Old Nightstand Rehab

Remember this nightstand from the flea market in May? I picked it up for $18, and it had seen better days.

While I have some large objections (which is a whole other blog post that I've avoided writing because, well, I'd probably offend some people) to the recent trend in painting old furniture, I was looking in the direction of doing that just that, because of the top:

My mother, however, who is a bit of a magician with the furniture refinishing, took a look at it, ran her hand over it a few times, and said "let me take that home with me for awhile." 

It came back looking like this: 

And the top of it looked so much better:

The Art Deco lines are even more beautiful now that it's seen a little love. I'm grateful to my mom that she was able to rescue this for me. (Note: I also know that I've photographed this in front of a vintage buffet that is, indeed, painted. I'm conflicted on the painting furniture issue. Can you tell?)

I am looking for two nightstands that are small in scale. When my bed moves to the alcove in my bedroom, I'll need smaller scale furniture, and this one will do the trick. I'm still on the search for the second one. I'm not married to the idea of matchy-matchy for nightstands, so anything could happen, just like with this flea market find.

We've got a bunch of little projects going all over the place right now. It's pretty much what August looks like every year, I've noticed. More soon!

Lots of Bubbly Vintage Tile Love

These are so awesome it's hard not squee when I look at them. They are aggressively colorful with red, yellow, green, blue, and purple glass, white-glazed dimensional "bubbles," and a background that is gray with an overspray of gold crackle glaze.

Shut the front door, they've got everything.

The other thing they've got is my heart strings, because they came from my aunt's house. My aunt married in 1960, and she and my uncle built a little brick ranch home on a farm in Missouri. I've always called it "pink and pepper," though I don't really know the real name for the brick style.

This is the only photo I could find of the place as I remember it as a child; but perhaps it's just as well, because the foreground explains everything about the heartstrings part. I spent a great deal of my childhood running around that farm, barefoot, sweaty, dirty, picking green beans and cherries and sweet corn, and generally getting into trouble with pack of equally grubby cousins. I think the photo above is from 1976 or 1977, and shows (from left) my sister Dyan, my cousins Thea and Leah, me (with my glasses slipping down my nose, as always) and my cousin Anya, playing with (and hopefully not torturing too badly) a toad.

What I don't have is a picture of the bathroom in that house in all its former glory. Salmon pink field tile, blonde wood cabinetry, and these accent tiles. It was marvelous. One of my earliest memories as a child is sitting in the bathtub at my aunt's house, running my fingers over the smooth glass bubbles, enchanted by the color and the glamor. My own bathroom at home was very plain, and these were just too much for my child-like desires to bear. I was going to have something just as fabulous when I grew up.

While my aunt and uncle still live in the same house, about 10 years ago the bathroom got remodeled. Mid-century enthusiasts can be dismayed if they want, but the lady of the house had grown tired of salmon pink and 40 years of wear on a bathroom is more than enough. I was sorry to see the tiles go, but I understood.

A few weeks ago, my mom was helping my aunt clean her basement, and found these, eight of them, in a storage box. They'd been salvaged. They both remembered how much I loved them as a little girl, and my aunt gave them to me.

I have to admit, I have no idea what I'm going to do with them. My long range plans for the downstairs bathroom has always been an aqua and black tile bath. I know I am not interested in a salmon pink tile bath, but I do like the way these tiles look with a dove gray:

That's a paint chip of Woodsmoke by Eddie Bauer Home. And again, there are only eight of them. My wheels are turning. Perhaps a framed wall hanging instead? I do not know for sure, only that I'm deeply happy to have something from my childhood back in my life like this. It's the best kind of serendipity.

Flea Market Booty, 2014

The last time my sister and I went to the flea market, in 2012, a great deal of our haul was fabulous vintage ceramics, like this:

This year is was more a mixed, and smaller, bag. For me. My sister got skunked. Seriously. She left the market without a single item. I was tempted to ask if she was running a temperature, but then decided against it. We all know that it happens. Sometimes the Flea Market Goddess decides it's not our day.

I brought home a wonderfully tacky fish planter, which will be used in our bathroom to corral things on the counter. Price? $1

I also spotted this nightstand; I loved the Art Deco lines, even though it had seen better days. Price: $18

Here's a view of the top. It's going to need a little bit of a rescue job:

Once it's feeling more like its pretty self, it will go in my bedroom.

This year, my friend Kristy couldn't go with us, and so instead of getting sunburnt at a county fairground for hours, she gets a glass to put her beer in. I've always kind of liked these older, 6 to 8 oz glasses for beer. That way way you can have more, right? Price: $3

My last item was my biggest "score" in terms of total satisfaction. For the longest time, I've been looking for a garden watering can, and I've been a total Goldilocks about finding one that wasn't too big (heavy) too small (not worth the effort), too flimsy (anything plastic) or too ugly (everything plastic).

A gentleman who was selling spiffed up old farm equipment had this to offer, and it came home with me. Price: $24. Yes, I know, and he wouldn't budge. But it is made like a rock, it's the perfect size, and it won't break or split after one season. I just love the feeling of it in my hand. And I think it's beautiful. Don't you?

The watering can is in itself a preview of the next few posts, which will be garden related. I'll see you soon!

The Flea Market, What Cheer Iowa

Back in 2012, my sister Dyan, my friend Kristy, and I went to the flea market in What Cheer, Iowa (don't you just love that name?). We had such a great time that when my sister decided to get away for the weekend this month, she came to see me, get some sister time, and return to the flea. I mean, how can you not like a place where you can get pickled people heads?

The 2012 What Cheer Flea Market

Last year we spent hours and hours there, and this year? Not as long, though I can't say we've lost our enthusiasm. I think that first trip we'd sized up the Keokuk County Fair Grounds, and this time we knew the lay of the land. There's a lot of territory to cover, and it's best to pace yourself. We did a better job this time. 

I'll share the bring-homes in another post coming soon, but this is the window shopping post. Ready? Here we go!

I liked this assemblage of vintage items. This seller had a real eye for grouping things together in an attractive way. But I have no idea what I'd do with a cast iron horse head. Do you?

Not just a set of cooties, but a COMPLETE set of cooties, I'll have you know.

There are days when I wish had wee ones again, and this little scooter is one of them. Rooster!

I have absolutely no idea why it reminds me of a cartoon, but doesn't this pitcher set look like something Wilma Flintstone would use? 

On the same table we saw these awesome tiki glasses. They are the only thing I think I regret leaving behind.

I've also been resisting the temptation to buy a vintage typewriter for a long time. I almost didn't make it that day. Here's why:

It came with a carrying case and an instructional method book. Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-Ching!

As a recovering chair addict, I'm proud of myself for leaving these mid-mod beauties behind (I do not need another chair...I do not need another chair....I do not need another chair....). They look suspiciously like Heywood Wakefield, but they are not. I believe the label was from the Jasper Chair Company, Indiana? The seats were nasty dirty and moldy and the wood covered in bird guano, but I think that they would have cleaned up very well. 

This mantel set, vase and candlesticks, caught our eye, and so did the swanky bar glass set behind it. 

If you're in the Midwest and interested in attending, the flea market meets three times a year, and the next one is in August. You can get more info on the What Cheer Flea Market here. Definitely worth the visit. 

What are the favorite fleas in your area?

Look At My Purty Dishes

On Tuesday I showed you my "new" printer stand, a vintage turntable cabinet. But oh, that's not all. I feel like it's third grade here on the blog this week, and it's show and tell. Every day.

One of my cousins is in the process of cleaning out the estate home of her aunt, and she picked out a box of stuff she thought I would like, and sent it along home with my Mom last week. Boy, did she have my number.

The items above from left to right are: a pressed glass spoon holder, an opalescent glass cream pitcher, and an amber Depression glass dish. I threw them on top of a dishtowel so the colors would show more in the photos, not necessarily to confess to you that I never iron anything. So there's your "keeping it real" moment for this blog post.

I'm one of those ladies who likes all sorts of "purty dishes" (say dishes with a long squishy southern vowel-- "deeshes") for entertaining, flower arrangements, holding eyeglasses, mail, and jewelry. Heck, I may even use that spoon holder as a spoon holder. I do, yes, have to actively manage my inclinations at garage sales, auctions, and thrift shops, or I'd have cupboards full. Cake stands alone are their own category.

Look at these!

Are these not perfect for my 1960s avocado supreme kitchen? The mixing bowls are especially great, because I've been needing some smaller-scale bowls for cooking. The casserole is a 9-inch square. They are all a Pyrex pattern called Spring Blossom.

There was also a loaf pan and a gigantic shallow casserole, almost 9x13 pan size. I'd never seen one that large.

And then there was this wonderful thing:

Anyone for some Tang? 

I could see myself serving mojitos in this. Tang mojitos? Hmmm. It's so summery looking. 

I am so grateful to Valerie (holla, girl) for thinking of me. All of these items are welcome to my home and will be used. 

I have to be honest and say I'm also grateful because it's hard to blog about progress on the house when, well, there's been no progress on the house. While all of these recent acquisitions have been great because they are wonderful in and of their own selves, I have to admit they've saved my blogger behind this week. 

I'll be back next week with some decor updates, some garden updates, and some project updates.

Thrift Finds: Waiting for the Right Thing

I am not the world's most patient person. That doesn't always make me a good thrift shopper, the kind that will wait to strike until the exact item and price is right.

I think I may finally have learned my lesson. 

Last year about this time, I managed to pull together our front room with furniture I had on hand, plus some refitted curtains and a new rug: 

You can read about that adventure in this post. It's one of those rooms that looks better in person than in pictures, because the colors don't appear to play together in digital photos but do in real life. Also, I'm a little bit better photographer. (But only a bit.)

The thing I like best about this room is its coziness and personal art. Who doesn't like owl mirrors and drawings of dragons in teacups? Not anyone I want to know. 

The thing I liked least about this room was the printer situation. At first I put it on an old kitchen hostess cart that had been found lying about the place when I moved in: 

Which collected about six horizontal square feet of of crapola along with the printer. On an open shelf out in front of God and everybody. What a mess. 

I was so desperate to get that eyesore out of there that I sorted the mess, stashed the cart elsewhere, and  put the printer on the floor along that wall, which you can see if you scroll back up to the top photo. 

If you think a printer on the floor in a house with four boys doesn't seem like a great idea, I totally agree. I'm not saying this was ideal. Or even smart. But it beat the mess. Or the wrong piece of furniture, like that slightly rickety and rusty cart. 

But yes, I worried that one day one of the kids would come rolling along and step on the fold-out paper tray, and the Canon would be toast. 

I needed something small, no more than a couple feet wide, no more than 20 inches deep, and nothing too tall, bulky or dominating. I didn't want to spend a ton of money. I honestly didn't think finding something that size or shape would be that hard. Stupid me. 

Here. Look at vases while I kvetch about file cabinets some more. 

Since that project last year, I have looked at dozens of possibilities, some of which were: 

1. New printer stands, the cheapness and plastic crap of which depressed me. 

2. Lateral files, which were shallow enough, but too wide, and ridiculously pricey.

3. regular file cabinets, which were too deep, and not wide enough.

4. Vintage office furniture, which has taken a sudden turn into trendy and chic, and therefore now unaffordable. 

5. Surplus office furniture from our local university's weekly equipment inventory sales. Cheap, but everything I looked at was just somehow wrong.

6. An ongoing menagerie of second-hand small dressers, night stands, side tables, bookcases, and anything else I thought might fit the bill. 

A few weeks ago I was really getting fed up with the printer-on-the-floor situation, and was glumly contemplating a couple of options on Overstocks.com and Ikea, but not really in love with any of them and feeling really grouchy about it. Luckily it was late, and I didn't even have the energy to click through an online purchase. 

This weekend I stopped by my mother's to pick up and drop off the endless round of things that pass through the hands of family when you live in the same town. She'd been down to family in Missouri to pick up some things that had belonged to elderly relatives and was going through a giant sort, including a pile of things destined for the curb. 

The curb pile included this: 

This is the obligatory terrible cell phone photo of the item fresh from the back of my van. It is my Great Aunt Elizabeth's turntable and album stand. I think it is awesome. Also? Twenty-two inches wide and 16 1/2 inches deep. And FREE. Perfect on all counts. Open shelving again is less perfect, but I think the way they are arranged in this case I can make it work. No vinyl records though! 

It's in pretty rough shape, with water rings, loose veneer, and scratches. 

Oh and the dust too. I haven't had time to even unload my dishwasher this week, so don't expect dusting even for a blog post. 

I'm not sure whether it will stay this finish. The wood is in terrible shape, and the finish clashes with the paneling in the room. It might become a painted color. I'm not sure. But if it's waited a year to come into my life, it can wait another year while I decide how to fix it up. 

Another little tweak to this room also happened in recent weeks. This chair was what I started with: 

Don't get me wrong. I like the chair. But it just seems awfully busy in a room with a busy rug and busy curtains and wood paneling. Also, the boys were being rather rough on it. Not deliberately, just four boys doing their usual thing requires sturdy furniture. So instead of this one we are using another one from my Pathologically Large Stash of Old Chairs. (Yes. Capitalized. If you knew you'd understand.)

The orange isn't as bright as it appears in the photo. I like that I can wipe it down if things get a little out of control with the after-school snacking at the computer. Vinyl. It's a way of life. 

I learned from this year-long exercise in waiting that eventually, the Thrift Gods will smile on you. I am glad I resisted the temptation to solve this problem with a solution that involved throwing money at something else that I was less than crazy about. That never ends well, does it? I also learned that, in the instance of the chairs, living with a room makes you realize how first decisions may not be lasting ones, and rooms need to evolve to fit the way you actually live. 

What home decor items have you waited and waited and waited for? Did just the right thing eventually arrive in your life?

Thrift Shop Valentine

For a person who hates Valentine's Day, I sure got a good one.

It was not red or pink or chocolate. But it was shiny. And floral.

I got butter knives in the mail. 

Yep. You read that right. Butter knives. Yes. I am a weirdo. 

When I scored this green Art Deco cream pitcher that I love, I bought it more out of that love than "I have a use for it." 

But I decided it would hold butter knives in the area of the kitchen where we make toast and sandwiches. With four hungry boys, there is a sandwich being made in my house at any given time. It's like I'm running a deli up in here. My butter knives are always dirty in the dishwasher, and I decided to stock up on extra and have them handy and ready to go. 

Thrift shop finds are the obvious bargain way to go, but I have to share a shameful secret: the thrift shop in my town is lame. It is lame because we are in a university town, so the Goodwill here is 90 percent crapped-out Abercrombie and Fitch t-shirts. In the case of butter knives, all that stuff is institutional flatware that college students cadged from the campus dining room. It's all very depressing. 

Thrift shops in my sister's neck of the woods, the greater Atlanta area, are AWESOME. I would call them "effing" awesome, but I'm trying to pretend that I don't swear that much. I'll leave that for Macklemore and Ryan, the hip-hop artists who have been mentioned by nearly every single blogger on the planet in the last three months for their song "Thrift Shop." The link to the music video is here, and consider yourself warned if you have delicate sensibilities. But the reason it's so popular? It's hilarious. If you thrift, you're part of the biggest inside joke ever with this song. 

There are 12 of these, and they are heavy and good quality. They were a couple of bucks, and Dyan took them home, scrubbed and boiled them and ran them through the dishwasher. She mailed them to me last week. I ran them through the dishwasher again when they came here, not because I don't trust my sister's cleaning but because I don't trust the ookiness that is Other People's Dirt. 

So to review: 

Butter knives: awesome

Atlanta thrift shop scene: awesome

Macklemore and Ryan: f(    )ing awesome

My sister: awesome

This is exactly the sort of Valentine I can stand. 

The Need for Red in February

Let's just say I hate Valentine's Day and get it over with, shall we?

I hate the subliminal message that women's good will and adoration can be bought with heart shaped diamond pendants, or pink furry stuffed animals, or boxes of mass-produced and slightly stale chocolates. I hate overseeing the handwriting of 25 valentines times two for two boys who utterly detest the chore and yet are obligated to complete it so that Valentine's Day can be another opportunity for the school to teach them handwriting. I hate the cloying artificial sentiment manufactured and marketed by card/flower/gift/candy shops. I hate the feeling of obligation it sets up in otherwise sane couples. And to be perfectly truthful and yet contradictory, I spent not just a few years of my marriage and then divorce, sitting at home in sweatpants doing nothing, feeling sour, and then feeling sour that I felt sour about being neglected on a holiday I hated anyway.

It's enough to make this usually level-headed woman eat a whole bag of potato chips at one sitting.

Now that we're clear on the that, I am still in favor of the color red in February. I think most of us who experience a true winter like we do here On the Doorstep, need a blast of warm, fiery color to counteract the gray skies, dirty snowbanks, and mucky streets we struggle through for months on end.

Red's a master of many roles: cheerful, passionate, saucy, loud, every one of them a good antidote to February blahs. I believe every room, no matter what's going on in it, needs a little red to keep things from being boring.

Here are some of my favorites, from Etsy sellers:

                      

                   

                   

                       

A Little Shiny Brite-ness

I am a raccoon all year round. I like shiny things. At Christmas time that raccoon goes completely off the chain. Candles! Sparkly lights! Glitter!

That's in direct conflict with my struggle with Christmas commercialism, over-consumption, and forced cheer. It's at odds with my inner Christmas Grump. There's your mixed metaphor for the day. Picture a raccoon (with glitter in its fur) duking it out fur and fangs with the Christmas Grump (she's wearing paint-stained sweat pants and a crabby look).

I'm never going to be the person who has a Christmas tree in every room of her house and garland stuck on anything that doesn't move. Okay, I was a little bit about that garland part for a few years. And you know what? It was EXHAUSTING. And dusty. I got over it.

Nevertheless, I and the inner glitter raccoon think there's always room for another bauble on the one tree we do have and I allow myself the fireplace mantel too. So every year I permit myself a few small Christmas things. For awhile it was the vintage bottle brush trees. I loved the kitschy, sparkly, funny things, and I could pick them up for a song at garage sales and off-season at flea markets. Then people got wise to their charms. They went from $5 to $10 dollars up to $20. Did I mention Glitter Raccoon is also a cheapskate? Last year I picked up my last one, a real doll of a number with bananas and oranges on it, for $22 and I was very lucky to find it at that price. This year, everything worth having was $50 and up. Way up.

This year my finds were a bit more modest, made to look way more modest by my hurried and badly focused photo above. Boy do I need a photography class. And a life outside of work that doesn't involve doing laundry and grilling cheese sandwiches. But I digress.

I was taken by the pale blue ornaments and their delicate leafy sprays. The bead garland is about six feet long, which doesn't cover much of the tree but it's pretty twined through the branches. I hope to find it some beaded siblings to join with in the future. It was just a few dollars for the bunch.

Do you have an inner Glitter Raccoon? Do you let it go every Christmas, or do you try to keep it under control? What holiday things do you collect?

Junk Finds: Chairs and Bookcase

I promised I'd share my Junk Jamboree finds from two weekends ago. Here are the furniture pieces that came home with me, two school chairs a little red and blue bookcase.

I'd been looking for some metal and wood laminate school chairs for some time. I even found some at Kudzu in Decatur, Georgia this summer while shopping with my sister. But at $79 a pop, I passed. These were $16. Yeay!

They are already in use in the twins' room, at their built-in desk, which I wrote about in a previous post:

I still need to paint and trim the end of the desk. 

The bookcase is also for the twins' bedroom. I'm not sure it's really all that vintage, and is pretty dinged up. However, it is exactly the right size, and the paint, while beyond distressed and verging into "wrecked," fits the colors in the room. Until I decide what I want to do with it to clean it up, it works, and it's not like the boys can do anything worse to it. 

The boys have been asking for a nightstand to replace this "baby-ish" (their word) piece, made to look like Side Table Drawer from the preschool TV show Blue's Clues: 

I think the little shelf needs a small-sized vintage globe, a piggy bank, an alarm clock, and a stack of story books when it takes its place between the two beds: 

I have a few other things to share from Junk Jamboree. Stay tuned on those! 

I'm also back from my trip to Arkansas. I'll update with a post when I've had time to sort through photos and reflect on the journey. Oh, and sleep off some major road wearies. As much as I love road trips, I don't much love driving. Crazy, isn't it?