Fun With Naturecraft

I was going through some of my books today and I opened up this vintage craft book that I picked up at a library book sale several years ago.

It's full of great ideas of cute little things to make out of natural objects. And every chapter begins with the word "fun", what could be better?

I like this chapter "Fun with Nuts" even though I dislike walnuts immensely (they squeak when you eat them), many types of projects can be made out of their shells.

One of my favorite projects out of the book would be this walnut raft. If only my nephews lived nearby we could craft up a few of these and let them float away.

The teepee scene is just too cute, I am going to have to go out and hunt around for twigs to make into trees, rocks to make into boulders and a big piece of bark to use as the ground. This idea reminds me of hunting for rocks last year...

An alternative to a bird feeder; a threaded spool for birds to make their nests out of string.

Forget about a ship in a bottle, how about a cucumber in a bottle? I remember trying to grow a cucumber once, but I watered the plant too much and killed it. But this cute project is worth another shot at growing cukes.

More Garage Sale Finds

Well, since today is Saturday and I didn't have to work I decided to participate in one of my favorite summer pastimes...garage saling. When I was a kid  I used to spend the summers with my cousin and aunt and uncle and every Saturday morning my cousin and I would head out with a piece of peanut butter toast and our Scooby Doo cups in hand in pursuit of the latest finds at the nearby garage sales and estate sales. (And it wasn't always peanut butter toast, I was known to take refrigerated Baby Ruth bars with me, I'm bad, I know.) Those summers are what began my many vintage collections and sparked an interest in anything vintage related. Today was a pretty good day as far as garage sales go and I was able to find a bunch of cooking related items at a particular yard sale.

The lady whom I bought this book from told me that she learned how to cook reading through The Joy of Cooking. Being a vegetarian, I will not be able to make most of the recipes but it is still interesting to look through, and I love anything that has a story attached to it.

Yummy, I would eat this for breakfast any day! (I am a vegetarian who eats fish, I guess I am a fishetarian)

Sick!

I lucked out with a couple of darling deadstock half aprons.

I can imagine myself cooking a weirdy recipe out of The Joy of Cooking for dearest D. while wearing my little half apron.

We found some cute wine glasses at the same garage sale (dearest D. informed me he is not a hand model).

Oh, and I bought a ceramic yule log. It's never too early to start thinking ahead for Christmas. Ho, ho, ho!

Garage Sale!

Ok, I've realized that as of late I've only been posting about vintage goodies that I've been finding, but I can't help it! For some reason I had this past Saturday off from work so dearest D. and I went out on the hunt for garage sales. We checked the paper and craigslist for local sales and away we went! We found a street where many of the neighbors were hosting yard sales and as we were walking toward one house dearest D. thought it looked very familiar. It turned out to be his friend's house from high school and we did indeed hit the mother load there. I was looking all around the driveway while D. was catching up with his pal.

I saw one of these Amish pattern pyrex dishes on a blog I follow, and I thought it would be fun to find one, and I did!

                                      

It turns out that the friend's grandma was quite the embroiderer, there were such beautiful pieces.

It is as though this doily was meant to be made into a peacock.

I've had my eye on snack plates on eBay and I found a complete set of six in perfect condition.

                                              

Milk glass vases in the $ 0.10 bin!

                                                

This was purchased from a different garage sale for only $3, I thought it would look super cute with a glass knob from Anthropologie. (The knob will most likely cost more than table)

Flea Market Finds

This past Sunday dearest D. and I hit up the local flea market once again in search of some vintage goodies; we were not disappointed. Now, I have this particular phobia of eating off of yellow dishes, but when the vendor offered these seven little dishes to me for $1, well it was just an offer I couldn't refuse.

The dishes aren't marked so I don't know who made them, I guess hunting for more on eBay is futile. I am trying to figure out what to use the dishes for, and I am a bit curious as to why the larger ones have handle like projections.

D. scored the most from our little outing, he added to his book collection with vintage copies of Pollyanna, Ivanhoe, Pilgrim's Progress and a peculiar book called Little Lives of the Saints for Children.

The book bindings are so pretty, why doesn't such care go into books that are published now?

(Why did Harry Fletcher write his name twice in Ivanhoe?)

                                              

He wanted to buy Pollyanna even after I told him it was a children's book, he said he was thinking about the future...

The Finds I Found

This past Sunday, I went to the local produce market looking for plants for my garden, but I found much more than produce! I couldn't believe the goodies that I found. I didn't even end up buying any plants. I got this entire mushroom set for $8.00.
These Lu-Ray Pastel saucers were only $4.00 for the lot. I found the exact same saucers on eBay for $14.00 for a set of two!
Lu-Ray was made from 1938-1962.

These are my absolute favorite, a complete milk glass set (only $12.00!) and five Fire-King ramekins ($4.00). I can't believe all the treasures I found. I will have a nice little collection of vintage for my kitchen.

Once I came back from the market, I started researching the brands I found, Fire-King is easy to find on eBay and very reasonable, I might need to add to my collection...

Progress

Two years ago while staying with my grandparents, my grandma gave me several unfinished sets of pillowcases that my great grandma never embroidered. When I was a teenageer my grandma taught me how to embroider and I've been doing it ever since. I have made quite a bit of progress in the last several months than I ever did in the past two years that I had them.



Here is the uncompleted one.



And the finished one.

Jantzen Heritage Collection

Today while I was getting a much needed pedicure, I read an article in May's In Style magazine about Jantzen Swimwear's 100th Anniversary Celebration and their new Heritage Collection. The collection has bathing suits inspired by the 1920's-1970's. The suit the magazine highlighted was so cute, I had to find it online. Well not only did I find the ruffled little number from the magazine I also found a plethora of other goodies. My favorite bathing suit is the following one, complete with the cape and swim cap. I found that most of the collection can be purchased at Dillard's, but I did not want to shell out over $250 for the ensemble. Not to mention I would feel a little foolish parading around the beach wearing a "swimming cape". I did manage to find a red Jantzen "Vamp" bathing suit on Overstock for a fraction of the price. I decided with summer just around the corner, and the fact that it has a perfect retro and classy vibe that I should just go ahead and buy it. After all, it is incredibly difficult to find a cute one piece swimsuit, usually they are some horrible muu muu looking thing with an ugly print and a little floofy skirt and no one wants to be caught wearing something that awful. I'm quite happy with my find.