Snicker-Snack

Should I be flattered?

2010-09-04T07:09:00.000-07:00

I was searching the Internet the other day, trying to find some information on this fabulous vintage platter hat I just bought, and I found a blog that had about 15 pictures from my Flickr site--all hats that I've bought and photographed, shown with a few paragraphs of text this person had written, and absolutely no credit given to me. They even included a few of the wonderful photos I have of my then 13-year-old son modeling a pillbox hat (he'd be so pleased to see the image is getting wide play).

I clicked around on this blog, and eventually it did link up to my Flickr, so if someone really cared they could find out who really owned these photos. I found it vexing, though I certainly knew the risks when I started posting on the Internet, and perhaps I should be flattered that someone liked my photos and collection enough to steal it wholesale.

And I have to humbly admit, it did make a fabulous blog posting. So taking credit where credit is due, here are just a few of the hats I have for sale. See my Flickr site for many more (many of which, alas, have already sold).

Black swirl platter hat, by Modernettes


Vintage red straw hat with feather pompom


Tulle and sequin toque hat by Luci Puci

Navy blue linen cloche with veil

Black velvet bowler hat, by Flechats

Back again, in a small way

2010-08-26T08:18:00.000-07:00

Sad (and a little embarrassed) to say that it's be ages since I added anything new to my blog. Well, I'd like to correct that; I'd like to get back into it with a big new, splashy plan for the best blog ever. But maybe that's what's kept me away for so long. Instead, I'm going to start small. Miniature, in fact.

Click here for more views

This is a Pendulette--a miniature coo-coo clock made in the 1930s. This is the animated bird model by Lux; as the pendulum swings, the bird moves back and forth and feeds its babies. Many of the Pendulettes were like this one--more or less like traditional coo-coo clocks, with a rustic, woodsy look and birds. But there were others shaped like cats or dogs, flowers, or even a Schmoo (and if you know what a Schmoo is, you just dated yourself.

You can see why people collect these--they're just so darn cute. If you can stand all that cuteness in one place, here's a gallery of Pendulettes and a little more on their history.

Vintage Wonderland, Day 14

2008-12-11T04:00:00.000-08:00

Two weeks into the $10 gift certificate give-away on the Etsy Vintage Street Team blog, and it's finally my turn!

That's right, boys and girls. Hop on over there, make a post with your cyber-name and e-mail and a link to your favorite thing in my shop (bet you can't find just one!), and after 9 pm tonight (EST) there will be a drawing for one lucky person to win a $10 gift certificate to Callooh Cally.

The give-away will be going on through the rest of the month, with a different fabulous vintage shop every day, so be sure to check back!

Pictured here: Some of the fun new things I've added to my shop in the past month:

An Olive Oyl marionette from the 1950s. This is one I'm really tortured about selling, which of course makes my kids just laugh. How could one be sentimental about a marionette? Of course, if I tried to sell my French bayonette, then they'd understand.
A fabulous Hawaiian flower 1950s tablecloth. How retro can you go?
A cruet and caster set in pressed glass and silver plate. At one time, every well-appointed table had one of these.
Disneykins Babes in Toyland toy soldiers, by Marx. Babes in Toyland was one of the first movies I remember seeing--or rather, I remember the emotions of watching the film, with its terror and romance. These toy soldiers were released in 1961 after the film came out. Oh Disney, I don't know how to quit you.

Walking in a Vintage Wonderland

2008-12-08T04:52:00.000-08:00

My posting on this is a little late (mea culpa), but there's still time to get in on the Etsy Vintage Street Team's $10 gift certificate give-aways. Every day in December (extended until the 31st), a different and wonderful Etsy vintage shop will give away a $10 gift certificate. All you have to do is to post a comment on the EVST blog with a link to your favorite item in that shop (complete details are available here). Today's featured shop is abbysrelics, who carries some of the most fabulous vintage postcards around (a weakness of mine).

If you're just finding out about this, sorry to say you've missed some great shops, but there are more than 20 to go (including my shop), and you can sign up every day. More important, great vintage shopping is available every day on Etsy. Put "etsyvintageteam" in the search bar for some of the best.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2008-11-27T03:05:00.000-08:00

Here's a fun fat turkey from my shop--a vintage postcard with embossed vegetables (my favorite kind). Makes me kind of sad about the bird we'll be roasting in a few hours, but I'll get over it.

I subscribe to Bon Appetit and each year scour bask issues for recipes (I always save the November issues). One year we brined the turkey--put it in a salt bath for a few days, changing out the water every so often--and it was absolutely fabulous but (like the year I made chestnut dressing and nearly killed my hands peeling chestnuts) something that's not to be repeated. The memory of that moist bird lives on; both my parents and my in-laws mentioned it.

So this year we're trying a rub with kosher salt mixed with herbs, put on the bird the day before. This is also a Bon Appetit recipe, from this year's issue--unearthed yesterday in our massive housecleaning effort and necessitating a trip to the store for kosher salt (along with eggs and other inevitably forgotten items from our list).

I'll post something later and let you know if it measures up to brining. I suspect it won't, but not having to bathe a turkey for two days will be worth it.

Mr. John: Milliner to the Stars

2008-11-14T07:22:00.000-08:00

There aren’t very many biopics I’d like to see made, but I just found a character who’d be perfect for one: larger than life, incredibly talented and successful, flamboyant, and yet with a touch of humor, even irony, about himself.

I’m talking (if you haven’t guessed) about Mr. John, one of the glitterati among mid-century U.S. milliners. His accomplishments, in a career spanning almost 60 years, were legendary, yet today he is largely forgotten

Mr. John--John Piocelle, or John P. John as he dubbed himself--led a sophisticated, glamorous life in Hollywood and produced some of today's most sought after vintage hats. He was also noted for work, before their split in 1948, as half of the John-Frederics duo, whose most famous hat was the straw and green velvet bonnet worn by Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind. Often using pseudonyms, Mr. John designed Garbo’s hat in Mata Hari, Dietrich’s cloche in Shanghai Express, and Monroe’s headdress in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.

Outside of films, Mr. John designed hats for everyone from Eleanor Roosevelt to Gypsy Rose Lee, from Jaqueline Onassis to Wallace Simpson. Even my mother owned a Mr. John hat, one with a bobbing flower similar to the one in my Etsy shop (pictured above), which she assures me was considered quite fashionable. His hats often showed his sense of humor—a bannana hat with a zipper, a hat for an elephant at the Republican National Convention, an Eiffel tower hat, an airplane hat.

This sounds like enough for a great movie, but his personal life was equally flamboyant. His Central Park West apartment had a white and gold décor he described as “Louis Unrecognisable” and had free-roaming macaws, cockatoos, and parrots. Once he visited a friend wearing a floor-length gold cape and with a bird on his shoulder.

Despite all this flash and glamour, Mr. John was known primarily for his flattering, wearable hats. Even with the bobbing flower, my mother said she always felt great in her Mr. John.

Now for casting that biopic: I'm thinking maybe Robert Downey Jr?

Much of this information came from a fascinating article by Drake Stutesman.

The park and John Waters

2008-11-08T04:44:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I took a dozen pieces of my jewelry over for consignment at one of my favorite local museums, Laumeier Sculpture Park. It's a wonderful place where we frequently picnic or walk the dog, with trails through the woods dotted with hidden sculpture, as well as a vast expanse of lawn and massive constructions of steel. The picture above is of Ricardo Cat, which used to be in the children's sculpture garden, right next to where they hold the art summer camp that my boys attended for years. Behind that you see the museum building, where they have indoor exhibits and the gift shop that heavily features local artists (and that is, not coincidentally, run by a woman who used to teach my youngest at summer camp). Below is another of the outdoor sculptures, La Libellule.

The current exhibit--well worth the trip if you live in the St. Louis area--is by one of my favorite film makers, the very twisted John Waters (yes, the guy who made Pink Flamingos and Hairspray). And it's just as funny as he is. The only other people at the exhibit when I was there was a woman and her granddaughter, who was taken by the sculpture of Michael Jackson as a baby (with an adult face and hair), crawling toward another baby/man. The girl was amused by Michael Jackson but didn't recognize the other baby as Charles Manson (complete with beard and swastika on the forehead).

My favorite pieces, I think, were his photographs, often presented in a long series and taken from films or the news--photos of Jackie Kennedy in the pink suit she wore in Dallas, interspersed with pictures of various actresses playing Jackie Kennedy in a pink suit; a whole series of Lana Turner's back, showing her in various films turned away from the camera; and similar series of Grace Kelly's elbows and Dorothy Malone's collar.

I had planned to see John Waters when he was in town for the opening of the exhibit (and a series of appearances around town), but events conspired and I missed him. But the exhibit runs through January 11, so I do plan to see it again and drag my children (if not my dog) along. We'll check out the gift shop while we're at it.

Catching Up

2008-11-02T05:28:00.001-08:00

It has been so long since I blogged, a friend asked my husband if I was sick. A few other friends (who I didn't realize were regular readers) told me they missed me! Aw, so sweet. But blogging is like going to the gym--once you stop, it is so hard to get going again.

And I need to do that too--but one hurdle at a time.

My life has been pretty crazy lately (whose isn't?). But so as not to blow all my blog posts in one sitting, I'll just mention one project I've been working on: getting some jewelry together for Steam Powered, the California steampunk convention going on now in Sunnyvale. I'm not there, but my jewelry is! Some wonderful people from the Etsy Steam Team (a group of Etsy steampunk artists who work together) have several vendor tables where they're showing jewelry from team members who couldn't make it there themselves. This is my first art show, and I'm not even there! But I've seen a few pictures and know that they look better in costume than I would!

It was fun to get together a group of pieces of one theme, and while I was doing this I listed very little in the way of new steampunk pieces in my Etsy store. But who knows? Some of them may return to me and be available soon.

Eureka Eureka--world beads and a bit of history

2008-08-20T04:25:00.000-07:00

I don't make beaded jewelry, but after spending some time with Debby Arem and her Etsy shop, Eureka Eureka, I'm sorely tempted to begin. Debby's shop has several things I love: rocks, gems, and stories of far-off lands. With her husband, Joel Arem (who worked for the Smithsonian and authored seven books on gems and minerals), Debby traveled all over the world in search of the finest and most unusual beads.

The ones I'm showing here are her favorites: glass beads from West Germany. Some of these are from the 1950s, and as anyone who sells or loves vintage knows, they don't make 'em like they used to.

The rest of Debby's shop is equally fascinating, with beads from Pakistan, China, Japan, Italy, Czechoslovakia--you name it. To read more about her beads and her career as a jewelry designer, check out this interview on the Etsy Vintage Street Team blog.

Last Sale Day--Whew!

2008-08-17T06:02:00.000-07:00

My week has been too busy--listing lots of new vintage items in my Etsy shop in honor of the vintage sale that's been going on all week. OK, today is the last day of the sale, and I've sold almost ten things through it so I'm happy. But I haven't blogged, haven't cleaned house, and haven't done much jewelry making all week.

So here's to the end of the sale! It goes till midnight tonight. The above treasury gives you a taste of what's available. To the right is something new I listed, a Fire King cottage cheese bowl. To see what else there is, go to Etsy and search for evstsale.

Vintage Sale Time!

2008-08-06T12:37:00.000-07:00

The only thing better than buying vintage on Etsy is buying it on sale--and now's your chance. August 8 through 17 will mark the first annual Etsy Vintage Street Team $12 and Under Sale.

Participating shops will have a wide variety of vintage goodies for $12 or less. To find them using Etsy's pull down search menu, click on "All Items: Tags and Titles" and search for EVSTsale. The sale lasts for a good 10 days, so check back--new items will be added as it goes along.

I'm not ready for this yet, but here's a little preview of something I added for the sale.

Garage sales: August '08

2008-08-04T09:43:00.000-07:00

The middle of the country has many drawbacks, including no oceans and teeny mountains (yes, the Ozarks are mountains). But one thing we have in abundance is great summer garage sales. Hot, humid, crowded, and full of good junk at great prices.

Last weekend I hit a bonanza with two older women (now defined as anyone older than me) who were closing down their antique shop. I practiced great restraint and left with three bags full of goodies, including six vintage hats that I'll be listing over the next several weeks in my Etsy shop. The picture above shows some of my other finds, including a Red Wing Lexington pitcher, Red Wing planter, Hull swan planter, hand-painted Japan pitcher, tin of buttons, and a couple of trays.

These were great, but what really got me excited was the hats. Once I started looking at them, one of the woman started hauling them out of the house. And kept hauling--more than 50 in all. Unfortunately, many were not in great shape, but I picked out a number of the best. Pictured to the right: a rabbit fur felt number from Saks Fifth Avenue, probably late 1950s to 1960s. So soft, and it matches my eyes (but sadly not my head size).

Quiz of the week

2008-07-21T16:32:00.000-07:00

This is an easy one: Guess where I'm going on vacation. Wish I could take you all...I'll bring back some photos (though I think I'll be fighting my son for the camera the whole time).

Loving my readers

2008-07-18T03:31:00.000-07:00

As anyone who has been here more than once knows, I'm not a regular blogger, not always an interesting blogger (maybe sometimes?), certainly a rambling blogger. So I am so impressed when the same people show up here again and again to see if there's anything new. Thanks to you all (as well as to those who stop by once and decide, meh, not for me).

Yesterday I created the above Etsy treasury to show my blog reader appreciation. (Note: I know I have some regular non-Etsy readers [hi guys], but they do a lot of lurking, rarely if ever leave comments, and really couldn't be included in an Etsy treasury. But I appreciate them too!) The most fun thing was visiting all these wonderful shops, which I'll admit I don't do often enough. So please visit the treasury and click around to see some fantastic art, vintage, and other items. I'll be switching out some of the photos throughout the next day, but still I know I'll miss some of you. Nevertheless, I appreciate you all! Thanks.

My history in smoking

2008-07-16T04:12:00.000-07:00

There was a time, I can't remember if it was high school or early college, when I smoked cigars. I mean, how cool was that, a girl smoking cigars. Wow, the people I must have impressed. I can still taste the nasty things, dainty little cherry-flavored chick cigars, the smoking equivalent of Boone's Farm wine. Then later, sometime after college, I took up the pipe. That was somewhat more refined, and I had (still have) some feminine pipes, a little metal cloisonne one and a purple painted wooden one. Neither worked worth a damn, and I remember the amusement of my uncle, who smoked a pipe for real, trying to teach me how to keep the stupid things going.

Neither of these habits was long-lived, fortunately, but I thought of them the other day when I was doing research on a new garage sale purchase--a beautiful antique cigar humidor. I was attracted to it because it's a beautiful box, a dark oak with a tin lining and a removable filter that could be wetted to keep the cigars moist. When I started looking around, trying to discover its age (1890s to early 1900s), I was reminded of the subculture that has grown up around different smoking options.

One of the most interesting websites I discovered was one that sells new humidors but also refurbishes antique ones to modern standards of cigar preservation. They take beautiful boxes like the one I'm selling (and, of course, ones much fanicer, made out of beautiful, rare woods with inlays and metal adornments and fanciful shapes), remove the lining; clean and refinish the wood if necessary; reline it with Spanish cedar; and fit it with modern moisture control devices (a humidifier and hygrometer).

Perfect for people who buy $10 cigars. (For those smoking cherry-flavored, girly cigars, a different receptacle will do.)

The vintage seller's alter ego

2008-07-11T05:51:00.000-07:00

Vintage sellers are a creative lot. Even if they aren't directly involved in arts and crafts, they have "the eye." They have a finely honed aesthetic sense, able to pick out the wonderful lost in a sea of the mediocre and just awful.

Many of them, however, are also artist and artisans in their own right. I've found that a number of vintage sellers on Etsy have another shop where they sell hand-made items (often made with vintage components), or they carry a mixture of handmade and vintage within one shop. Here are just a few of the secret lives revealed (I'll highlight more in a later blog post).

AmbrosianBeads is run by Carol Holmes, the owner of RetroThreads. (You can see an interview with Carol on the Etsy Vintage Street Team blog.)

HerRoyalMajestyBags and SurrenderDorothy are products of the same creative mind.

backhomeagain is the crafty counterpart to 300nmulberry.

artsfarm combines vintage items with hand-crafted accessories, jewelry, and art in one shop.

Finally, AuntiePrincess moonlights as lamplighter, creator of extraordinary Victorian lampshades.

What's going on

2008-07-08T08:22:00.000-07:00

I've been in a neglect-the-blog mode again, so here's my quick remedy: five things that happened lately (hope I don't have to pad the list):

I got a request from a writer to include a photo of my vintage California Pottery bells in an upcoming issue of an Israeli home styling magazine.
I won a pound of coffee from Vintage Indie for a photo I took of a coffee cup (one of my lovely Russel Wright chartreuse mugs, sitting on a napkin that I intend to list in my shop if I can ever find where I put the other three of them).
I became a contributing writer to the Etsy Vintage Street Team blog (my first interview is in the works). Just what I need, right? Another blog?
I found a photo of one of my necklaces on Gothic News, a website that is too cool for me.
I had my 6-month Etsy anniversary. The stats: 76 sales, 156 items currently listed in my shop, 1119 hearts, 2965 forum posts, almost 8000 Flickr views, and 2263 blog visitors. (There's something wrong with these figures--I talk way more than I sell.)

The Etsy Pledge

2008-07-03T04:41:00.000-07:00

Etsy, whose tagline is "Your place to buy and sell all things handmade," is also host to a thriving community of vintage and supply sellers, including some wonderful shops that make the online experience like a comfortable trip to the very finest antique mall.

And then there are the others.

The ones who have cheap cameo bracelets they bought last week at Walmart. Or the sugar bowl that's not too bad, except it was made in 1994 (and thus not considered vintage by Etsy's 20-years-old standard). Or the skirts that were made in a factory in Southeast Asia.

What happens to these rulebreakers, these cheats--who contribute to the impression that Etsy is "an online flea market" (as one online columnist called it)? Some of them eventually get shut down (sometimes to reopen under another name). One of them I know of has made more than 100 sales in 4 months of business; maybe the boom will be lowered some day, but it does seem to take forever.

The community at Etsy is starting to fight back. This past week, the shop owner of Keys and Memories set up the Etsy Pledge Blog to highlight vintage and handmade sellers who publicly affirm that they "don't mistag or resell new items under the guise of being vintage or handmade." The blog already has 34 so-called Seal of Approval Shops (mostly vintage) listed and is adding more daily.

It's tempting, of course, to give you a link to those shops selling Walmart jewelry or brand new accessories. But maybe, if Etsy does its policing job right, by the time you read this they'll be gone.

Or maybe not--and there'll always be someone new to take their place. Caveat emptor indeed.

The weekend haul

2008-07-01T06:52:00.000-07:00

Saturday I found some marvelous garage sales, including this one house of wonder that was packed, just packed with stuff--most of it good, some of it overpriced but some of it a great deal. There were two stories and a basement, and every single room was jammed full. The sad part: my older son was with me (he sells computers on e-bay, so he was making the rounds with me), and he was bored stiff and constantly on my heels, wondering why I was looking through a stack of old hats or rummaging on a table of pottery.

So I didn't get as much as I might have otherwise, but still found quite a few treasures. My son's just turned 17, and I don't see too much of him these days, so it was worth the foregone booty. But I'm still thinking about that house...wonder if they'll be open next weekend too (surely they couldn't have sold everything!).

Do I need a new model?

2008-06-28T09:35:00.000-07:00

Things started out amicably enough. He was right there, usually in front of the TV or playing a video game in the basement, and always willing to help me out. He seemed to instinctively know the right way to wear my vintage hats--like a young Barbara Stanwyck, perhaps, or even Grace Kelly. That kind of elegance, that poise, cannot be taught.

Lately, however, I've been wondering whether I'm wrong to confine myself to just one model. I've had this happen before, you nurture their talent, teach them everything you know, and then one day New York calls, or Milan, and they're gone on the next plane without a glance back. To a life so exciting, even our new Halo 3 game cannot compete.

Don't get me wrong, I'm still happy with his work, but there's something I can't quite put my finger on. Some glint in his eye, a distance perhaps, that tells me he's thinking more about his next career move than my needs. Take these photos from our recent photo shoot--he starts out happy enough, but by the end... well, you be the judge.

Branching Out: The Pear Project

2008-06-24T12:15:00.000-07:00

Beginning this week, I'm pleased to say that, in addition to my Etsy shop, some of my jewelry will also be available on the Pear Project, a website that carries a variety of goods made by artisans from all over.

Brooke Fuller, founder of the Pear Project, runs the business from her studio in North Carolina. In addition to being a savvy marketer, Brooke is a photographer, jewelry maker, and big believer in using recycled items (her bracelets made from repurposed tin are a great example).

"Artisan goods for everyday life" is the Pear Project's tagline. "A purse can come from a department store, or you can buy something unique that was made in a small quantity," Brooke explains. "Not only do you have a gorgeous bag, but you are also supporting an independent artist or craftsperson who is making a career out of what they love."

The shop carries bags and purses, household goods, jewelry, fine art prints, and paper goods "with a modern twist and utilitarian appeal, hand picked from a variety of submissions," she says. This is a small venue (one of its advantages), but it's expanding and constantly adding new artists and items. Here are a few of the other goodies you'll find there. (Guess which one's mine.)

My Studio

2008-06-19T05:45:00.001-07:00

The headline is a bit of a joke. I've been looking at other blogs with pictures of cute little cabins in the backyard, full of windows and light with ivy climbing the sides, where the artist can be an artiste. What I have here is a corner in the basement with a few shelves and a card table. But, on the plus side, the basement is three-fourths finished, a project we started and abandoned more than a year ago (and, if I had to bet, one that will remain undone until some time far in the future when we sell the house).

My basement also has a number of windows and a rarely used air hockey table that I can spread things out on (when I was growing up, it was a rarely used pool table; every basement needs something like it). So I can't complain. I don't imagine I'll ever get a little freestanding studio of my own, but if I can train my kids not to set their Nintendo controllers down in the middle of my work bench, at least I'll have my own little corner.

....And, on an unrelated note, here's a picture of a new necklace I finished this week. Why not?

My blog's smarter than I am

2008-06-16T04:18:00.000-07:00

I just found out my blog is a genius. Yep, that's right. (Oh no. Did it just drop a few IQ points? Do geniuses say "yep"?)

Someone in the Etsy forums gave a link to a site that will rate the readability of your blog, from grade school to genius. The Blog Readability Test supposedly rates what level of education is needed to understand your blog. Of course, it says nothing about the quality of the layout or features, the value of the information, or the uniqueness of the views presented. And having a high level in the blog world is not necessarily a good thing.

I used to work on a professional journal where we thought it was fine to challenge the reader, even make them crack their dictionaries once in a while, but publications with a broader audience often find it necessary to "dumb down" the vocabulary and monitor the length and complexity of the sentences.

I'll admit I'm a snob though. I cringe (don't we all) when listening to speeches by our fine leader, still-President Bush, and it's sad to compare that with the level of thought and range of vocabulary displayed by your average person not fifty or seventy years ago. Our knowledge of words is contracting, and our patience with complexity has all but disappeared.

I could lament this sad state of affairs, along with the decline of the American newspaper and the quality of our education, but instead I'll share this quote by the great Nobel Prize-winning writer V.S. Naipaul: "There can be no showing off in literature. You want simply to be read." I think this applies to blogs as well.

Genius, shmenius.

Debra Drexler: The Pre-New York Show

2008-06-14T09:26:00.000-07:00

My friend Debra is leaving in a few weeks for a one-woman show in New York at the Blue Mountain Gallery, but she held a preview for a few friends at her St. Louis studio. Debra's on sabbatical this year from her job as a professor at the University of Hawaii, so she's been splitting her time between St. Louis (home) and New York (opportunity).

Here's a few of her new paintings, from a collection she's calling Pool of Reflection (but another friend fondly dubbed Volcano Heads). My pictures are not that great (a little skewed), but the paintings are really striking--very large (as is most of her work) and with wonderful colors and movement. I'll be going to New York myself later this summer to catch the show (it runs July 8 to 26) and as many other New York sites as I can cram into five days!

A few other photos from the preview: Debra with a painting of the red tide, in honor of our ill-timed trip to Florida last fall, and
Debra in one of the hats I made her model for me (and I'm still grieving that they don't fit me).

The Saturday sales

2008-06-07T08:10:00.000-07:00

Oh yes. Saturday garage and estate sales, and I came home with a bunch of good stuff but nothing so cool as these hats. Upright Midwestern church-going hats these are (Methodist, I would guess, or possibly Presbyterian). The woman who sold these to me said she remembered her grandmother dressing in her little suits and gloves and then putting on the hat right before she went out the door. Neat as a pin.

I remember my own grandmothers (both Methodist) doing the same (though their hats are long gone), as did my mother for a time. My mother-in-law continued wearing her hats to church (Lutheran) until last year, when she no longer felt well enough to attend, and she loved the comments and compliments, especially when she pulled out the lovely fake leopard skin hat from the fifties. I've got a few of her hats now, but they're too small for me, whereas these lovelies came from another big-headed woman.

Big enough for my 13-year-old son (agnostic) to model for me, right before he took off for a boy scout car wash.

Now that's something grandma didn't expect.

Making the bears dance

2008-06-03T03:56:00.000-07:00

A few days ago, in an argument in Etsy forums, the following concept was raised by vintage seller and seamstress PetitPoulailler:

“According to RG Collingwood, Principles of Art, what distinguishes the artist from the craftsman is that the craftsman has a precise notion of what she is constructing. The artist, in contrast, performs her creations to learn what they become. And in learning what they become, the artist informs herself about something previously unknown to the artist.”

It’s an interesting distinction—and not one that should be seen as a putdown for craftsmen. It’s just a different approach to the visual arts. I think the distinction can also be seen in literature. The writer of literary fiction begins with questions or a vague direction and ventures into the unknown, whereas someone writing genre fiction (such as mysteries) would begin with a plot—a detailed map of the journey and destination.

I would consider my own jewelry firmly in the artisan camp, though there is still an element of surprise and serendipity involved (plus what my art teacher mother would call "the happy accident"), which makes me think that the boundaries between these two ways of working are not always so clear cut. Even with a map, there is going to be the occasional detour or insight that pushes the piece in an unexpected direction.

One of my favorite quotations (only tangentially related, but I never get a chance to use it!) is by Gustave Flaubert:

“Language is a cracked kettle on which we bang out tunes to make the bears dance, when what we long for is to move the stars to pity.”

Etsy Vintage: Play to Win

2008-05-30T05:49:00.000-07:00

It's contest time! Well, I've never done this before, but Sunday June 1 my shop is going to be part of the Etsy Vintage Street Team scavenger hunt.

It's easy to play--search one shop for a clue, then on to the next shop. Everyone who completes it gets a code worth 25% off one item in any participating shop. There are going to be 16 shops in all, so that's a lot of vintage goodies to choose from.

If you want to play, you can find more details on the Etsy Vintage Street Team blog. (To get a closer look at the treasury above, go here.)

Ways I can waste time

2008-05-29T07:16:00.001-07:00

Like most other people (except those annoying overachievers), I have many, many ways of wasting time. One of them is curating treasuries, a collection of gorgeous and gorgeously photographed products available on Etsy. It's like my own mini art gallery, and I go back to look at it again and again, so pleased am I with the results. This is my latest one (available here if you want to go leave a comment).

Here, in no particular order, are another five of my favorite ways to waste time (for the complete list, you'll have to wait for my book...if I ever write it):

Get another cup of coffee, or heat up the one I already have.
Spend some time in the Etc. section of the Etsy forums, reading about someone's marital woes or participating in discussions on weighty topics (current threads--and I'm not saying whether I contributed to them!--include snorks vs. smurfs, cutest dog, dumpster divers, disgusting but true medical conditions, and anus waxing).
Watch the fights at the bird feeder.
Check the view counter to see how many people have visited my Etsy shop in the past five minutes.
Clean the house.

OK, that last one was a joke (my husband reads my blog). That's the kind of thing only an annoying overachiever would do.

Photo album: Memorial Day weekend

2008-05-26T06:28:00.001-07:00

We have had the rainiest weekend--severe thunderstorms, marble size hail, and rain, rain, rain. In between showers, I've gotten out to a few parks and taken along my lovely camera.

On Saturday, before the rains came, Forest Park in St. Louis was filled with Old English sheepdogs--hundreds of them. My friend Lou, who is a lovely person but a questionable driver, stopped in the middle of the road, transfixed. Here are just a few of those big boys and their people.
We had lunch at the boat house and were going to go out on a paddleboat, until the deluge. These people got drenched but looked like they were enjoying it.

The next day, after the rain and before the hail, there were a few nice hours and we went for a picnic at Laumeier Sculpture Park.

It was a small group of friends--about eight people and five dogs. This is Bruno. Bruno was bad. Bruno's in time-out. There was a small debate as to whether Bruno saw the error of his ways and was thinking, "If only I'd been nicer to those other dogs."

Steam Team takes off

2008-05-23T04:49:00.000-07:00

One of the fun ways of promoting your products on Etsy is joining a street team--a group of people with common interests, whether it's a locality, a medium, or a favorite cause. Some time ago I joined the Etsy Vintage Street Team, which has been a great way of meeting and learning from other vintage sellers. I recently joined another team, the new Steam Team, which includes artists and artisans in the steampunk genre. Some are like me, with only a portion of their stores devoted to items that could be considered steampunk, whereas others are thoroughly involved in both the art and the lifestyle.

And it's been fascinating, as you can see from the above treasury curated by ClockworkCrow--such a variety of approaches. There's gorgeous jewelry but also interesting artifacts and wild fashion. Keep an eye on their new blog for ongoing interviews and highlights from Etsy's steampunk community (plus, if you scroll down, some more of my cool postcards).

Bird fetish

2008-05-19T06:29:00.000-07:00

"Do you have birds?" the woman asked me. I don't, but I was purchasing six vintage bird postcards from her, so I could see why she'd ask. In fairness, I also bought a polar bear, a beach, and a couple of wild futuristic air ships, but for some reason the birds were what attracted me most (many were set in Florida--maybe I just need a vacation).

These are a few of my favorites. The top one, a barn swallow, is from 1910 and was illustrated by the popular and prolific Ellen Nash. The two that follow are colorful linen postcards published by Curteich in 1948 (bird lady) and 1940 (flamingos).

Makes me want to get my binoculars and a ticket south.

Flea Marketing

2008-05-18T08:16:00.001-07:00

This past winter and spring, I've been going to estate and garage sales--some marvelous finds, don't get me wrong, but to get to that 50 cent Trifari pin you have to bypass outgrown toddler shorts, boxes of romance novels, yellowed Tupperware, and tables and tables of ugly coffee mugs. It requires perseverance.

Yesterday, in contrast, I went to an honest to god flea market in Belleville, Illinois, and oh my what a difference. Stall after stall of wonderful stuff--even if it was ugly, it was wonderful. Vintage plates and planters, hats, buttons, tools, weapons, souvenirs, costume jewelry, toys, postcards, pictures. It was sensory overload. I'd look at a table and only be able to really see three things, then have to look at it again to see three more. Fortunately, I was with friends, so we were able to point out to each other the treasures, the hideous, the absolutely laughable.

The downside, of course, was that most items were priced appropriately, meaning that I couldn't afford them. This was particularly painful when it came to some gorgeous bakelite jewelry, especially a translucent carved pin that looked like applejuice bakelite only green. I'm glad I was about out of money by that time.

So yes, I did manage to come home with a few goodies, including a cute cake cover, a little duck planter, a pile of postcards, and a tin of buttons (you can see some of them above, with my photography assistant, Stella). And it was interesting to talk to some of the vendors. Several of them said they had cut back the number of days they did the flea market to save on gas money back and forth. Many of them lamented the economy, and more than once the price came down as we walked away from a table. One woman told me her son said he was getting a tattoo as soon as he turns 18. Another showed me her Fiestaware price book and told me which colors are most valuable.

I won't give up on my garage sales, but it was nice to be in a place where people really knew and appreciated what they had. Even if most of it was out of my range.

Bloggers block (and other ramblings)

2008-05-15T06:15:00.000-07:00

I think I'm getting worse at blogging instead of better. I started out with ideas and energy--what happened? Now I look at my last post and realize it's been a few days and think, aagh! What crap can I put up quickly?

In that vein: Here's a couple of necklaces I recently listed in my Etsy shop. More steampunk, yes, and fun to do, although I find myself in my basement sawing the pointy pieces off old clock parts, wondering if there's an easier way and also wondering why my children are so spoiled (or busy) that they turned down my offer to pay them to help (maybe this summer).

Recently someone on Etsy had a hilarious treasury (collection of artwork) saying that steampunk had jumped the shark, but given that most of the people you talk to are still unclear what it is, if they've even heard of it at all, I think we have a bit of time left before this goes the way of 70s shoulderpads. I figure I live in the Midwest, where people still wear Crocs. It takes a long time for styles to get here, even longer for them to go out of fashion.

Besides, as far as I can tell, it's alive and well. Witness the recent article in the NY Times, and now Etsy has a steampunk street team--a group of people who get together to promote a particular style or product. It's just now starting to get under way, but already has a blog and plans for a contest. (I'll have more on this later.) The more I see and read, the more fascinating the style is.

If nothing else, it gives me something to blog about.

Retro, kitsch, and cute: what's not to love?

2008-05-11T13:28:00.000-07:00

The 1950s contributed so much to our culture, from the Big Bopper to poodle skirts. Much of it was something your mother might have called "tacky," "tasteless," or "junk."

The rest of us know better. The photos above (a picture of a Treasury, or curated selection of items, I put together on Etsy) show a few of my favorite figural planters from that era. Lambs were popular, as were swans and other animals (often hauling a wagon or something, where the plant went). Many seemed to have been designed as baby presents (which makes sense, during the height of the Baby Boom). Yesterday at a garage sale, I found a planter in the shape of a gigantic blue bow, a perfect gift for little Jimmie or Bobbie.

If you want to see more examples, visit the Vintage Figural Planters collection on Flickr (my own little pink boy is a recent addition). Cute, kitsch, and retro. Dig it.

Steampunk Style: Is WalMart Next?

2008-05-09T05:38:00.000-07:00

Is steampunk going mainstream? A recent piece in the New York Times calls it "that rarity, a phenomenon with the potential to capture a wider audience, offering a genteel and disciplined alternative to both the slack look of hip-hop and the menacing spirit of goth."

The steampunk style, a neo-Victorian amalgam of a modern cyberpunk and the past world of Jules Verne--dirigibles and brass, high hats and lace--is stepping out of the shadows of places like The Steampunk Workshop and Etsy and into bricks and mortar stores like Gypsy Moon and the Bombay Company.

So if Target is the next thing to go steampunk, is that a bad thing? Jordan, one of the citizen reporters on the website NowPublic, poses this question in a recent article and has so far received a number of responses from his readers, most along the lines of "once these types of things get to the public eye, they are just over-produced and cheapened." (Jordan's article includes a slideshow of a number of steampunk designs, including one of my necklaces.)

Like everything else, if there's an interest in it and a way to make a buck, you can be certain that the retail giants will follow. So keep your eyes peeled--and tell Oprah I'm ready for my close-up.

Will work for trash

2008-05-07T08:52:00.000-07:00

I have a new plan for stocking my vintage shop on Etsy: I'll help you clean out your mom's house when she moves into that nursing home, and all I ask for in return is a trunk of junk.

Last weekend I did that for a friend of mine whose mother recently moved into an assisted living apartment. They'd already had the estate sale and were sending some items to a consignment shop (plus her mom was there, and I didn't want to look too much like a vulture), so I didn't get the best of the best. But there was plenty left in the Good Will box for me to pick through.

This was a woman who hadn't moved in sixty years, who liked antiques, and who had a bit of a shopping habit. For a couple of hours, I helped bag up clothes to give away (including some suits that had been in the attic for 40 years and crumbled to the touch), and I hauled some things to the garage. In return, I came away with milk glass, pressed glass, drinking glasses with Andrew Jackson on them (who wouldn't want those?), junk jewelry, old silver plate utensils, a few squashed hats, and another bag I haven't really looked through yet.

So call me. I'll even bring my own trash bags.

The substitute teacher

2008-05-03T08:58:00.000-07:00

Today I feel like the substitute teacher who is a little lazy and a little overwhelmed, so she puts on a video and doesn't even mind if you fall asleep during it.

Today, class, I'm going to show you a few of my favorite photos that I've taken lately.

First, the pink dogwood blooming in my back yard.

Next, a few new buffed celluloid buttons. Note that the ones on the left and right in the top row look like little logs. How weird is that.

Finally, a new postcard in my shop. This one dates to about 1910 and is illustrated by Frank Reynolds. It's titled "Racing to Supper."

OK, class dismissed.

Moesewco's That Girl Hat

2008-05-01T04:53:00.001-07:00

Can't you just picture Marlo Thomas wearing this with a little mini-dress and colored stockings? Or maybe Mary Tyler Moore, throwing it up into the air?

Emily of Moesewco has done it again. Her lovely little mod cloche, in a bright cherry red, features one of my funkiest little pins--a mixture of vintage buttons in chocolate brown, pink swirl, and red bakelite ball.

Emily's hats are entirely hand made--blocked using vintage wooden hat blocks and stitched by hand. So it's a good match for my vintage buttons, which hail from an era before mass production. I love seeing how artisans can take the styles and processes of the past and update them for today.

Seller's remorse (part 2)

2008-04-30T05:37:00.000-07:00

Last night a nice son bought a pin from my shop for a mother's day present, and I'm thrilled that it will end up with someone's mom, and at the same time sorry that I sold it.

This pin belonged to my grandmother, Alice, a woman who was less than five feet tall but still imposing. She was a schoolteacher until they made her quit when she got married. She was a good cook and a perfectionist, which meant that cakes went down the toilet if they weren't perfect. (And why the toilet? A throwback to the days on the farm when she had an outhouse?)

I have vivid memories of her big house in Kansas City, where she always had one jar of baby marshmallows and one jar of chocolate chips; she had celluloid reindeer on her mantle every Christmas; there was an attic with holes in the floor over toward one edge, but trunks of old clothes that we were allowed to play with; and she always made the lightest home-baked crescent rolls and a green Jell-O mold with cottage cheese that my sister loved, but not me.

One of my last memories of her, and one of the most vivid, is driving with her into downtown Kansas City at about 40 miles an hour in the left two lanes of the highway. It was the last time I ever let her drive when we were together, though she kept her car (an old Dodge Dart) for a number of years, unwilling to admit she shouldn't use it. It was at least three or four years after that before she was finally diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease.

I have other pieces of her jewelry, but know I'll miss this brooch and memories of it pinned to her precise little suits. I'm starting a collection of her china though (Russel Wright in chartreuse) and I have her roll recipe, which I haven't made in years. Maybe I'll try it out again for mother's day.

Exploring memory

2008-04-27T05:32:00.000-07:00

I just finished The Gathering, by Anne Enright, a marvelous book of a dysfunctional Irish family (does literature have any other kind?) that is told by an unreliable narrator--a grieving woman who freely admits that she's not really sure what did or didn't happen in the past that led her brother to walk into the ocean with a pocket full of rocks.

"We know that real events have real effects," the narrator says. "In a way that unreal events do not. Or nearly real. Or whatever you call the events that play themselves out in my head."

(The book is sort of like that throughout.)

One of the fun things about having kids is watching the unreliability of memory in action. It's much harder to judge where your own memory is playing tricks, since you don't always have the objective ruler to point out your errors. But with your children, as they retell the stories of their lives, you can see where they have conflated events, incorporated bits of movies or stories as their own, or simply made things up.

When my youngest was 3, we got a lab puppy for Christmas from our neighbors. But she wasn't ready to be weaned yet, so Christmas morning we wrapped up a picture of the puppy hanging in a stocking and gave that to the kids. Now my son is convinced, and I've heard him tell this story frequently, that they came down Christmas morning and Stella was hanging there by the fireplace. We've told him a time or two it didn't happen that way, but the memory--borne out of the picture--is as real for him as anything.

Now I'm happy to let that memory ride. As Enright's book shows, there are far darker childhood mysteries to deal with.

Pricing vintage

2008-04-25T13:29:00.000-07:00

I've been buying and inheriting and coveting vintage items my whole life, but it's only over the past year that I've had to come up fair prices at which to sell them.

It started with my Barbies on e-bay--finding websites online that specialize in Barbies so I could look at their little butts and hairstyles and figure out what the model was and what year they were made. Then doing searches on e-bay and elsewhere on the Internet to get some idea of what they were going for, and how much it mattered if someone had gnawed off their fingers or drawn on a bra with red pen.

[Side note: My teenage son was helping me list these, and one of my fondest memories is of him bending down to take a close-up photograph of a Barbie butt. If only he hadn't had the camera, it would have made a priceless picture!]

Now for the past three months I've been selling vintage items on Etsy (in addition to my jewelry), and this has proved to be even more of a challenge, since I'm not a specialist and for each new item I need to find new resources. One of the first items I listed was a beautiful green dish with hydrangeas, made by Hutschenreuther Selb, Bavaria. First I had to figure out that the signature on the back said Selb, not Gelb (amazing how many e-bay sellers get this wrong). Finally after several hours of searching, I actually found a website (in German) that showed the manufacturer's marks and dates so I could tell that it was made before 1920.

Once I have a concept of the year and maker, then I need to do a search of e-bay, Etsy, and other online sellers to get an appropriate price. Seldom have I found the exact item, so a lot of it is guesswork. Fortunately, there's a great vintage community at Etsy, and they are a wonderful resource for relative newbies like me.

I can see why people end up specializing. Each new item--costume jewelry, a random leather purse, postcards, buttons--I've had to go through a similar process, and always I'm left wondering. Is this one of those Lisner necklaces that's worth $35 or $65 or $125?

You tell me.

My new necklace

2008-04-23T10:17:00.000-07:00

I just finished a steampunk necklace on commission, and now I'm going to keep it. Sorry, Charmaine, hate to break it to you this way, but I like it too much to give it up (let's see if she can track me down).

Charmaine, aka High Desert Diva, sent me some of her grandmother's Victorian buttons, including a beautiful large black mourning button with crepe and beads. She also sent a box full of clock parts, and using some of those and some of my own, I put together a design for her to approve. The finished piece, above, is pretty much the same, with extra reinforcement in the back and a black leather cord.

It's going to look so good on me.

Losing that ace in the hole

2008-04-22T04:01:00.001-07:00

I used to work in a bar, several different places at different times of my life, and I also had a brief stint as a waitress at a family restaurant, where I wore a poo-brown uniform and learned to hate all children and generally sucked. The kind of waitress, forgetful and stressed and six orders behind, that you pity and loathe in equal measure.
Still, for some odd reason, after that when I had jobs that I hated for one reason or another (and there always was one reason or another), I consoled myself by thinking, Well, if they fire me, I can always be a waitress again. I don't know why, but I saw this as my ace in the hole. I'd always be able to support myself, so there was no reason to get overwrought about the current situation.
I'm not sure when it dawned on me that this wasn't really so. Maybe it was some time after my back surgery, when I watched a waitress balancing six plates on a tray held above her shoulders like a giant flying saucer. No, I could not do this. In reality I never was any good at it, but now I am physically as well as temperamentally incapable.
I don't mean this to be a reflection on aging and loss, though it could easily go that direction. Rather, I mean to celebrate. I never have to be a waitress again! That possibility is off the table, and the other things that I can pursue--things that don't require me to pilot a flying saucer through a maze of tables while trying to remember who the hell wanted more catsup and why I have an iced tea pitcher in my other hand--these are much more exciting and satisfying possibilities.
Best of all, no uniform required.

Life happens

2008-04-19T05:15:00.000-07:00

A week or two ago I was tagged by MelissaKate (who, by the way, has Willy Nelson on her blog this week), and I'd like to follow the rules and share seven random facts about myself, but I've done it a few times already. No one cares that much. So instead, I'm going to share three weird or annoying things that happened to me recently. In no particular order:

My son found a mouse in the basement yesterday, which is no surprise since the kids leave food down there all the time. He took care of it; I won't go into details. Ewww.
Some fun-loving teenagers heaved a huge rock from our garden through the back windshield of our car last week. Little pebbly shards of green glass everywhere. We're still cleaning up.
My dog has epilepsy. She's had occasional seizures over the past year but had a big one this week, so the vet finally put her on meds, and she seems much better.

I'm sure everyone has a similar litany of gripes and distractions. But tonight I'm going to be a bartender at a fund-raiser for a friend who has cancer (pretty bad cancer) and no insurance. What is wrong with this damn country that people who are dealing with a life-threatening illness need to put their pictures in the newspaper and rely on friends and strangers for money? Anyway, it puts all these little things in perspective.

Peace out.

You vote what you eat

2008-04-16T06:30:00.000-07:00

Before you pour yourself that white wine for dinner, better ask whether you want to see Hillary in the White House. If you prefer McCain, make it a scotch.

A New York Times article today on micromarketing examines how political strategists are using information on what we buy, eat, and drive to target their campaigns. Among the findings:

Democrats prefer Pepsi-Cola, Sprite, clear liquors like gin and vodka, white wine, and Evian water. They prefer Popeyes fried chicken and organic foods (the article doesn't explain the apparent contradiction here). They are more likely than Republicans to subscribe to gourmet cooking magazines.
Republicans favor Dr. Pepper, brown liquors like bourbon or scotch, red wine, and Fiji water. They eat at Chick-fil-A.

Strategists break it down even further. The article quotes Mark Penn (Clinton't former chief strategist and a miscrotargeting expert) as saying that Obama "has more of the arugula vote.... Senator Clinton's voters are more likely to be making ends meet and so they do a lot more cooking at home and a lot less eating out at expensive restaurants."

Not everyone buys that this is a great way to target a campaign, of course, and there are many cross-over eaters. Still, next time you're out to dinner with friends, look at what they order and ask yourself, Are these really my kind of people?

Country roadtrip

2008-04-14T04:51:00.001-07:00

We thought yesterday, being mid-April, would be a perfect day to get out in the country for a hike and perhaps a quick stop by a winery for lunch, all in celebration of my friend Debra turning the big five-oh. Instead we had a bit of snow, some rain, cold, overcast skies, and wind. So we improvised--skip the hike, spend the whole time at a winery.

Yes, Missouri wine. I'm not here to defend it, though others would. We drank it. We enjoyed it.

The best part: a singer who billed himself as Maury Sinatra. He had a great voice, a fine trio behind him, and a marvelous repertoire. (We could have sung along to all of them but saved it till the drive home.)

No, this is not the winery. Just an interesting ruin of a farmhouse.

Debra and Maury

Dreaming in vintage

2008-04-11T11:19:00.000-07:00

On Thursday nights, I dream in vintage--browsing through antique stores, trying on ravishing hats and dresses (I'm size 2 in dreamland), picking up baubles and knick-knacks and treasures.

That's because Thursday evenings in the forums of Etsy (the website of all things handmade and vintage), a group of sellers far more knowledgeable than me gets together to gab and share their latest, or more likely the things they love from other people's shops. The conversation flies so fast you can get up for a drink and come back to find 15 pages have passed and three people have left, three more arrived. It's like antique shopping with a group of hilarious friends. I always leave dizzy and a little overwhelmed.

Here's a brief sampling of some of my new favorites from last night's vintage marathon:

Cactus planter from AuntiePrincess.

Stalker dutch doll from PetitPoulailler
(check out the eyes)

Metalware tray by LorenzStudio

Royal biscuit tin by SurrenderDorothy

Killer red heels by RetroCycle

Green camel salt and pepper shakers by SlushyGirl

This is just a fraction of the gorgeous, and sometimes hilarious, items shared. Newcomers, interlopers, voyeurs all welcome--it's most every Thursday night for 3 or 4 hours (I poop out after 1 or 2), in the Promotions forum, hosted by SurrenderDorothy.

Neglectful posting

2008-04-10T06:23:00.000-07:00

My blog has been neglected the past few days, and though inspiration has not come, I'm determined to add a few notes today.

It rained hard here last night, and my dog woke me up, like she always does when there's thunder (brave warrior that she is). So while I was calming her down I looked online (Etsy addict that I am) and discovered my little moss green ring on the front page.

It's a beautiful treasury (collection of items for sale on the Etsy website) put together by starvingartistdsgns. And though it was the middle of the night here, somebody somewhere was up--I got more than 300 hits (and still the little green ring is for sale!).

More later...I've got to go nap.

Vintage Postcards: True Confessions

2008-04-06T06:04:00.000-07:00

True confessions: I bought 18 vintage postcards at a huge postcard convention the other day, and if they hadn't closed up (and my friends hadn't borrowed the rest of my cash), I would have bought more. They were fabulous! Probably 50 vendors with millions of postcards each, all arranged in boxes with dividers with intriguing titles like Big Type, Midgets, Dancing, Multiple Babies (found that one after I'd already spent too much), and Enormous Objects.

I'm probably going sell some of the cards--I bought too many to keep them all. Worst of all, I found out from one of the vendors there's a postcard swap a mile from my house the first Monday of every month. I could quickly become addicted!
Almost as interesting as the cards themselves are the messages on the backs. Not all the cards had been mailed, but a number have messages and 1 cent stamps. The writing is all cursive, some beautiful, some hard to read. Many of the messages are mundane, things that would now be taken care of in a phone call or an e-mail. Here's a sample:

From a 1910 card of the flying machine:
"Dear frinds, We will be over Sunday Jnry 3. meet us at the tram good by Mr. Bert Broylis. if we are not there this Sunday we will be next Sunday shore.

From a 1953 postcard of two babies, sent from Michigan.
Dear Bill. We are up at the cottage. Drove thru the Toronto area. I will fung (?) some pape (?) pictures. Just can not describe how bad it was. So sorry for the people whoes homes are leveled to the ground. Writing this in car. Maby you can not read this.

From a 1911 card of a man swatting at mosquitoes, sent from Selma to California:
Dear Cousin: I will drop you a few lines tonight. Well, kid I was sure surprised to hear that aunt & uncle has come home so soon. I want to go to see them as soon as I can. Say Helen I have bought me a piano. What do you think about that? Say come up & we will play a Deut. ha ha.

Impressive condiments

2008-04-05T17:40:00.000-07:00

The world's largest catsup bottle is not even an hour from where I live, and surprisingly enough I had not been over to see it until to day (all you people who live by the ocean or mountains, eat your heart out). I was over in Collinsville, Illinois, visiting a friend and going to a vintage postcard sale, where, yes, I spent too much (I'll share some photos later).

A few bonus pictures from my trip: a monkey sign, and a still life with dust and candles from my friend's house.

Tagged by a banana-phobe

2008-04-02T09:15:00.000-07:00

I'm not one to make fun of people and their phobias--just want to point out that Emily of Moesewco, who just tagged me, has a much more interesting list of seven random facts than I do. Visit her blog, Discriminating Weirdos, and see. (She just bought my funky pink pin for use on one of her wonderful hats; can't wait to see what it looks like.)

So, on to the list. After being tagged, the rules are, roughly, that I need to list seven random facts about myself and then tag seven more people.

I am related by marriage to Tony Randall.
I've visited at least three active volcanoes: Vesuvius, Mount St. Helens, and Kilauea (plus a bunch of inactive ones).
Last night I went to see Roby Lakatos, a gypsy violinist. It was fantastic! They did a mixture of gypsy, klezmer, jazz--even some Fats Waller. The cimbalom solo brought down the house.
When I was in third grade, I took violin. They asked me to stop.
Stone Phillips went to my high school. He was like super jock, captain of everything, and also valedictorian. He had a date with my sister once.
I never liked raspberries until we moved into a house with raspberry bushes. Then I decided to make myself like them, since I knew they had to be good and it was just something I had to get over. (I haven't been able to accomplish the same feat with beets.) So now I like raspberries, but I still have a little trouble with raspberry-flavored things. I think it goes back to hard candy I OD's on at my grandma's.
I do not like to have my neck touched. I don't know why--strangled in a past life I guess. My kids know this and love to torture me.

That's all. Anyone reading this can consider themselves tagged--I'm off to listen to gypsy music.

The Dolly Parton train wreck brooch

2008-04-01T08:01:00.000-07:00

I knew it wasn't a good idea when I made this brooch--I couldn't imagine anyone actually pinning it to their chest. But just think: some stylish woman in some distant time (probably the 1940s) actually wore this hooter on a coat or dress. I would imagine that men couldn't keep their eyes off her!

Anyway, I love this little button, and I couldn't resist making the brooch, but I haven't had the nerve to put it up for sale yet. (I should mention that it's enormous--almost 2 1/2 inches wide and 1 inch deep.) I'd be interested to know whether my assumption is correct--that it's more fun to look at than to wear--or if someone could actually envision the day they would put this on and go out to meet the world.

On an unrelated note: There's an interview of me this week on the Etsy Vintage blog, featuring a few of my less bizarre creations. Check it out.

Illusions of rationality

2008-03-31T05:15:00.000-07:00

Anyone who's been paying attention (or even just breathing) knows that people do not always make decisions in their own best interest--from the working stiffs who vote for politicians in favor the elite class, to people who purchase $20 worth of books they don't need to save $3 in shipping fees.

A fascinating article in a recent New Yorker pointed to a new book titled Predictably Irrational in which an M.I.T professor in behavioral economics, Dan Ariely, reveals that "our irrational behaviors are neither random nor senseless--they are systematic."

In countless experiments--including one in which he asked kids to trade Halloween candy and found that they generally choose something that is "free" over the better deal, chocolate-wise--Ariely "offers a taxonomy of financial folly," according to Elizabeth Kolbert, author of the New Yorker article. One fascinating experiment involved having subjects write down the last two digits of their Social Security number, then write what they would be willing to pay for a list of items. The results showed that those whose SSN ended in a larger number would be willing to pay more than those whose SSN ended in a smaller number.

This effect, called anchoring, shows that price is not just related to intrinsic value or to supply and demand; in some way the stated price establishes the value of the item. It's an interesting concept for retailers, who often ponder whether raising the price of their goods might make them more appealing. Similarly, Ariel's Halloween experiments and others like it belie the argument that "you're not fooling anybody" when you offer free shipping but jack the price of the item. Apparently, as marketers have long known, you can fool a lot of the people a lot of the time.

Etsy's antique mall

2008-03-28T22:50:00.001-07:00

Sometimes I dream I'm antique shopping, often with my friend Laurel, whom I don't see much any more but who is the slowest, most thorough browser I have ever met. In these dreams, I am always about to make "the find," which as all vintage aficianados know is the thing that gets your heart racing, that keeps you coming back again. Interestingly, very rarely do I dream about buying; just about shopping.

Well, today is Saturday, estate sale day, so I'll make this brief. The picture above shows a vintage Treasury I made for Etsy, a combination of beautiful items that I "curated," which means I poured through different vintage shops like they were a huge antique mall and came up with these "finds."

These are all items sold by members of the Etsy Vintage Street Team, a group of some 65 sellers who sell vintage items or items made with vintage components. We've got a blog, and a section in the Vintage Buyer and Seller Community, (a larger networking community). It's a great way to meet people who are way more knowledgeable than I am about all things vintage. A great way to learn more and, of course, to shop.

Fictional characters I have known (part I)

2008-03-28T02:58:00.000-07:00

My first boss out of college was an enormous man, well over 300 pounds, but with dainty feet encased in expensive black loafers. He had thick white hair puffed up in a pompadour, and gold chains around a neck that looked like a melting layer cake. Most arresting of all, his left eye was nothing but the white, the sclera, with a pale blue iris barely visible underneath, like a blue plate seen through a poached egg. His other eye was a vivid blue, and he combined them to great effect, leering and bugging the good eye, or squinting with a practiced devilishness, while the other, the poached egg eye, gazed blankly into nowhere. It was transfixing.

He had a patch—brushed leather with gold initials—but rarely wore it. “When I go on a sales call,” he explained to me one day, leaning forward in a rush of cologne, “I come in, shake hands, and sit down with a smile. But all they can do is look at the eye. They’re hooked. I don’t need a killer opening line or a gimmick to get their attention—I’ve got it. I keep it. And the next time I call, they remember me.”

During my first few months there, I often had to contend with his pathological need for an audience. He even concocted some pretense for having me sit through a court hearing so he could impress me with his testimony, delivered slowly and dramatically à la William Shatner. In this case, one of six or seven in which he was embroiled, he was suing his landlords because they were trying to evict him for not paying his rent.

Sexual harassment hadn’t yet crept into public awareness, and I had no idea what was going on, not until the day he yanked me onto his lap and kissed me. “I may be an old man,” he said, his mismatched eyes half closed in a twisted imitation of a sultry look, “but I’ve still got it. It’ll be fireworks, baby, all night long.”

That I was surprised, even shocked, at his attack shows how young and naïve I was. I mumbled some excuse, some demure protest, and fled, spitting to get the taste out of my mouth. Then, as women have done for thousands of years, I went back to work—disgusted, angry, but ultimately passive. It never occurred to me to do anything about it, to quit in protest or horror (I wasn’t that traumatized) or to complain to anyone, not even his wife, a sweet, pretty woman who, even through her habitual fog (probably from Valium, that decade’s happy drug of choice), already knew about her husband’s philandering.

Celluloid buttons in black and cream

2008-03-26T11:45:00.001-07:00

I just got in this exciting batch of celluloid buttons--this is about half of them, but some of the more interesting. My kids of course think I'm nuts for getting into this stuff, but look at them! Some are beautiful, some are totally hilarious. I've already decided on one combination for making a button pin (the modern-looking zig zag button near the top left, placed on top of a black button with a beautiful border). What I haven't decided is whether to sell it or not--may need to keep it for myself this time. The others I'll take my time with.

Now, does this remind anybody of the I Spy books? You have to have kids to know them, but I love them too--it's like looking through an antique shop. OK, find the button that's shaped like penne pasta. Now find the one that looks like a pause button on your DVD player.

Ugly wins the day

2008-03-24T12:58:00.001-07:00

We have a winner! Voters in the Ugly Necklace Contest have overwhelmingly chosen We Three Rings necklace, submitted by Jane of AdlensKrafts. She explains in her entry: "A friend of my daughter's wanted a necklace out of these three wooden rings from an old handbag. Well I tried. Maybe I was asleep when I made it."

We Three Rings practically swept the competition, but other necklaces had their detractors as well. The runners up, in order, were:

One Damn Big Ship, submitted by girleddycreations.

Spring Has Sprung, submitted by shelialk.

These Are the Voyages, submitted by sailorjenny.

And finally, Eeek a Bug, submitted by AnnieHowes.

Significantly, each of these ugly necklaces had at least one person say they thought it was pretty cute. So there's hope for all us who have ever made or tried to unload ugly jewelry!

Congratulations again to the winner. She'll be receiving a pair of lovely bobby pins from Callooh Callay. For the rest of you: Better luck next year.

The Etsy conspiracy

2008-03-22T20:38:00.000-07:00

American casinos are well known for their tricks to keep people from leaving. Once you enter, there are no indications of what time of day it is--no clocks, no windows to see the sky turn dark. The music is in a continuous loop, no lyrics, to keep you in a trance-like state. It's safe and cozy, like a womb, with free drinks and the promise of hitting it big.

I believe that Etsy, the online marketplace for all things handmade and vintage, has a similarly devious strategy in the way it's designed. Consider:

Even if you don't sell anything, you can accumulate "hearts"--little rewards from fellow members to give you hope and keep you putting your quarters in the slots.
The forums are open 24-7 for chatting, eavesdropping, combat, and titillation.
To keep things interesting and patrons happy, the management adds new games every now and then (such as Alchemy) or moves things around to make them seem fresh.
Just as casinos give their big spenders free rooms and airfare, big sellers and the particularly talented at Etsy are rewarded with perks such as featured artists position on page 1 or, more deliciously, a plug on the Martha Stewart Show.

Tonight I had one of those heart-racing moments on Etsy when one of my steampunk pendants was featured in a front page treasury (currated by the talented MissKnits). For more than 2 hours the views stacked up (from 110 to 480 views on the featured item), the hearts accumulated, the anticipation mounted. And even when it failed to sell, the adrenaline kept me going for a while--the knowledge that more than 370 people visited my site, and more than 50 marked the shop or specific items for future reference.

The only thing missing was a hostess in a skimpy outfit serving me drinks. (Maybe my husband will be home soon.)

Anatomy of a Steampunk Alchemy

2008-03-22T04:52:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I finished up my first commission for an Etsy customer, through a new (or resurrected function) called Alchemy that allows sellers to bid on requests for handmade items. In this case, a steampunk necklace. My particular take on it incorporated a beautiful vintage button.

Here's what I started with: my buttons (yes, there must be a better way to organize) and a pile of watch and clock parts.

I segregated a number of pieces to play around with, and came up with a configuration I liked. The picture on the right shows the pieces just arranged together--no gluing yet. I uploaded this for the client to approve. (I don't think this step is strictly called for in the rules, but it seems like a good idea to me.)

Well, she loved it, so I finished off the piece (lots of stinky glue) and attached the leather cord. This took several days because of all the parts involved (eight different clock parts, plus I added an extra, thin button on the back of the celluloid one for stability). Et voila! I still need to clean it up a little, and Monday it ships.

I love this new feature on Etsy. It gives people a chance to get noticed whose shops otherwise might not be found; it inspired me to try something a little bigger and wilder than I might have otherwise (and this necklace looks pretty awesome on). And it allows people to purchase exactly what they want (we hope).

Etsy love

2008-03-20T05:04:00.000-07:00

A couple of fab Etsy artists have features on Callooh Callay this week. Let's give it up for Maria from Vintageholic Frog and for Todd from Torchwood Studio. Take a visit and check out the great things they have going on.

The waste diet

2008-03-19T12:10:00.000-07:00

Did you know that the average American generates about 66 pounds of landfill waste each month? For a family of four, that 264 pounds a month, or 3168 pounds a year. Disgusting, yes? Last week a friend of mine yesterday turned me onto a website by one of her neighbors who is trying to do something about it.

This nuclear family of two working parents, two children, and two pets is challenging itself--and its website readers--not just to follow the three R's of reduce, reuse, recycle, but to keep a chart. Weigh the garbage and the recycling. Continuously seek ways to reduce waste.

"Just like going on a food diet, you'll have more success if you can adopt a diet change you can live with for a lifetime," explains the author of the website, titled The Waste Diet. "So that has become our goal to create a lifetime plan to reduce waste without changing our lives (too much)."

Their experiment is entering its third month. In February, they cut their landfill waste by almost 12 pounds (to 27 pounds below the national average) and recycling waste by 27 pounds--all through relatively simple steps like buying larger quantities to reduce packaging, repairing items rather than throwing them away, shopping at thrift stores, and avoiding excess paper products.

Other steps, like composting and becoming a vegetarian, require more of a commitment. But as the website's author advises, "Make a goal how to improve, even if it’s just one thing at a time. Doing something is better than doing nothing at all. "

Tagged again

2008-03-16T10:30:00.000-07:00

I was tagged again last week, by ThePeachTree. "Tagged" means (by law, again) I have to reveal seven random facts about myself and then pass it onto someone else (usually seven more people, but I'm going to flout the law this time).

My seven:

My only celebrity autograph is from Petula Clark (remember? Don't sleep in the subway, darling).
When I was a kid I loved English boarding school books.
My garage is full of recycling.
Getting fired was the best thing that ever happened to me. My view of human nature greatly improved, and I read Proust.
I might have gone into geology if it weren't for the math.
I'm currently reading Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami. Wonderful and very strange.
My dog's name is Stella. We sound like Stanley Kowalski when we call her.

This time I'll tag Sarah at No Title Necessary and Kerry at Chasing Moonbeams. Enjoy!

I've been steampunked!

2008-03-14T21:18:00.001-07:00

I'll admit it. I'm not proud. Three months ago, I didn't know what steampunk is, and now I'm proudly represented among some fine examples of the style. This Treasury (an Etsy term for a collection of items "currated" by an Etsy member, in this case Fairies and Treasures), has the usual hallmarks of the style--the vintage-future-techno punk. But that's not all that it's about.

My investigations of steampunk began when my dad gave me a couple of boxes of old watches and clocks that he dismantled 20 years ago for one of my mother's forgotten art projects. It was a great find, but only a superficial aspect of the style. Still, as I read more about it, I realized how well the steampunk aesthetic fits with the other vintage items that have so captivated me lately.

Steampunk had its origins in science fiction of the 1960s to 1980s and still exists as a fictional movement, but also as a subculture, as a musical genre, and as a style. It's been applied to movies, anime, graphic novels, computer games, and even computers. Steampunk--sometimes referred to as neo-Victorian--hearkens back to the days of steam power, before electricity, combining a touch of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells with a cyberpunk aesthetic, with lace and machine parts in equal measure.

One blog devoted to the style, The Steampunk Home, describes it beautifully: "It's finding a way to combine the past and the future in an aesthetic pleasing yet still punkish way. It's living a life that looks old-fashioned, yet speaks to the future. It's taking the detritus of our modern technological society and remaking it into useful things."

Other definitions and applications of steampunk abound, and I don't pretend to have more than a beginner's knowledge of what it's all about. But it's exciting to explore.

Seller's remorse

2008-03-13T04:06:00.001-07:00

Everyone who's ever bought a swimsuit or an American car knows the feeling of buyer's remorse. Lately, though, I've run across its opposite: seller's remorse.

Here's a little dog I shipped off yesterday--glad to have the sale, of course, but as I bubble wrapped him him, I remembered buying him, more than 15 years ago, in a little place called the In and Out Shop that was simply crammed with junk like this (if it was still open, I'd make a fortune). I felt kind of sad to see him go, but he spent the past ten years in a box in the basement, so I must not have needed him that badly.

I've had similar bittersweet reactions when I've sold my jewelry, even though, for God's sake, I'm making it to sell! Here's one of the brooches I made out of antique buttons, and the first sale from my Etsy shop. I was thrilled with the sale, a week or so after I opened shop, but so sad to see this button go, with its fun textures and buttery yellow.

This reluctance to let go of things is not peculiar to Americans, but we undoubtedly suffer from it more than many nations. Our closets are crammed, our basements stacked, and if we do manage to let go of anything, it is with some regret. The upside of this anal retentive impulse is that I have boxes and boxes of old junk that may turn out to be craft worthy. The downside is that I have boxes and boxes of old junk.

Hurray for contests!

2008-03-11T07:15:00.000-07:00

Before Etsy I never won much of anything, and now I've won two contests (out of maybe five I've entered)! Nothing like freebie art.

My latest coup is a beautiful polymer clay pendant from Rebecca of the blog Rebecca's Annex and the Etsy shop RGCreations. She calls this one Inca. The contest itself was easy-peasy--visit her lovely blog, e-mail answers to a simple question, and wait for your name to be drawn. (Sorry to all those who lost. I'm sure you were deserving.)

Here are couple more of my favorites from Rebecca's shop:

There are a lot of contests on on the Internet, as everyone tries to increase their traffic. And in that vein, may I call your attention to my own humble Ugly Necklace Contest, which at this point has a few entries, but could use more. Follow this link for details, and remember: Contests easy. Free stuff good.

All politics is local

2008-03-10T05:00:00.000-07:00

All politics is local, as the late great Tip O'Neill said, and last weekend we got involved in local politics.

My husband had the harder meeting to go to. A month ago a disaffected black man in our small, Ozzie-and-Harriet suburb shot the mayor and killed two police officers and three city officials at a city council meeting. The fact that he was black is not irrelevant, for since his rampage (and consequent death) the anger has poured forth from a segment of the community, a historically black neighborhood, that has felt overlooked and unrepresented by local government. At the same time, plans for an April 8 mayoral election are going forward, even though the candidate that many of us supported as representing new ideas and inclusiveness was among those killed. The inevitable mayor, our only choice, is a good man, no doubt, but not the change agent many of us seek.

It's a long story, more complex than this brief paragraph (I've written a bit about it before). At any rate, last Saturday a group of community leaders (citizens, not government) brought together residents from all races and economic strata to discuss how we can heal the rifts in this city. My husband took part in these discussions, which were only the beginning of attempts to grapple with racial tensions that extend even to the most seemingly placid suburbs.

Meanwhile, I attended a meeting across town that focused on how citizens and city officials can work to reduce their community's carbon footprint. A speaker from Kansas City, Missouri (not Portland or Seattle or one of those cool cities, like you'd expect) was there to tell us about their sweeping and successful initiatives and ways that we can push for progress in our own communities to do combat global warming, while we wait for our federal government to wake up (sometime, we hope, in early 2009).

Both these initiatives are nascent, as far as my small town is concerned. Our mayor (recovering in a rehab facility after being shot in the head) signed the U.S. Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement, but little else has been done since. With elections for new city council members in April, along with (I hope) growing citizen awareness of the necessity of being involved, I look forward to seeing what we can accomplish.

Shit I'm it

2008-03-09T07:36:00.000-07:00

I had just figured out what “tagged” meant when it happened to me. Stella of Paint Floats tagged me on Friday, which requires me (by law!) to reveal seven random and personal things about myself and then to pass it onto others.

1. My feet have very high arches.

2. I’ve been to Carnivale in Rio, but I can’t samba. I can, however, drink caprinias.

3. My poor gecko is dying of old age. We've debated the ethics of gecko euthanasia but probably won't do anything as long as he's able to eat. His name is Gilda (named before we figured out how to sex a gecko).

4. I thought I would like gardening, and when I look at my crappy yard I wish I did, but I don’t.

5. I live by railroad tracks. It's annoying and cool.

6. My basement is full of old computers that my son said he was going to sell on ebay, but he hasn’t.

7. In my book group the other night, four of us didn’t like Away by Amy Bloom, and three of us did. Only one of us didn’t like the wine.

And now is the time on Sprockets when we dance. I tag Anna Cox at purtygirldesigns, missfire, cheerup cherup, and Karessa and Gene at thescenicroute.

Two months at Etsy

2008-03-06T17:19:00.000-08:00

Today is my second month anniversary since I opened shop at Etsy, trying to sell my humble little buttons—two months marked by fun and frustration in equal measure.

It’s also now roughly 3 months since I had the, uh, genius idea that maybe I could make money as an artisan (since it’s even tougher for a fiction writer, and I’m so bored with editing I could eat my keyboard).

Here’s what else I’ve done over the past two months:

Started a blog (duh) and started figuring out ways to make it successful
Been inspired by some amazingly talented artists
Spent way too much time in the forums, chatting, learning, promoting, and also eavesdropping on hilarious, revealing, and frankly snarky conversations
Tried not to whine
Won a writing contest on an Etsy artist's blog
Was featured on another Etsy artist's blog
Wrote the words “cute” and “sweet” more times than in the past ten years combined
Created a new emoticon, for mooning: ( )( )
Created a male version of that emoticon (you figure it out)
Found out there are lots of Alice in Wonderland fans out there
Learned a lot more about all things vintage by hanging out with the cool folks at Etsy Vintage Buyer and Seller Community and the Vintage Street Team
Bought a red pleather toilet kit with a Shriner’s logo for my husband
Bought more buttons (sure, I needed them)
Felt very old and mature at times, at other times like I was back in junior high hoping the cool kids would like me
Neglected my real (i.e., paying) work
Neglected the house
Forgot to eat (the most amazing feat of all)
Stayed up late to snag a treasury; made it to the front page once
Decided that drinking and talking in the forums, late on a Friday night, isn’t always in one’s best interests
Killed more than one thread
Sold more jewelry to my mother-in-law than anyone else
Learned that wtf just about sums it all up

An Etsy collaboration

2008-03-02T19:07:00.000-08:00

This beautiful hat reminds me of a bygone era, of Barbara Stanwyck and dames who didn't take no guff. It was hand blocked by Emily of Moesewco, an Etsy shop that specializes in hats and embroidered goodies. Emily's hats are made entirely by hand, finished to the last detail, and in this case that included a pin by Callooh Callay!

Emily purchased one of my favorite pins to adorn this beauty, a popular item in my shop and one that I really hated to let go (as sometimes happens). It's made of three vintage buttons, a dark, mottled brown base with scalloped edges; a lovely light mauve button with a raised, swirled design; and a mother of pearl in the midddle.

Visits moesewco's Etsy site for a closer look at this hat and others, and visit their website, Discriminating Weirdos, for a fascinating look at the hat blocks Emily uses (and the ones she covets).

The moss in the woods

2008-03-02T16:36:00.001-08:00

Today was a beautiful spring-like day, 75 degrees outside, lovely light breeze. So I prised myself away from my computer and took a two-mile hike in the woods, just me and my friend and a few dozen other people thrilled to be outdoors. There are no leaves out yet, but the ground and rocks were covered with mosses, dark velvet green, spongy brown, and lacy white.

Tomorrow it's supposed to snow, so this was just a teaser. Something to make us even more anxious for the final break from winter, probably three or four weeks away. For now, it was enough.

The Ugly Necklace Contest

2008-03-01T09:35:00.000-08:00

Send me your overwrought, your color blind, your clunky messes yearning to be seen. It's the first annual Ugly Necklace Contest. How about it? Can you beat this (the mother of all ugly necklaces)?

Entering is easy: just post a link in the comments here, or e-mail your file to me at calloohcallay3@gmail.com, or convo me at Etsy. I'll save them all (first, I'll laugh at them), then in a few weeks post them for everyone to vote on a winner. The deadline is two weeks from now, March 15.

The necklaces can be either vintage (20 years old or older) or something you made (not the new necklace Aunt Mabel gave you for Christmas, and definitely not the monster you saw on someone else's website). Assuming there are enough entries, I may split it into two categories.

OK, so the rules are a little vague. Still, what have you got to lose? In addition to the bragging rights involved, there's a prize! I was going to send the winner my ugly necklace, but then I saw one of the same series on ebay for $28, so screw that. Instead you'll get a nice pair of bobby pins made from vintage buttons, like the ones in my shop. Much better, eh?

I think I've made this clear enough, but let me know if you have any questions. And may the most atrocious necklace win!

It was a dark and stormy night

2008-02-28T05:00:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago, I won a writing contest on a blog run by the talented artist rtisan (you can see my gorgeous prize in a post about the contest below). Well, I ran a link to the winning essay and figured that was enough, but a writer friend told me I should run it on my blog. It really didn't seem necessary to me, it was just a little riff on noir detective fiction (incorporating a list of words rtisan provided).

On the other hand, I haven't posted in a few days, and this is ready to go. Enjoy!

* * * *

If it weren’t for the torrential rains and that damn wiener dog, sitting in the middle of the doorway like he owned the place, I would have kept on going and never would have noticed the dame in the galoshes. I mean, she wasn’t much too look at, standing there in that disgusting gray overcoat, her complexion like peanut butter and jelly. Grape jelly.

“Got a light?” she said, in a voice that reminded me of Carrotop on coke. She stuck an umbrella out and blocked my way. I tried to weave around it, but she hooked me around the ankle and pulled tight.

“Hey, gumshoe,” she said. “I’m talking to you.”

I turned to look at her then. She had a nose like a stiletto, a mouth like a head of cauliflower. “Kind of a stormy night, ain’t it?” she said, and I could tell that she was coming onto me. “What of it?” I said, trying to maintain my usual swagger but she unnerved me, this dame. I knew what she wanted, and I knew that in the end I would give it to her.

I always had a soft spot for peanut butter and jelly.

Millie's bracelet

2008-02-26T13:08:00.000-08:00

I found this bracelet in a box with a lot of other old costume jewelry my mother accumulated over the years, most of it my grandmother’s, but this particular bracelet she said belonged to Millie, my grandfather’s second wife. Grandpa and Millie married on the day his divorce from my grandma came through, and they were married 45 years until her death.

I didn’t meet her, or my grandpa, until I was well into my twenties. They lived on the West Coast, estranged from the family. But every Christmas she would send us something we would find appalling and inappropriate--a platter of dried apricots, a piece of driftwood adorned with plastic balls in the shape of a grape cluster. This bracelet reminds me of those gifts--dyed yellow shells with fake pearls and rhinestones. If I'd seen her wearing it back then, I know I would have secretly laughed at it. Now it looks kitschy and fun (still ugly though).

When Grandpa and Millie finally moved back to the Midwest, I saw them more often, once or twice a year at most, and Millie was always a sweet, quiet little woman, a diabetic who had to eat at 5:00 on the dot. The kind of wife my grandpa preferred, who jumped up whenever he wanted something, ever alert so she could meet his every need. After she died, Grandpa went off the deep end, proposing to her sister and then two more women until one finally married him the year that he turned 90. That marriage too ended in divorce, with a court injunction because Grandpa threw an afghan at her. Not an easy man.

I have a few things of my grandpa's to remind me of him--some hats, a turned bowl he made during his woodworking phase--but until I saw this bracelet, it had been some time since I'd thought of Millie. This reminds me of how sweet and unpretentious she was, and how she always remembered us in her own way.

Shoe fetish

2008-02-25T06:19:00.001-08:00

You don’t need to know that I’m now barefoot and will be wearing clunky brown oxfords later when I do go out. Just know that I love these shoes and that they would look absolutely fabulous on me.

These vintage shoes are from an amazing Etsy shop named joules. The proprietess talked with me about how she goes about choosing shoes for her shop:

“I always look for integrity of craftsmanship, most often found in Italian and Spanish brands, and certain American shoe companies of the past. I prefer to see all leather construction, including the lining and soles. Styles that make a definitive fashion statement, and clearly exemplify their decade of production, are best. It's especially nice for the footwear to exhibit little to no signs of wear, but that is rare. Finally, they have to be the sort of shoes that I personally would like to own. I'm quite selective and pass up many vintage shoes, as I find a great number that are simply mundane and commonplace. I seek a certain funky elegance, in tune with my own quirky aesthetic.”

Funky elegance indeed. Here's a few more examples to drool over:

The shoes are , from the top, Via Spiga tiger stripes on black suede, made in Italy; Joseph vintage silver leather pumps; Maud Frizon of Paris black suede shoes; Paradox by Zalo, green leather; Realities by Ooomphies black velvet slippers; and Amano Bootier with Paul Allen.

A fishing I will go!

2008-02-22T16:43:00.000-08:00

I asked my son to get the mail today and he went out in the snow barefoot (I didn't want it that badly!), but when he came back here's what was in it:
This beautiful print is by a talented artist from Santa Rosa. You can find more of her work at her Etsy shop, rtisan2, or on her blog. I won this as one of the winners in a writing contest she held a couple of weeks ago. It was a fun contest--OK, not the best writing I've ever done, but fun, and best of all this was my reward. You can find my prize-winning entry on her blog, but really I'd suggest you enjoy her artwork and jewelry instead.

Three teenage boys in a carpool talk about video games

2008-02-20T14:18:00.000-08:00

“It’s awesome man, I’ve got this dragon like that you can never find anywhere but I found it and now I’ve got it on my team.”

“I never bother much with the animals cause they get super powerful later on but at first they’re just not worth it, I think the people are worth more than the animals early in the game.”

“I got this guy that’s like a prisoner and he had his hands in handcuffs and you don’t find out till later that it was because he’d gone crazy and he was just the strongest guy and he killed everyone around and that’s why his hands were tied up.

“Did you ever get the golem?”

“Yeah, the golem was pretty good man, but then it turned into a stone golem. Until he does that, he's pretty good.”

“I don’t even bother with Sheera because you know she’s going to turn on you. Even in the lower levels I don’t bother because she always deserts you later and it’s just not worth it.”

"I never liked her cause she's an old lady."

“You know who’s cool man is Croesseus and you don’t find out till later that he’s your father, not until the end. He’s all pimped out and cool man and as soon as I saw him I said I gotta have that guy.”

“Yeah but then he dies on you.”

“Yeah but you get him back at the end of the game. And he’s so wicked, he just kills everybody around him man, he doesn’t care.”

“Yeah he’s so pimped out.”

“Yeah.”

Art and life in a voyeuristic society

2008-02-19T05:51:00.000-08:00

It used to be that to learn your neighbor's dirty secrets, you had to don a trenchcoat and peep through their window. Or go through their trash, or buy a pair of good binoculars. Now all you need is the URL for their blog or to know the forums where they like to post.

I haven't been going to online forums for long, so I'm still amazed at what people are willing to divulge: polyamorous relationships, abusive spouses, runaway children, nasty diseases. Others of us are more circumspect, a few get offended, most of us like to gawk.

A friend sent me a link to a website, PostSecret, where people share their secrets--dirty, funny, touching, fascinating, and sometimes tragic. "I was off my meds when I broke up with you," one reads. "I had to go back on them to live with what I'd done." Best of all, the secrets are sent in anonymously on one side of a home-made postcard.

"Before you marry her, you have to know she slept with three guys on the night of her bachelorette party!"

The tragedies and triumphs of everyday life combined with art. And you don't have to hide in the bushes.

Vision quest

2008-02-18T05:33:00.001-08:00

Aren't these great items? My first Etsy treasury that ended up on the front page. It's amazing how much exposure that brings--four of these items have sold so far, and I'm sure the shops got a lot of other views and sales as well. My shop even got a few increased views, and about 10 extra hearts yesterday out of the experience. So another lesson in the value of taking good photos.

Buttons, buttons

2008-02-17T08:47:00.000-08:00

I've never been a big collector, not since I was eleven and had a herd of ceramic horses, and I've never been inordinately obsessed with buttons. But now my work area overfloweth and I have to admit they're pretty cool.

I think my favorite is celluloid. This was one of the earliest plastics, later abandoned because it was found to be unstable. Millions of buttons from the 30s and 40s are available today, in all shapes, colors, and sizes. Here's a picture of some of my current beauties:

These celluloid buttons include bubbletops (on the top row), a tight top (far left), and three wafer buttons. The far right one is a layered and carved wafer, one of my favorites types. The bright blue one is called a buffed celluloid (not sure if you can tell in this photo). Bubble tops and tight tops all have metal backings; the difference is in how close the celluloid is to the metal.

Now here's what some of them look like when they're made into jewelry:

On the left is a bubble top, paired with a chunky lucite button (a later plastic). You can really see the depth on this one. To the right of that is a layered wafer, carved to reveal the different colors underneath (the button on top is, I believe, a Victorian cut steel). Finally, below is a pressed wafer button (this one is topped by a carved vegetable ivory button and mother of pearl).

On a lighter note:

2008-02-10T08:09:00.000-08:00

I got this at an estate sale a few weeks ago--great graphic, isn't it? I plan to post it on my etsy site, but first I'd like to listen to it. Aye, there's the rub. I tried to unearth our turntable, and somehow the cord has disappeared, so now my husband has completely emptied the armoir we keep our records and CDs and stereo in, and we're trying like crazy to find the cord.
So my house is an even bigger disaster than usual, but this winking Irish lass cheers me right up!

Not a great day

2008-02-08T06:48:00.000-08:00

I was going to post something a little more upbeat and useful today, but I live in Kirkwood, Missouri, where last night this guy went crazy and killed five people at city hall. The mayor (who lives 3 blocks from me) is in the hospital still, possibly dying. The councilwoman I was planning to vote for as next mayor is dead. The gunman, Cookie Thornton, is dead, as are two police officers and two more city officials.

Cookie Thornton went to high school with my husband, and he was quite the character about town--generally upbeat and well liked, but over the years increasingly combative. This feud with city hall has been going on for some time. I first became aware of it about three or four years ago, when our kids had to attend a city council meeting for boy scouts. It was in October, and Cookie had taken a couple of bales of hay from an arrangement they had outside city hall, and he lugged them upstairs and put them in the meeting room so there were little wisps of straw all over. Well, the powers-that-be were making him clean up after the mess he made, so as we left the meeting he was on his knees in the middle of the aisle picking up straw, being as obstructive as he could and singing, "Oh it's good to be a free slave in Kirkwood." He was laughing and joking with people, and we stopped to talk to him for a moment, and for some time after that we sang that song when the circumstances seemed to warrant it.

One thing I like about this community is that most people seem to acknowledge this tragedy has six victims, including Cookie.

Foggy morning breakdown

2008-02-05T13:48:00.001-08:00

I got up at 5:30 the other morning. The snow had mostly melted out of the front yard and the street was thick with fog. This picture was taken standing on my front porch, feet wet, dog sniffing at the door behind me.

The tree swing has been there for four or five years now, and the kids never swing on it anymore. About time to take it down, you say? But doesn't this just look the picture of the American suburb? OK. This summer we'll take it down. Before the hornets find it.

(This picture was taken with my new Nikon D40x, which I'm still getting to know, though we're already in love. I didn't use a tripod, as you can see. I cannot explain the gorgeous red color--it was really more of a misty gray. Perhaps in time these mysteries will become clear.)