Happy Happy New Year!

I can't believe that 2013 is almost here.  This year has gone by so quickly. 

I bought Charizard Pokemon fabric this summer at a garage sale for $4.  (Pokemon material is hard to find.)  Anyway, the boys wanted me to make them a quilt.  I do love to quilt so I was up for the challenge.  I used fabric that was bought at garage sales since I have a large amount of great fabric.  I made a simple quilt so that the Charizard figures would stand out.  I hand sewed POKEMON on one edge and then hand sewed 2 letters per side (sort of) to make the word POKEMON.  It came out really neat.  I wanted it to be done before the new year and it is! 

I have soooooo many other projects that I want to start, but this was an important one for me.  I didn't want to have too many unfinished projects laying around.  I finished a knitted scarf the other day and when I washed it to felt it, it didn't come out the way I wanted it to.  So, it's back to the beginning again.  I will use the scarf for pieces on other projects.  That happens sometimes when you felt.  Things don't always wash the way you want it to.

Wishing everyone a very happy healthy New Year with lots of paths to junkentreasure!

Merry Christmas

I made this pinecone tree years ago and still have it.  I keep it with my Christmas treasures and love to bring it out every year.  Sometimes, like this year, I have to reglue a pinecone.  I have it on my kitchen table so we share all of our meals and homework with it.  It reminds me of when I was a new homeowner and watching my money.  I collected little pinecones until I knew what I would do with them.  (I still collect pinecones and have them contained in a vintage metal tub in front of my fireplace.)  This is what became of some of those pinecones.

Merry Christmas!

Music Boxes

I stopped in at Interiors Anew on the Woodstock Square.  It's always nice going in there.  You never know what treasure awaits.  With Christmas being only a few days away, I was hoping to find some charming holiday item. 

As soon as I walked in, I spotted a small table with wind up music boxes (only the shell of the music boxes).  Each one played a Christmas song.  I bought the three that played "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" for $3 each.  I will keep one and put the other two into Ethan and Austin's Christmas stockings.  They still had music boxes that played "Deck the Halls."

I think that they are wonderful now; just the way that they are.  I'm not going to put them into anything.  I remembered that I had found a frame with vintage looking sheet music with "The 12 Days of Christmas" on it.  So, I grouped them together with some gold glass pieces that I had.  It had just the right effect that I was hoping for.   A little touch of yesterday.

Cookies and Buttons

Cookies and buttons.  Some combination huh?

I spent this morning baking chocolate chip peanut butter cookies (I found a really great recipe to try.)  I had been looking forward to this all week.  So, in between eating and eating the cookies (I needed to make sure that they tasted good for others), I went through a tin of buttons that my mother had sent to me.  She found them at a garage sale for $1.  So many of them were vintage.  They were also pretty dirty so I wiped off each and every one of them.  I didn't really mind since I was waiting for batches of cookies to get done. 

The buttons were so wonderful.  I separated them into piles of what I would be using soon.  (I added them to my red suitcase button collection.)  I am trying to finish up on a scarf that I am knitting.  It will have flowers on it and I'm going to use the buttons for the center of the flowers.  I have my idea in my mind.  I just hope that it comes out the way I am planning.  But, sometimes I love what happens instead.   It's the surprise ending that comes out better than I could have planned.

I'll be making peanut butter blossom (kisses) cookies this weekend.  Notice the theme of peanut butter.  I love peanut butter! 

Happy baking!

Look at this Vase!

What a wonderful vase!  I was at the Goodwill in Huntley today and found this great vase for 99 cents.  I just couldn't pass it up.  It goes so well with my other larger ones on the windowsill in my office/guest room. 

You have to check out www.holidaywithmatthewmead.com to see the wonderful pictures that he posted of the sale he had recently.  He is also having a contest for a great cake stand and jelly jars.  You will be inspired to create.  I know that I am.  He created groupings for displays that go together so well that you will be looking throughout your own treasures to do the same. 

It was nice today to take a break from all of my organizing and purging.  It started to snow periodically throughout the day.  A white Christmas would be so nice.  Now I can focus on baking and enjoying the joy and peace of Christmas.

May you have a wonderful and blessed Christmas!

Creating and More Creating

I have been busy, busy, busy organizing and purging my collections.  I just finished going through all of my vintage tablecloths, hand towels and needlepoint treasures.  I have a pile that I am going to part with.  That leaves room in my closet to begin collecting again when the sales start.

I had been collecting pretty plates and items that would make a fun project.  (I used a clear glass candlestick, a milk glass drinking cup and a gold gilded ashtray.  Each item cost me between 25-50 cents.  Each cake plate cost about 75 cents to $1 to make.)  I wanted to make pedestal cake plates.  I made a few the other day.  The glue that was recommended didn't work as well as I had wanted it to, so I had a lot of redos.  But finally, they stuck.  I'm happy with the results.  They will make nice presents.

Last year, I made a few Christmas stockings with vintage tablecloths that had holes in them.  (Remember, never cut up perfectly good vintage tablecloths.  Only the ones that have holes in them or have other major problems.)   I also used vintage ribbons that I had been saving.  I gave some of those stockings out as gifts this year filled with goodies. 

And Even More Jewelry

Boy, did I have a busy weekend with Holiday parties and family activities.  But there was still time in the schedule to go back to the estate sale on Grove Street in Crystal Lake on Sunday.  She sold a lot, which was great for her, and she put out the rest of the vintage costume jewelry which was good for me.  My cousin Barb had spent the weekend with us and she also found some great jewelry buys. 

I ended up buying 9 pins and 2 bracelets for $18.  What a great deal!  I found a few rhinestone pins and was very pleased to see that one was marked Weiss on the back.  That was a very good deal!  I only have a few Weiss pins in my collection so I was so very excitied.  Those deals and finds don't come along every day.

I hope that there are more good sales this week.

Sooooooo Much Jewelry

Another fun day going to estate sales.  The one in Crystal Lake on Grove Street was great!  She will be adding more stuff on Saturday and Sunday.  I bought a lot of vintage pins and bracelets for $3 each.  I can't resist vintage jewelry.  I also can't resist elf or santa vintage items so I bought 2 elfs for $2 each and 1 santa for $1.  I also got a vintage Mrs. Claus ornament for free.  Another of my finds was a working roulette ash tray from Las Vegas for $1.  It is so cool.  I'm not sure what I will do with that yet.  It was just to cool to pass up and for the right price.  I'm going to try to make it back this weekend to see what other treasures she has.

I also went to 2 estate sales in Woodstock. 1 was on North St in the new townhomes.  What a magnificient place it was.  Sometimes it is more fun to look at the building and structure than to shop the sale.  I did find some PC games for the boys for $2 each and even a brand new, never opened DVD of King Kong.  Everyone needs a King Kong DVD.  The other estate sale was on the corner of Raffle Road and Banford.  I didn't find anything there.

The estate sales this past week have been fun and I've found some really nice treasures.  I was glad that most of the sales had lots of vintage items.  Too many of the sales recently didn't have many vintage items.  I hope there are more sales like these in the next few weeks. 

Estate Sales Treasures

I went to 2 estate sales today.  One in McHenry and one in Crystal Lake.  I had the best time at the one in McHenry.  Not to mention that I found some treasures there.  The garage was opened first and I found 2 wonderful turtle cookie jars.  One had a chip inside so I got them for $10 each.  I thought that Ethan might want them for his turtle collection and I was right!  If he didn't want them, I was going to give them to my mother for her cookie jar collection.  See how collectors can cross over into other categories.

Inside the house were other treasures waiting for me to purchase.  I found 3 hankies for $2 each (1of The 3 Little Pigs, 1 of a child and ducks and 1 of hearts), more turtles from $1-$5, a wastebasket that is hand painted for $3, a vintage orange pin for $4, 2 Christmas vintage ornaments for 50 cents each and an aluminum cup that collapses for $2.  I don't see them anymore and this one had a note inside that it belonged to someone in the army.  Kind of fun to find that note.

This was a fun sale and a large house so all of us on line got to go in right away.  No waiting this morning. 

At the estate sale in Crystal Lake, I found a children's book on the 3 Musketeers for $2.  Nothing else.

Tomorrow are a few more sales.  I'm happy that sales are still going on because there may not be that many soon.  At least I have had more time to go through my own collections and to rearrange and purge.  It's been fun.

My Work Space

I spent a few hours today posting auctions on Ebay of vintage Christmas tablecloths from my collection.  It is definitely time to give them to another home.  So, I thought it might be a good idea to show a picture of where I spent most of my time.  My desk is really a vintage dressing table.  I took off the mirror and stored it.  The desk is the perfect size for the space plus it looks vintage.

I have a wonderful seashell "topiary" on my desk next to a picture of a seagull from Atlantic City New Jersey.  I love the ocean and it makes my day to look at these day in and day out.  I use a vintage flower frog to hold my pen.  On the other side is a head lamp that I bought years ago at the Volo Antique Mall.  I also use an aluminum box to hold notes.  On top of the bookcase, which is filled with gardening/knitting/craft/quilting/antique books, I have a vintage floral painting that blends well with the vase next to it.  I also made a wreath out of vintage hankies years ago and I love how it looks.  There is also a pink milk glass bowl and white milk glass pitcher on top. 

I love being surrounded by things that I love.  I like for things to be neat and organized and I'm also a homebody that likes routines, so this area is my comfort zone.  Recently I added some vintage cow farm toys to the shelves.  They were a true find. 

Christmas Tree

We put up our tree this weekend.  It is always decorated in white lights (which is the part I have a hard time doing).  Nothing like having Neil Diamond's Christmas songs playing in the background while decorating the tree.  It really was a lot of fun and the kids love fighting over who gets which ornament to hang.

I tried taking pictures in all kinds of light, but the pictures didn't come out like I wanted.  I'm posting one of them, but it doesn't do the tree justice.  It is very wide and full.  This year we used vintage ornaments, whether really vintage or just vintage looking but new.  I also hung a lot of the crafty ornaments that I have. 

It was a good time to sort through my ornaments and set up a discard pile for my garage sale.  I managed to clean up quite a bit so that I have room for all of the new ornaments that I bought this year.  I'm doing the same thing with the vintage Christmas tablecloths that I have.  I'm going to be selling some of them on my Ebay site:  milena2000.  It always feel like I'm losing something from myself when I get rid of things from my vintage collection.  I know that I need to pair down regularly, but it still feels hard.  Matthew Mead (see his blog and website:  www.holidaywithmatthewmead.com) is doing the same this weekend.  Too bad I don't live in New Hampshire because I would be adding to my collection instead of cleansing it.

Potting Bench Shelf

I rearranged Austin's room for what I hope is the last time for awhile.  When I was growing up, my mom would rearrange our bedrooms about every month.  My brothers and I loved it!  It was like having a new house.  It was a surprise for us when we got home from school.  So I guess I do that on a smaller scale for the same reason.  I used the potting bench for Austin's nutcrackers and it fit well into the space I wanted it to go into.  I then had to rearrange his other shelves.  He liked the changes. 
Hopefully there will be enough room for the nutcrackers he is getting for Christmas or I'll have to figure out yet another room change.