A visit from the Easter Monkey

This year marked the first Easter since Quin and I got married 4 years ago that he wasn't deployed and I didn't just give birth 2 days prior, so we decided to have a little fun and do Easter baskets for each other. I have the best husband EVAH because not only did he fill my basket with all kinds of yummy Godiva and Lindt chocolates, but he managed to find a MONKEY basket to put them in! I was beyond tickled to find this on Sunday morning! What a guy. {swoon}












We had a busy, but wonderful Easter Sunday. Quin's dad was driving through so he spent Saturday night and Sunday breakfast with us. I thought it would be oh-so-festive to have Hot Cross Buns with our scramby eggs for breakfast, so Saturday night I put aside my fear of all things yeast and whipped up a batch of said Buns. And then, in short order, I whipped them straight into the trash can. Just when I get all brave and ready to conquer Yeast Breads, they smack (or is it punch?) me down and yell "Ha!" yet again, and I stuff the litle packets of yeast back into the spice cupboard for the next time I get a similarly hare-brained idea.

After breakfast (sans Buns) I attempted to take Easter photos of Maren, the result of which I posted yesterday. As usual she was significanly less than cooperative, so that is about the only decent shot. Ah, well. Next year I'll bribe her with candy to sit in the giant basket, and have darling Easter photos that will be the envy of all. After photos and a quick nap for Maren we had church, but not before I got the photo of us at right. I unfortunately only got the one, as we were in a hurry and I couldn't remember how to use the self-timer on my camera which resulted in much fumbling and time-wasting on my part.

Church went until 4:00, so I started cooking dinner as soon as we got home. I bought a quarter ham from the Honeybaked folks, made mashed potatoes, buttermilk biscuits, a nice green salad, and the requisite Jello concoction. I even busted out the wedding china and silver since it was a special occasion. It was nice to eat together, just our little family. Maren loved the Jello, and we had a great time watching her try to eat it--not so easy to do with your hands! She was covered and required Bath #2 for the day when it was over. We finished up the evening with a walk around the neighborhood to enjoy the lovely evening.

Hope you all enjoyed your day!

Happy Easter!

Bean update:
I just chopped up some ham to put in the beans, then tasted them--and the beans are still hard! :( I soaked them over night and they've been in the slow cooker on low since 9 am, so I'm confused. I thought for sure they'd be all nice and mushy. I'm going to keep cooking them, since I don't have anything to lose at this point. I'm also disappointed because the soup is still very thin. I even took out a cup and pureed it, then added it back in, something I've heard will thicken it up. It didn't seem to help. Maybe since I'm going to keep cooking the beans, I'll add in some potatoes to starch it up. I want a nice, thick bean soup--not broth and beans. Looks like we'll be having sandwiches tonight. :(

I just have to say that it's too bad these blogs don't have a Smell-o-vision function! I've got a Crock Pot full of beans and ham going and it smells incredible. This is the first time I've ever cooked with dried beans before, so I hope it turns out and tastes as good as it smells. Yum.

Mc-Ching!

Remember this?



This is the twin fitted sheet I bought at a thrift store last week for $3.95 with the McDonald's characters on it. I found out it was produced for Sears in 1976 and I put it on eBay, noting that similar sheets have sold recently for as high as $37. Well, last night my auction ended...and the high bid was--are you ready for this?--$79.00!!! Yes, that's correct--nearly 80 bucks, a 500% return on my investment! I nearly died when I saw the total and then worried that something would go wrong and my buyer would not pay, but the money came through this morning, so I'm good!

I doubt I will ever have this luck on an eBay sale again, but it was sure fun and I think it lent some credence to my junk-buying habit. See, I don't just buy crap--I buy crap that's worth something! :)

Wild Iris

Not much to say, so I thought I'd share a photo. This was taken last summer at our family cabin in Southern Colorado. These were just growing wild, and the sun hit this particular flower and illuminated it. I've never seen iris grow wild before, and it was quite charming to find them--like little jewels among all the weeds and grass!

I'm never too sick to thrift

It's been a quiet week here; not much to blog about. Quin is out of town so it's just us girls. I'm still trying to shake a nasty sinus cold that I got over a week ago, so I've had zero energy. It's frustrating as I had big plans for all the things I was going to get done this week, but I haven't felt like doing any of it.

I did manage, however, to scrape together enough energy to go thrifting this afternoon. I think I may have to be on my deathbed to not feel like going thrifting! :) I found a few fun things:


Old muffin tin, $ .80 and embroidered "L" hankie, $ .50. You can't tell from the photo, but the muffin tin has a really cool patina on it that makes me believe that it is OLD. It's an interesting size, as it has 8 cups instead of the more standard 6, and the cups are slightly smaller. I won't use it for baking, but either decorate with it in my kitchen or I thought it would be a nifty way to separate beads or embellishments when I'm working on craft projects. The hankie is for my mom (if she wants it), as I know she gives old hankies as gifts sometimes. I don't know anyone with an L name, but maybe she does! Don't know that it is necessarily old, but the embroidery is pretty and it's in good shape.









Distressed-looking white wire basket, $3.83. This is a good-sized basket; 17" long by 6" high. You can't see from the photo but it is made to look distressed, with the silver metal showing through in spots. I thought it would be cute with some fake greenery in it. I've been looking for some objets to put atop my china cabinet to 'draw the eye up', and this is kind of what I had in mind.






Okay, I know this is a bizarre purchase. The two of these together were $3.00, and they're going on eBay. These are old Burger King toys from 1987. They are disturbingly realistic and life-sized. Maybe it's not such a good thing when you are a restaurant and you can make plastic food that looks alarmingly like the real fast food you sell. Ick.









Three more 1950s cook booklets, $ .69 each. I must have missed these when I was at Saver's last Friday night. The one on the left, "Quick Dishes for the Woman in a Hurry," was put out by the Culinary Arts Institute, the same folks that did the Dairy Cookbook I bought last week. This one was published in 1954 and has the standard disgusting food photographs, but also some really cute illustrations. The one in the middle is called "Metropolitan Cook Book" and was put out by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company in 1953. It has the cutest little illustrations of food and kitchen equipment that have faces and appendages. Very 1950s, very charming. The one on the right is "Carefree Cooking...Electrically" and was put out in 1950 by the Edison Electric Institute. Its purpose is to teach housewives how to use thir new electric ranges. This one has some great photos and drawings as well.


And last, the Better Homes & Gardens Barbecue Book from 1956, $2.99. It has lots of really great photos of guys that look like Ward Cleaver, grilling in the backyard in dress shirts and slacks. It also has some really cute illustrations, like this one:
Someday, I will figure out how to change the banner at the top of this blog, and I'd love to use all these fun illustrations from these cookbooks.

So that's it for today. I had actually intended to just stop at one store, then go grocery shopping. I got caught up in the moment though, and ended up going to 3 stores. Maren was not happy to be out shopping and made her displeasure known in very vocal ways, so we ended up coming home without going to the grocery store. So I have old junk, and no food. And that's perfectly fine with me!

Thrift Store Therapy, Part 3

The last installment of my finds from Friday:

This old cookbook is from 1941 and was put out by some Culinary Arts Council. I like old cookbooks, but I think I paid too much for this one: $2.99. Cool, but not that cool. Eh, whatever. I got caught up in the moment.













These little booklets are part of "The Amy Vanderbilt Success Program for Women." The Dinner Party book is from 1963 and the other one is from 1966, if I'm reading my Roman numerals correctly. I have no idea what this Success Program entailed, but apparently being a good hostess and creative uses for artichokes as wall decor were part of the curriculum. The bio for the author of the dinner party book cracks me up: "Adele Whitely Fletcher has an international reputation as an imaginative hostess and has given dinner parties for the famous and near-famous as well as using her great gifts as a hostess in her own home. Her articles in this field have appeared in..blah blah blah..She has also found time to collaborate with the Duchess of Windsor, in Paris, on a series of articles featuring the Duchess' favorite recipes. A doting grandmother, she lives in Huntington, Long Island,where she is known as a warm and ispired hostess." Well, la-di-freakin'-da! I had better get reading, as my international reputation has slipped a bit lately.


These little cook booklets were commonly put out by food manufacturers to encourage housewives to use their products. They usually feature food photography of the most ghastly sort, with everything styled and embellished to within an inch of its life. These three aren't too bad, as they are for Nabisco cookies & crackers, Royal Gelatin and Knox Gelatin. Some of the recipes in the Nabisco book actually sound kind of yummy. The Knox booklet is from 1957; the others are undated but look to be from a similar timeframe.



These booklets were put out by Pet Evaporated Milk and are written by Mary Lee Taylor, who was actually a fictional alter ego for Mrs. Erma Proetz. She did cooking radio shows starting in the 1930s and running until 1955. More ghastly pictures, with equally ghastly recipes: Egg Salad Loaf, anyone? How about a nice, steaming bowl of Lima Bean Chowder? {blech} I'm guessing these are from the early 1950s, because they feature ads for the radio program on the back.





And of course, there's always room for Jell-O! The Joys of Jell-O are many and great, comprising approximately 90 pages of recipes in this booklet. I will never, ever understand why it was acceptable--nay, desirable-- in polite society to suspend such garbage in gelatin! Jell-O was more of a tool than an actual food, it seems. I know that there are jokes among Utah Mormons that anything is fair game to be included in Jell-O salad, but seriously, we don't hold a candle to this collection. Fun fact: Did you know you can make Marzipan out of Jell-O? Consider yourself enlightened.








One of the things I loved about the Jell-O book was this ad on the back page. I have a set of the Individual Fluted Molds (second from left) that I found at a thrift store, and I adore them!


All the cook booklets combined were $ .99, and I've definitely gotten a dollar's worth of delight out of them.

One other thing I got but didn't photograph is a 14" square pillow form, still in plastic for $1.00. I put it in an old souvenir Salt Lake City pillowcase I found a while ago and it fits perfectly.

And that's everything! I think I spent something like $27.00 total.

Thrift Store Therapy, Part 2

Old Valentines, $1.99. From the graphics, they look like maybe from the 1960s? About half of them hadn't been punched out yet, and envelopes were included. There were more valentines, but they looked much newer and not nearly as neat. Those will be going back to charity with my next donation.








This is a throw pillow, about 15" square. I think I've seen something similar in Country Living (which is obviously my design bible!) and I saw this one at Saver's several weeks ago. I didn't get it then, but when I went back on Friday it was still there, which I took as a sign that it was waiting for me. :) It is made out of pale pink fabric that has a slight sheen to it, almost like taffeta but I don't think it is. I suspect it is handmade, because the fabric is thin and I can see pencil lines on the reverse. It's stuffed with a square piece of foam and backed with pink fabric that doesn't even match at all, so I think what I need to do is use my handy seam ripper, remove the backing, and soak this in some Woolite to see if I can get rid of the pencil lines. Then I'll have to resew it to some better fabric. Shouldn't be too hard of a fix. I like how it looks kinda Shabby Chic. This one was $1.99.


This little gem is headed straight for eBay! It is a twin fitted bed sheet with a McDonald's pattern on it, and it is in almost perfect condition! One tiny tear up in a corner, but the colors are bright and graphics unfaded. It looks like it was hardly used. I did a little searching and a similar one sold in the last couple weeks for $38.00! Wow! Don't know if I can get that much, but even if I could make $10 off it, I'd be thrilled. This cost $3.99, and I think it was money well spent! I'll update here if I sell it. I'm going to list it this afternoon.





More later!

Thrift"Store Therapy, Part 1

Quin leaves tomorrow morning and will be gone for the entire week, meaning it's The Mommy Show all week long. I stole a few hours of 'me' time yesterday in preparation for the long week ahead and of course, I went thrifting! Here are some of my finds:


This one is probably my favorite find of the day. It was only! $5.95. I know a comparable lamp would retail for easily $40. The shade is shot, but that's an easy fix and I know Target has some really cute shades in their Simply Shabby Chic line that would look great with the base. In fact they used to carry a lamp very similar to this, and I saw another similar one in my new Country Living magazine today. The lamp is glass and very heavy, with cut glass balls on the base. It's tall, almost 24". I love it! Not sure which room it will go in yet, as I am running out of places to illuminate, but rest assured, I'll find a place for this beauty!



This is so fun! It's hard to tell from the photo, but it's actually a hostess apron with scenes from Colorado silk screened on the front. It was $1.99. I am not sure of age, as it is in almost-new condition, but I can't imagine that they sell a lot of these in the gift shops around town nowadays. At any rate, this is a double-collectible for me, since I've been collecting both old Colorado souvenirs and aprons. This will likely go in the guest bedroom with all the other Colorado stuff.






These appear to be linen tea towels. I'm not sure if they are vintage or just made in China, because of the very Asian cherry blossom motif. I loved the colors, which don't show up great on screen but are red, yellow and teal. One has a pretty good sized yellow stain but I'll go soak them in Oxyclean and see what I can get out. I think these were maybe $1.99 for the pair.











Five rolls of vintage seam binding, $1.99. Each roll has 100 yds and they all appear to be full, so that is a lot of seam binding! These may go on eBay, as I've done some research and a fewsimilar lots have sold. I know Jenni Bowlin frequently uses vintage seam binding in her projects; I remember getting some at CKU a couple years ago, so maybe there's someone else out there just looking for something like this! I'm half tempted to keep the aqua-colored one, but I don't know what I would ever need all that for!
















This is a little milk-glass bowl (like Pyrex is made of, but this one is not marked any brand name). I don't know who Ricky is or why his name is on his bowl, but I thought this bowl was cute for the red checks. I figure I can always turn the Ricky part around. I'm always looking for small bowls for my kitchen to use for baby food or chopped ingredients when making dinner. This was $ .60

That's all for today. More goodies tomorrow!

Sew what?

I'm feeling pretty darn proud of myself this week. I managed to sew these pillows, with no pattern even! Okay, well, I suppose you don't really need a pattern to make a square. Fine. But if you understood that my sewing abilities rank in the Little to None range, you'd know that this is a big deal to me! The back sides are actually a little fancy as I made an envelope back, so they are like pillow shams. That took a little more thought and engineering than just a plain old square, I'll have you know.




I'm totally in love with the red fabric I found. I actually looked at this fabric way back when I recovered my kitchen chairs last year, but I didn't think the blue would look right in my kitchen. So I was thrilled when found it again at the fabric store and realize that it would look great in my living room! I like it so much I'm very seriously thinking about making curtains out of it to go on the window over my couch. Flush with my pillow success, I went to the library yesterday and checked out about 8 different books on making curtains, but nothing caught my eye. I think I'm better off hitting the pattern books at JoAnn's because although I may be competent enough to sew a square without a pattern, I think curtains may prove a trifle more difficult.

Status Report, 03/29/06

Maren's had a busy day. So far she has:

1) Evacuated her bowels with such force that somehow her foot actually became encrusted with poop, requiring me to hose her off with the handheld showerhead
2) Broken a glass vase
3) Unwound about 20 feet of yellow thread off the spool
4) Found and gnawed on a small taper candle
5) Found and uncapped a red Sharpie and had it on the way to her mouth (I caught her just in time! Dodged a big bullet there)
6) Dumped a box of thumb tacks on the floor and attempted to walk through them while I frantically cleaned them up, then got mad at me when I wouldn't let her
7) Played in the dog's water dish
8) Dumped out 2 boxes of my tiny alphabet rubber stamps and I suspect, ate the rubber off 3 of them, rendering it impossible for me to spell any words with the letters F, U, or W, or the number 7. (Thankfully, she did spit out the Q so I can still spell Quin)
9) Grabbed a box of beads off my desk and dumped them

And it's only 4:00 pm. She still has about 4 hours until bedtime.

Thankfully, today she also:
10) Fell asleep on the floor in the middle of the living room much earlier than her normal naptime
11) Did all the above naughty things with such flair and overwhelming cuteness that all I can do is laugh at her after I scream!

Maren turns 1

"Ewww, it tastes like...red!"

This past weekend was Maren's First Birthday Extravaganza. My parents and grandparents came into town to help us celebrate the wee one's big milestone. Friday was her actual birthday, but Saturday night was when we had her party and her cake. I decided on a ladybug theme, and my mom made Maren this little chocolate cake and frosted it to look like a ladybug. I think we had to use almost the entire pot of red paste food coloring to get the frosting to be that shocking shade of red! When we put the cake in front of Maren, she was a little unsure and mostly just poked and patted it, rather than stuff handfuls in her mouth like most little kiddos do.

Here she looks like she has tasted it a little. She did grab a few big chunks and then proceeded to squish them in her hands. This picture makes her look kind of like a little Vampire Baby.

Maren got some fun toys for her birthday. Of of them is this little mechanical puppy that yips and moves. Maren took to it immediately, toting it around and patting it. I was so surprised to see this, as she's never done that with any other toys or blankies before. If only I had known, and I'd have gotten her a fluffy white doggie sooner!

I know Sanford had a Son, but do you think he had a Daughter?

Folks, I have taken one step down the slippery slope. The slippery slope that is.....TRASH-PICKING!! (dun dun dun)

Last Wednesday (trash day in our neighborhood) I was out running errands in the morning, before the garbage truck had made all its rounds. I happened to be driving through the neighborhood when something caught my eye...I literally did a three-point turn in the middle of the road to get back to it. I found this dresser sitting out on the curb next to a garbage bin. It looked to be in okay condition, so I hopped out and checked it out a little further--a little wobbly, needs new handles and a new paint job, but otherwise okay.

I've never trash-picked before, so I wasn't sure of the proper etiquette, but I decided to knock on the door of the house to ask if I could have it, just so I wouldn't get reported to the police for garbage theft. No one was home, so I decided to take it, permission or not!

Getting the dresser in the car was a little tricky because I had the stroller with me, so I had to move Maren's chair over, put the stroller on its side in the middle seat with her and then the dresser in the back cargo area. Luckily it is small and light enough so that I could carry it over to the back of the car and slide it in by myself.

Once I get it refinished and have new knobs put on, I'm going to put this in one of my spare bedrooms and I think it will be cute. I was actually on the lookout for a small dresser for the room, and had been watching for a cheap one at thrift stores and garage sales. Lucky for me I found one at my favorite price--Free-ninety-free!

Tomorrow's trash day, so maybe I'll take a quick look through the neighborhood in the morning for any *treasures* people might have mistaken for trash. I've got the fever...the Trash-Pickin' Fever! (hey, isn't that a country song?)

Paint my walls and call me Silly Putty

Last summer, I had some painting done in my house. It was no small amount--2 bedrooms, including one ceiling and one closet, and my large front room that has two-story ceilings and goes up a staircase. I had a less-than-stellar experience, which I shall not enumerate now as just thinking about it makes my blood boil. I chose two colors for the front room: a deep crimson that I really like, and what I hoped would be a Nice Neutral but what turned out to be the exact shade of Silly Putty. Or Band-Aids. It's peachy. It's pinky. It's horrible.

I'm finally to the point where I want to have the front room repainted, partly because we have company coming next week and I want the house to look nice. A friend lent me a can of the paint from her living room, and it is just the right Nice Neutral that I had hoped for in the first place.

For the last two weeks, I've been getting estimates from painters to do the job, something I failed to do the first time around. I wanted to do due diligence so I could feel confident in my choice, because I really can't afford to be screwing up again--that was one expensive mistake I made the first time.

• Painter #1 came a day earlier than expected. Very professional, wrote everything out in detail which leaves little room for miscommunication a problem that plagued me the first time around. Quote: $395.00, plus I have to purchase 3 gallons of paint to the tune of about $70.00.
• Painter #2 came two days later than expected, after many excuses and apologetic phone calls. Showed up 10 minutes before I told him I had to leave the house. Looked around briefly, didn't write anything down. Quote: $350.00, including paint.
• Painter #3 came early for the appointment, but started things out by asking to borrow a wire coat hanger, as she'd just locked her keys in the car. Not a good sign. Looked around and gave me an estimate of $1980.00 and said I'd need 8-10 gallons of paint (included in the cost).

No, I did not make a mistake typing that. She honestly quoted me almost TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS, which is $1600 more than the previous quotes, and almost $1000 more than it cost me to get a much larger amount of painting done last summer. And 8-10 gallons of paint? What, are they going to do 6 coats? She told me they use exterior paint, because it's "practically bulletproof." Yes, I'm sure it is practically bulletproof, because you used 8-10 gallons and now it's 3 inches thick!

Quin was eating lunch as she gave us the quote, and I thought he might actually choke. I kept a straight face, but what I really wanted to do was ask her just exactly how many rocks of crack she is smoking and how often, because that is just EFFING insane.

About 15 minutes after she'd left, while we were still laughing about the incredulity of the quote, she called back, and said that she'd made a mistake on our quote. Oh good, I thought. This should clear everything up, I knew she must have been mistaken. It was actually supposed to be $1480, rather than $1980. $500 less than the first estimate. Mmmkay. Still about $1000 too high, you nutso. But thanks anyway.

I went with Painter #1. He's coming Monday. I'm thrilled.

Gimme some sugar

Sunday after church as I was cooking dinner, Maren was rummaging in the pantry and found a half-full sack of brown sugar. It was one of those bags with the built-in Ziploc zipper at the top, you know, to Seal In Freshness. Well, those seals may keep out stale air, but they don't keep out babies! Maren managed to get the bag open and dump almost all of the sugar right in the middle of the kitchen floor. Bronco thought he'd died and gone to heaven, and proceeded to lick as fast as he could while I grabbed his collar and physically dragged him back behind the gate.

Maren treated the sugar like her own personal sandbox, and stamped through the sand before running around the kitchen island, still clutching the bag like a trophy in her sugary little hand! She didn't get far, as the sugar stuck to her little bare feet and made them extremely slippery, so she slipped and slid all over the place. Quin and I laughed and laughed, and I'm so glad the camera was close!

Remind me to add 'brown sugar' to the grocery list.

Thrift store finds: Tuesday

After a long hiatus, I went out thrifting again this week. Here are my finds:

tin cup, $.39. I just liked the look of it.

old aluminum "Short'ning and ice cream spoon" $ .99. Love that spelling! This will go with my other vintage utensils.






Old yellow Pyrex dish, $2.00.

Vintage printed dishtowel, $ .99
















I think this is my favorite find of the day. This was $8.99. It looks like a window, but I think that it is actually a frame with molding added to the front to make it look like a window. I have been wanting to go to the architectural salvage place to get an old window to do this exact treatment to. I want to hang it by my front door. However, those old windows aren't cheap, and by the time I had mirrors cut to fit, I'd be in for WAY more than $8.99. I think I may paint this and distress it, or use a crackle finish or something fun. Then once the house painters come next week, I can hang it up! I'm pretty excited about this one!

Flowers & Freedom

Aren't I lucky? These are the beautiful flowers that Quin got me for our anniversary yesterday. Back when we were first dating, Quin secretly asked my roommates what my favorite flower was so that he could surprise me. I have always loved Gerbera daisies, and nearly every year since then, I have gotten a beautiful arrangement of them for one occasion or another. They make me smile every time I see them!

Tonight we've arranged for a baby sitter for Maren for a couple of hours so that we can go out by ourselves for the evening! This week she's been very Mom-clingy. If I leave the room or go out of her line of sight, she cries. She's not normally like this so I'm sure it's the discomfort of the teething, but I'm a little worried about how she'll behave for the sitter. If Maren is naughty, I may have to pay the sitter extra for Pain & Suffering.

Four Wonderful Years

Happy Anniversary, Sweetie! I love you!!

It all comes out in the wash

So, the Sears repairman came and fixed my washing machine to the tune of $192. Ouch. It was an easy fix, took approximately 5 minutes for him to install the new pump, for which I was charged something like $60. Man, I am SO in the wrong business. Even though it cost $192, if I'd decided to just get a new washer altogether, I would have been looking at $65 service fee+$399 new washer+8.1% sales tax+the time it takes to research washers, find one I like, buy it, have it delivered and installed+not be able to do laundry for who knows how long. In light of all this, I still feel like I came out ahead.

Bad night again for Maren last night. She was up 3 times and would fall asleep in my arms but wake up the moment I set her down. I just let her cry. Poor kiddo, I wish there was something more I could do for her. Darn little tooth.



Here's Maren yesterday with her new haircut and a new outfit. The jeans are from Baby Gap and they are supposed to be capris, but on Maren they go all the way down! They are 12-18 months, but they have this nifty adjustable waistband system so they actually fit her. They were expensive for baby clothes--$24.00, and I don't even think my jeans cost that much--but because they are adjustable and supposed to be capris, I think she'll be able to wear them all spring and summer and into the fall, so they were worth it. Plus they are just so darned cute!