Oodles and oodles

Homebody, an expanded definition

The dictionary defines the word homebody as "a person who prefers pleasures and activities that center around the home." If the dictionary had more space, it might say more. It might define a homebody as someone who, when they go away even for a few days, misses the view out the window over the kitchen sink.

 

Who wonders if anything new has sprouted or bloomed in the garden.

 

Who longs for the sound of the clock that chimes on the hour and the yellow warblers that sing in the meadow.

 

Who misses the morning paper, the cats, the dog, the local NPR station, the comforting familiarity of the grocery store and phone calls from friends, though not necessarily in that order.

 

Who measures in equal proportion the happiness in the prospect of a few days away and the reluctance to leave the place that now is called home.

Who is never happier than when she turns the key in the lock and opens the door.

Today's question

So much to get done. Sending our eldest off to a program at a local college for a week, must pick up forms, shop for some clothes, get him packed. Getting ready for a quick trip to Pennsylvania ourselves, must pack, etc. Also must obsessively clean house, since I have this peculiar inability to leave home unless the house is perfectly clean. Also must purchase various gifts and cards for a number of relatives who decided to marry/graduate/be born in June. Also must find dog's vaccination certificate and pack up his blanky and toys so he can go to the swanky dog motel and not the kennel that scares him. Also must clean out car, which tends to get a bit messy during the yard sale season. Before any of this, laundry. So my question is:

Given everything I need to get done in the next 48 hours, why did making a teacup pincushion with my recently acquired vintage bird fabric become my highest priority?

Sort of new

The only good thing about never, ever getting anything new to wear (not that I'm bitter) is that when I do, I'm just beside myself with joy.

The term "new" might be debatable. The fabric is vintage Greeff that I got in a big box of fabric at a sale a few years ago. I had all the thread and bias tape that I needed. I even had five buttons that matched.

I used my favorite summer dress for the pattern. My favorite summer dress is pretty much two big rectangles with button closures on the shoulders and a tie at the waist, so it was pretty straightforward.

So now I've got something new - or vintage new - to wear to my nephew's graduation party this weekend.

 

p.s. Some of you have asked about the pattern. I traced around my old dress, which I bought about 10 years ago. It's really two big rectangles with curves for the arms and neck - the tie around the waist is what gives it the shape. If anybody knows of a similar pattern, let us all know!

Easy centerpiece

Vintage rack for glasses picked up at a yard sale last year + eight peat pots + eight snapdragons that haven't made it into the garden yet = quick flowers for the picnic table.

Not complaining

The only reason I'm not complaining about this weekend's sales is because

I got a new Swanky Swig for 50 cents! Oh, joy! This is the skinny blue tulip swig. I have swirly blue tulips, and a skinny red tulip, but not this one!

This is a later swig, which is known as Bustling Betty or Betsy (I can't find my guide book right now.) She's cute, although I prefer the floral swigs. But she was only 50 cents, too, so I brought her home.

Have a great weekend!

When it rains ...

The bad day actually began Wednesday night. The ATM at the grocery store was out of order. (I live in a town so small that when I refer to "the ATM at the grocery store," there is only one location to which I could be referring.) That required us to drive to the ATM at the bank, which would not have been a problem except that we had ten minutes until my son's golf banquet began, and we needed to get cash, buy a card, get a gift certificate and get to the banquet because it was discovered that no one had gotten the coach a card and a gift, and it somehow became our responsibility to correct this oversight.

It didn't seem like that big a deal. Things happen. In the middle of the night, one of the cats jumped up on a shelf she has never jumped up on and knocked off a sugar bowl. Annoying, but it could have been worse. Thursday morning, with the kids out the door to their finals and my husband off to work, I started on my to-do list. Just as I was about to put in a load of laundry, the power went out. It would be hours before it was back on, the power company said.

No problem. I decided to mow the grass. But the lawn mower wouldn't start. It showed no indication of ever starting again. Undaunted, I decided to mow our ginormous yard with the push mower.

The push mower wouldn't start. My son called to let me know his final was over and it was time to pick him up. I had not accomplished a single thing in the two hours he had been gone. When I started the car, the low-fuel light came on. I drove to the gas station. Every pump was out of order. Instead of buying gas at the bargain price of $4.12 a gallon, I had to drive across town, praying I didn't run out of gas, to the only other gas station in town, the Mobil station where gas is $4.36 a gallon. Because I was very cranky in general, and specifically about forking over even a penny to Mobil, I got $6 worth of gas. It  took two-tenths of a second to pump that amount.

Because we had no power, and frankly nothing very interesting to eat, I offered to grill something for lunch. Naturally, the grill was out of propane. Absolutely nothing in our town was working. Apparently aliens had landed and somehow knocked out the power grid, sucked the cash out of the ATMs, drained the fuel supply and perhaps stolen the batteries from my lawn mower to power their spaceship. That was the most logical explanation I could find for all of these random failures.

And so I went outside and weeded, because as long as you're frustrated and in a bad mood, you might as pull some weeds while you're at it. I weeded for hours. I found some sunflowers sprouting in the herb bed...

the first spears of asparagus poking through in the bed we started this spring ...

and a little jungle of snapdragons that sprouted from the ones I planted last year.

I worked in the gardens a good two or three hours. They looked pretty good by the time I was done. My spirits were pretty good, too. A bad day that ends in the garden isn't that bad a day at all.

They grow up so fast

An update on the baby bluebirds ... growing fast and getting prettier every day.

Yard sale theories

This past weekend was an excellent test of some of my favorite yard-sale theories. For example, I went to a sale that was advertised like this: "Too much to list! Something for everyone. Still unpacking." That's not one but three red flags in my book, but since I was driving right past the place, I stopped. I was right. It was an awful sale. People who don't say what they're selling don't have anything worth selling.

I went to a village-wide sale, too. I know people have good luck at street-wide and village-wide sales, but I almost never do. I think they simply encourage people who should never have a sale to have one anyway.



So where, you're asking, did the stuff in the pictures come from? Well, I bet I stopped at maybe 30 sales this weekend. (That's a lot, even for me, but the village-wide sale upped my usual average.) And except for the red rose canister and a single cookie cutter, everything else came from one sale. Where I spent, on the two vases, the red Pyrex dish and 11 cookie cutters, a grand total of $2.25.



It was the last sale on my list, and I was having such terrible luck I thought I might not even bother to stop. Which proves my favorite yard-sale theory of all. Finding stuff has almost nothing to do with luck.  Call it persistence, or maybe obsession, but it usually pays off.

Show and Tell Sunday: Flea Market Favorites

For this week's Show and Tell Sunday, hosted by Heidi, we're showing off our favorite flea market finds. Since my blog pretty much consists of my favorite flea market - auction - yard sale - thrift store treasures, the trick for me was to find something you haven't already seen. So I'm offering my Top 10 list of things I love to look for, starting with number 10 up there: old children's books, particularly counting and alphabet books. In no particular order but saving my favorite for last, here are the rest.



#9 Christmas ornaments



Stencils, indents, figurals, Shiny Brites or made in Germany or Poland: I love them all.
This box was a bargain at $5.

 

#8 Sewing notions



Nothing makes me happier than sorting through a box of sewing notions, looking for rickrack, seam binding, the occasional scrap of fabric. Almost every box has a tomato pincushion, so this group took no time at all to collect.



#7 Wooden benches



A plant stand, an end table, an extra seat at a campfire, or stacked for shelves: little wooden benches are almost always a bargain.



#6 Scottie dogs



Because everybody needs one collection (or, um, maybe more than one) for no reason.



#5 Birthday cards



New ones can't hold a (birthday) candle to these.







#4, #3, #2 Jadeite, Swanky swigs, old wallpaper



Long-time obsessions. Approaching the dangerous stage where price starts to not matter.

And my absolute flea market favorite?



#1 My dad



Lots of people go to the flea market with their mom or their sister, but believe it or not, my favorite junking
partner is my dad. He is insatiably curious about what things cost and what they might be worth, and he is a serious student of human behavior. Going to a sale with him is endlessly fun.
If we didn't live 300 miles apart, we'd be out every weekend.
 
p.s. to Mom: Sorry I cropped you out of the picture.

Happy Father's Day, Dad! See you in two weeks!

Freebies for the 4th

 

Vintage images for the Fourth of July never seem all that plentiful to me, so I thought I'd share a couple with you. These come from a really old, falling-apart reading and writing primer. In a perfect world, I'd print them out and make something vintage-y and lovely with them. I probably won't, but maybe you will. If you do, let us see what you make!