad, cute song with character
Albania - catchy tune and I enjoy songs in the lower range.
Please ctrl click on the links to listen :-)

Seeing as I love to sew clothes I thought it might be fun to award some unofficial Eurovision 2009 Costume Prizes!!

My Favourite and the Most Co-ordinated Ensemble
Estonia - the beautiful blue fabric looked great as a feature fabric in each outfit, all different styles

The one I'd most like to study close-up
Armenia - with it's layers of velvet and silver detail

Most Beautiful Fabric
Cyprus - white with delicate gold detail

Prettiest Feathers and Frills
Iceland - tastefully frilly

Most Leg Flattering
Albania - pretty prom feel to this one

Best Corsetry
Germany - I'm sure I've only ever seen that shape in cartoons before!

Most Scantily Clad
Ukraine's Roman Gladiators - couldn't get any shorter could it!

Easiest Costume To Make
Russia - rectangle of fabric gathered with elastic, what the ... !!

Put On Your Sunnies!
Netherlands - wow, glitter suits

Wardrobe Malfunction
Greece - looked ridiculous with his hairy belly popping out as he gyrated ;-)

Wooden Spoon
Czech Republic - I just don't get the caped crusader look

On Stage Costume Changes
Hungary - from suits to barely anything ;-)

Feel free to share your favourite songs and costume prizes :-)

Costume Maker's online magazine

I gasped with delight when I found this amazing historical costume while surfing online today!!! See More pictures here. I was revisiting a Canberra Costume Maker's website, Earthly Delights as I had noticed an ad in the National Folk Festival program. I actually donated my beloved old Janome sewing machine to Aylwen G through freecyclecanberra and love to think of it enjoying it's retirement sewing historical costumes :-). She had a link to an on-line magazine called Your Wardrobe Unlock'd, the Costume Maker's companion, an online magazine for everyone who's passionate about historical clothing. There is a single pattern project readers can participate in and this is the pattern chosen. I'm in !!! Wow deep inside there's a definitely frustrated costume maker trying to get out ;-)

National Folk Festival 2009

I just spent a wonderful day at the National Folk Festival here in Canberra. Aren't these Welsh folk dance costumes divine! This group came up from the Hunter Valley to dance for us and taught two dances as well, lots of fun. I especially loved the coloured 'jackets with tails' that the ladies wore. Features included generous pleats at the back topped with large matching buttons, large black buttons down the shaped front which was cut right back almost to the side seams to flow when dancing, and dark ribbon around the base of the short sleeves. They were all wearing dark skirts, stockings and shoes, with white aprons, blouses, lace shawls and caps, and different coloured jackets. Beautiful.