Featured at Dollar Store Crafts!

What a nice little surprise this week to discover that my "quick, cute centerpiece" project had been featured over at the Dollar Store Crafts blog! 

I had entered the project in the "30-minute Challenge" contest, and although I didn't win it's quite a thrill to see one of my projects "up in lights" at a blog filled with such creative projects! Wondering who won the Challenge? It's Suzi from Suzi's Crafts, who shared a cute, colorful night light cover! 
More soon,

Swooning over Johnson Brothers Rose Chintz

Remember my happy little tale about acquiring Old Country Roses last Fall? Well I am SO excited to report that today I had a similar experience with Rose Chintz by Johnson Brothers!

Here's what happened: This morning, while procrastinating during "get ready for work time," I noticed an Ebay auction for dinner plates in Rose Chintz, another pattern I have been really in love with but slow to collect. The auction showed three dinner plates available for a reasonable price per piece. The downfall, as always, was the additional shipping cost, which made the total more than I wanted to spend. 

But I did wonder what the combined shipping would for all three pieces together, so I set out to "ask seller a question." In doing that - SURPRISE! I learned that the seller was actually local - so, I quickly messaged her to see if she would allow me to pick the plates up in person and avoid the shipping charges, and she said yes! Suddenly, the price for all three plates was well within my budget AND I could make arrangements to meet up with her and get them this very day! 
I completed the purchase through Ebay, but didn't pay right away. Instead, I met this delightful gal in a grocery store parking lot and traded cash-for-plates. (I wonder if any law enforcement officials took photographs? LOL) So now I have three dinner plates and four dessert plates in this classic Johnson Brothers pattern. 
It's probably kind of silly to get this excited over dishes... but here was the message I posted on Twitter just before I set out to pick up my treasure: 

Squeeee indeed! 

Sunday painting

I have a small collection of what I used to call "amateur paintings," all picked up for a couple dollars or less at area thrift stores. Later I learned another expression for them: "Sunday paintings," meaning pictures created by people who took up painting as a hobby or weekend pursuit. My collection centers around landscapes and still-lifes - barns, houses and floral arrangements. Here are a few of my favorites: 

I even tried my hand at painting one - yes, on a Sunday: 

Since I recently re-painted the Mom-cave, I've been trying to be really particular about how I arrange them. Slowly but surely, I'm getting many of them up on the wall. 

I recently acquired this charming little beauty - the colors and subject were lovely, but it was missing a frame. 

No matter, a few weeks later I spotted this 11 x 14 frame at a different store for just 99 cents. It has the routed edges on the insides so the canvas will fit down inside. 

Today I took on a different type of "Sunday painting" and just applied a few coats of my off-white acrylic craft paint to the 99-cent frame. I put it all together and really love the result: 

The tabletop above is still a work in progress, but I do kind of like the painting in its frame next to the creamy white pitcher. 
Are there any type of  "other people's artwork" that you like to collect? 
More soon,

Hydrangea dessert plates - swwoooon!!!

Oh! And did I ever show you these blossoming beauties? I picked these up on a visit to my favorite antique mall a few weeks ago... they cost more than I normally like to pay for plates, but they were soooo pretty... and I only bought four of the 8, and when I got home immediately wished I'd bought all eight of them. 

Aren't they beautiful? They would be dessert plates, I think - too small for luncheon plates... 

I was NOT going to buy them, at $4 each... but my enabler husband said, "Do they make you happy to look at them?" Of course they do! And he bought them for me... so, maybe I can ease my guilt by saying they were a gift!  More soon,

New thrifty finds

Pussy cat, pussy cat, where have you been? 
Well I haven't been to London to visit the Queen, I can tell you that! 
I feel like I've been in a sort of self-imposed exile from all of my decorating, vintage treasures, and good ol' junk-hunting. Do you ever get side-tracked into another area of interest that pulls you away and suddenly you realize you've been neglecting something for awhile that used to make you really happy?
Yep, that's me. A couple weeks ago I allowed myself to get sucked back into the world of politics - reading and commiserating with like-minded pol-junkies about some the stuff going on in this beloved U.S.A. of ours, and quite honestly it depressed me to the point where I withdrew a bit from reading and commenting on all my favorite beautiful blogs. 
Add to that a new blogging project that I launched (well, am 99% ready to launch - no, it's not a political blog! LOL)... and well, I've just been MIA around here for bit.  I'm happy to say I did a little junking today and came away quite happy: I spent less that FIVE dollars! Here's what I picked up.  
A set of two deep-green fluted vases, each about 4 inches tall, 79 cents each: 

A sweet little plate featuring my favorite Spring birdies for $1.99: 

And this 11x14 frame for 99 cents, with the routed inside edges so I can fit a painted canvas inside it. I'll be painting it off-white: 

Also, before I went on hiatus a few weeks ago, I found this gorgeous covered casserole dish for $1.99. Now I need a "covered casserole" like I need another hole in my head, but this thing has SUCH a  pretty shape, was in pristine condition, and the colors and scrolly design are really pretty. You can see the backstamp in one of the photos below - it is the Signature Collection, Queen Anne pattern, made in Japan. 

Alongside it were cups, saucers, berry bowls, bread plates, luncheon plates and a sugar/creamer set, all in the same pattern, for 79 cents per piece. I picked up 4 each of the bread plates, luncheon plates and berry bowls   - trying to leave some for someone else to discover, and trying to stick to buying what I knew I might actually use. (I actually tried to sell all these pieces on Ebay after I got them home, but no takers. That's okay - I wanted to keep them anyway!) 
How about you - what have you found lately? 
More soon,

Child's clay pottery pieces

Happy Valentine's Day! I am linking this week to one of my favorite link parties, Suzanne's Vintage Thingie Thursday. I love browsing through all the treasures! 


One day - let's call it 10 years ago - while digging through the bins of loose junk at a thrift store, I spied a little piece of glazed, molded clay. I pulled it out of the bin and quickly realized: it was a small clay "monster," obviously made by a child.

Call it PMS, but I got pretty emotional thinking that someone’s mother had likely died and their child’s handmade art got donated to the thrift store. 

Needless to say, my soft collector's heart fell in love with this little guy. So I took him home, and for the next several years I picked up "clay projects" with surprising frequency - to the point where I had a pretty impressive collection of orphaned childs' pottery. 

I actually re-donated many of these pieces after I pulled them from storage following the flood in 2008 that took our house. But I've kept the Monster Guy, and a few other favorite pieces, and thought I was done with this phase of my collecting. 
Until about two weeks ago, when I happened upon this hefty heart dish at the Goodwill. 

My daughter spied it first, pointed it out, and I actually said, "Oh, it's really nice but I don't buy clay projects anymore."  

"Are you sure?" she asked. "It's pretty big, and it's only 99 cents." At that point I took it from her and began to inspect it. It was covered in little stamped markings, probably using similar tools that made the "teeth" of Monster Guy. 

Even with the pretty red and yellow sides, and the generous size, I was going to put it back until I turned it over and read the writing on the back: 

"To: Samtha Samantha, From: Kyle with love"
Someone please tell me I'm not the only one who gets emotional over these things... 

Cleaning an antique wool hooked rug: don't try this at home

I'm almost afraid to admit this, but I decided to toss my possibly antique wool hooked rug into the washer and dryer in hopes of restoring it to some sort of less-than-disgusting condition. 
It worked... for me. But consider yourself warned: DON'T try this on your cherished heirloom rug and then try to sue me when it falls apart in the washer. The ONLY reason I tried this on my rug was that it was specifically NOT a family heirloom. It was a good thrifty vintage find, the right colors for the right price... but it has always been really, really dirty, and to be honest, I wasn't entirely thrilled with having it in the house. 
Here it is the day I brought it home... it's about 3 feet by 4 feet in size. 

This "before" picture hopefully shows you how faded, dirty and matted-down the fibers were. 

I first tried to clean this rug last year by laying it out in the yard and blasting it with the garden hose. ("Sheep get wet, and they don't shrink," I reasoned.) It took for-ever to dry, and even then I felt like it wasn't clean. Plus it had grass clippings on it. So I put it in the dryer, and it came out nice and soft, but not as "revitalized" as I had hoped from a cleanliness standpoint. 
This time around, I decided to go all in. I set the washer on cold water, put the rug in by itself with a dash of liquid soap, and let 'er rip. When I opened the washer, quite honestly I was sorry I'd done it: there were globs of loose, wet, matted wool all over the drum, and I was sure I had ruined the rug. I peeled all the loosened wool off the rug (and cleaned out the washer). To my surprise, after doing that, it really looked like the only actual damage was to a small section of the binding. So I went ahead and put it in the dryer. 
An hour later when I pulled it out of the dryer, I was pleasantly surprised. 

Yes, I ruined a bit of the binding. I believe this would not have happened if I'd thought to set the washer on the gentle cycle. These two photos show the same section of binding, top and bottom. 

But, the rug itself was soft, and clean, and smelled like a dryer sheet. The colors really are beautiful, and the loops are no longer matted. This rug is welcome back in the Mom cave, even with the battle-scarred binding.  

Again, please remember: for me this worked because I had just $20 and zero emotion invested in my rug. And I got lucky, because the "sheep don't shrink" theory holds somewhat true. 
However, the "sheep come apart in the washing machine" theory is also somewhat true. And I would hate for that to happen to your family treasure. 
More soon,