Thursday, August 12, 2010

Do you feel it...

Align Center

Do you feel summer slipping through your fingers...
Butterflies are cocooning already, their final dance into history.

The coneflowers are all but seed heads,
they're glory left to the nuthatch, who are gladly harvesting
nutrition for the winter.

Sunflowers are no longer beautiful beams of sunlight,
harvested by squirrels and every avian migrant on the scene...

Soon I'll be making the winter 'Fireside' candles...
the slight scent of the fireplace
with notes of a man's cologne
suggesting a hint of Winter and cozy firesides.

Then it will be here...Autumn...
Summer vanquished,
the calm settles in
and again we await...the Spring...
SIGH!!!

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

A walk in paradise...with yard birds...

It was so beautiful this morning out my front door,
I just had to share it with you.
After the rains last night, the clearing sky
just made it magical,
as the rains have really made the flowers
and weeds bloom this year.
Once my shop is set in place the transplanting will begin.
Was this all set in motion for some
grand scheme...
of course it was, the Universe heard me!

Don't ya just love 'yard art'...
I love these 'skillet birds'.
They will be for sale at the new shop.

As will the 'iron birds'...

Are they not the cutest lil' yard ornies!!!

You can never have enough 'yard art'...
In my world anyway!

When my new shop is created, it will take the name of
THE WILD THING
Lots of Nature studies in watercolors,
concrete statues, iron art, jewelry, taxidermy,
wind chimes and what ever else this wandering
soul trips across in her travels on this planet.
With winter looming in our future, I will be inside creating
for the spring open house...
HEEHAW!!!

Oh yes,
and more 'Cracked in the Head' night lights...
Stay tuned, she's on the loose!

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

More bones...dem bones...

Autumn...yup, it's just around the corner...and you know what that means...
Halloween decorating!

So I been playin' around in the bone yard for some funky kid soap...

I think these will be fun, but I'm just starting to look for fun things to put in the soaps...
I also have glow in the dark bugs to play with...

And who doesn't love to play with Fall, the brilliant colors, the cooler, DRY air!
Boy, this has been a wet scorcher this summer. I have never mowed my grass in sections before, but it's too hot, humid and mosquito infested to do it all at once.

So Mother Nature, throw us a bone, at least an 80 degree one...

Monday, August 9, 2010

Bones of a new shop...

As inventory starts to pile up in my living room,
I ready my plans for the bones of the biz,
the furniture...isn't this just the coolest piece,
it will stand on a table or hang on a wall...
And it would look so cool in my house...
but then, so would it all!!!
ARGH!!!

Talk about chippy and crusty...I haven't even looked in the drawer or the doors
to see if there are bottoms, but when the dealer told me the price, I said, 'YES'!!!
will make a darling setting, can you see it...

Thanks Mark and Liz for being the best junkers EVER...
a husband and wife team that truly know what it's all about!
Their booth is always jammed full of great stuff,
right TOT...ha!
And their prices are wonderful,
you don't even wanna know what I paid for this sweet lil wash stand...
weeeeee...

Wonderful old bird house on a stand...SWEET!
Couldn't pass it up, will be divine in a setting...

Love this old dark finish oak high boy...
isn't it cozy with all of the Autumn color splash...
It's displayed at the Candle Shed,
for now!


and you can never have enough farm chairs,
especially old white painted ones...
do ya think I'm draggin' in some goodies...
OH YEAH!!!
SOON!

Saturday, August 7, 2010

Shadow Shot Sunday...I was blessed...

sit a spell and remember...
my grandparents had a cottage on the Cedar River
my brother and I were young
memories

'don't go in there yet' yelled granny
running with a rolled up newspaper to wipe the cobwebs
out of the corners of the outhouse
CREEPY
lookout for that ol' snake under the steps
I run fast
see gramma

gramps would hook up the storm windows to the ceiling
lettin' in the warm summer breeze
through the screens on the porch
'don't sit on them chairs yet
they gotta be wiped down'
granny grabbed an old rag from the basket
and whitened the ol' Adirondack chairs
with a few whacks
dust would fly

same ol' rag safety-pinned to a broom
polished the corners of webs in each musty room
it was the smell of old
as curtains set sail to each opened window
cicada song was the tune that lulled me to sleep
on the giant bouncy bed
my ship of dreams

tall prairie grass fortressing the strawberry bed
me and my brother crawled around
in and out of the shafts
where are you
let's go to the creek and look for craw-daddies
I'll catch that butterfly
go get a peanut butter jar

Gramps planted sweet corn
the best in our world
sweet butter oozed down our chins
fresh butchered chicken
GROSS
but how soon we'd forget
that headless twirling apparition
when the crispy crumbles dotted our shirts
did someone say apple pie
I can still smell the old wooden matches
blown out with a flick o the wrist

sittin' in the porch
listenin' to the old radio tunes
a bath high up in the big ol sink
seersucker jammies
curled up on Granny's lap in a rocker
squeak squeak squeak
wrinkled old hands caress my arm
soft lips on my cheek
I was blessed

Wilbur swat that fly


for my beloved Grandparents
Wilbur and Estelle

I share a glimpse of my treasures from a day's outing...
it's Shadow Shot Sunday down under.
The memories of olden days and a childhood filled with adventures...
these are the days of my life.

Friday, August 6, 2010

Manley's Antiques...

My dealer friends from the St. Louis area, Pam and Gary from Country Meadows Antiques, traveled to Iowa to do some junkin' of their own...
great stuff at Manley's Antiques...









Great stuff, as always at Manley's Antiques...
this is what I like to think of when I think of Iowa dealers,
ready to wheel and deal, with fair pricing on everything...
great stuff clean and ready to stick in your home,
honest, hardworking American antique dealers!


Ya know, in this biz
some like us, some don't, you get complaints, you get praises,
you get over it...



Thursday, August 5, 2010

Where it all began...

Five years ago I had a web site,
started for my Victorian lampshade biz
and antique shop,
it was the beginning of my experience on the internet...
talk about cornfusin'...
But I had a dream of owning and working in my own lil' world,
a shop right outside my kitchen door where the commute was 25 feet...
ahhhh...paradise!

So I began compiling pictures of sheds, n shacks, n stuff
for ideas to make it all happen...

Everyone has their own idea of their lil' piece of paradise,
so we all feed on each others skill to make it our own...

dreams, dreams, dreams...

Let the sun shine in, without it there is no life...
white rooms filled with the light of creation,
this is what it's all about...

Playin' with our toys
and having our very own doll house to share with our friends...

I have a dream...
and next week they start building mine!!!
YIPPEE!!!

Thanks to everyone whose photos I borrowed but,
can't remember where...you guys rock!!!

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

A drive by...

Every time I drive to Illinois, I drive by this glass shop, always wondering just what it's all about, I stopped there yesterday delivering a piece of furniture to Elaine that she bought at the Candle Shed.
Boy was I surprised...

Elaine is an artist and antique lover, she's turned the front of her glass shop into a darling lil' shop of antiques and art. I've known Elaine for quite some time now, as she has bought from me quite a bit, but I had no clue to her talent as a collage artist.
She does 4 shows a year and is constantly on the lookout for parts and pieces to craft her work.

I love this piece framed in an old mirror frame, it's actually a photo copy of a collage set on linen her and her granddaughter put together from a walk in the woods...

Another collage and a great prim piece made from old cheese boxes.

How 'bout this old wooden tool box turned table, with a corner piece of amber glass...
LOVE IT!

Two more collage and the cutest box that her and her partner fashioned a stand for.

They made this darling shelf from an old window, she has a pair of them, they have mirror on the back wall of the unit to throw light on the trinkets inside.

Great pieces abound in this tiny, well filled space...but Elaine obviously has the knack
and love of primitives!




Would you drive by this lil' shop...I sure won't anymore!!!
Next time we go through her shed...
when it's not 100 degrees outside!

The Wench...

I have a new friend...Lori
The French Wench

I have always dreamed of being a wench
a wild and bawdy woman of mystery
a gun totin', horse ridin', seafarin' maid
long wild untethered hair
weathered, copper-tone skinned
creature of the forest
a wanderer I was once in another life
I pulled a two-wheeled cart all over old England
a healer of animals and man
an Earth mother
a dirt under the fingernails
herbalist extraordinaire
'a potion for what ails ya'
was my chant
as I sang my way over hill and dale
I slept under the stars with the wolf
I was a free spirit

Seven things about me...

1)-I've always wanted to learn to sail...
2)-I abhor math, it gives me hives IT DOES NOT COMPUTE!!!
3)-I love wearing men's clothes, they're so practical
4)-I am painfully shy and don't like crowds
5)-I write notes of my thoughts and ideas everywhere
(but rarely find them again)
6)-I'm scared to death of bears
AND SPIDEYS!!!!
7)-I used to cry myself to sleep for the want of a horse


A dreamer and a loner
a hopeless romantic
filled with fairytale schemes and wants
my blog shares with you
every day in my humble life
nothing spectacular but
new discoveries and soul mates
worldwide
oh yeah, and junk

I could never choose my faves,
I've bonded with so many, as my side bar suggests,
but please go to Lori's place
this is what she wrote to me...

Your blog is just a sweet oasis that I want everyone to know about.

Back atcha girl!!!

THANKS!!!