If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times....

Never pass by a church rummage! Here's my loot!

Vintage flower basket, English candy tin, giant Pennsylvania Dutch tray, Delft pottery, 1920's Hymnals (Including Gospel Hymn Selections for Female Voices)(!), sweet divided dish with floral aluminium lid, turtle bank circa 1970

2 shoe boxes full of molds of various shapes, Queen Mary dish, doily (note: I am usually not a doily girl, but loved the red and blues of this one), and a vintage pink jewelry box. Look what was inside:

See the fab shoe box? I gave that to my friend Magpie Ethel. She loves silhouettes of kids and the color orange. That's what I call a double delight!

Letters from famous people - Part 3

Okay, it wasn't a letter...but something even better. A bit scandalous even. A famous person tried to pick me up once. I was living in New York. The year was 1989 or thereabouts. One crisp Fall afternoon, I was waiting for a downtown bus on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

You know how sometimes you can feel that someone is watching you? It was like that. I turned to look and caught the gaze of a man walking towards the bus stop. He smiled at me, slowed down, and said, "Don't I know you?" Just then I twigged. It was...

Carl Bernstein!

I said "I don't think so." and started to scrounge around in my bag like I suddenly realized I needed some chapstick. Then it hit me: This is the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist who helped bring down an American president, and the best line he has is: "Don't I know you?"

Still, my research shows that over the years, he dated Liz Taylor, Bianca Jagger , Martha Stewart and was once married to Nora Ephron, who ~ by the way ~ is a genius. (You can read her blog on Huffington Post.) Just goes to show you, One Gal's Trash is in very good company. Come to think of it, I should have jumped all over him...I certainly would have had a book deal by now!

Recycled Garden Tools

I found these two creatures at an estate sale over the weekend. The guy running the sale told me that his dad made them out of garden tools about 40 years ago. They are quirky and charming and are already at home in our backyard. They have faces only a junk mother could love.


Oh! I almost forgot...$5 for the pair!

Hazel's First Birthday

We celebrated Hazel's birthday with a party at the dog park.

Emma handed out doggie treat bags to all the pups who showed up.

Charlie brought toys.

Roscoe was there...

and Chloe...

and Baron...

Stretch and the birthday girl had a little tumble.

Hazel stole a ball, because on your birthday, you get to do that sort of thing.

She had a wonderful time!

Letters from famous people - Part 2

When Prince William was born in 1982,

I decided to send a little something to the future King of the British Empire to mark the occasion. So I drove over (this was way before ordering at Disney.com) to the gift store at Disneyland, and bought a toddler sized one of these in powder blue and sent it across the pond.

Well, guess what came in the mail 3 months later! A letter of thanks on embossed paper with the seal of Buckingham Palace, signed by Hazel West, Princess Diana's lady in waiting.

~Double click on the letter for a better view~

Short, sweet, and to the point. I was a little disappointed that it didn't specifically mention the sweatshirt. For the next few years, I pored over every issue of People Magazine looking for pictures of William. I never saw him wear it. Not even once.

P.S. Just for kicks and giggles, I googled Hazel West and found this at Yvonne's Royalty Home Page (!):

Diana, Princess of Wales' Ladies-in-Waiting:

N.B.: The ladies-in-waiting are listed in alphabetical order by surname.

Mrs. George Alston-Roberts-West (née Hazel Elizabeth Margaret Cook)
Born: 23 May 1944
Parents: Lieutenant-Colonel Sir Thomas Cook and Gweneth Margaret Jones
Spouse: Lieutenant-Colonel George Arthur West (great-grandson of the 1st Duke of Westminster)
Notes:
• Extra Lady-in-Waiting from 1981.*

* Buckingham Palace announced her appointment on 25 September 1981. It was published in The London Gazette of 6 October 1981.

I would so love it if Hazel read this post and sent me a message!

Let the Billy Chips fall where they may...An Update

Remember this guy?

I posted about him here. Well, out of the blue, I received an email from a gal named Marilyn. Here's what it said:

Googling for fun - Williams Potato Chips....there you were talking about my family's company. The Billy that you are in love with is my brother who was featured in the ads in about 1950. The original bags actually had a photograph of him rather than a drawing. Thought you might like to see a couple more memorable pictures.

Then it got even better...Billy sent me a recent photo and a message! He wrote:

Thought you might be interested to see what the ravages of time and Jack Daniels can do.

So, if ingesting massive amounts of potato chips leads to owning a sweet motor boat and looking exactly like Sean Connery, I say...Go ahead, eat the chips!

A cartload of fun and family dysfunction!

While driving yesterday afternoon, I saw a sign for a yard sale and instinctively started to slow down. Emma was with me and she saw the sign too. "Please Mom, no! Anything but a yard sale!" My response: "I promise, I'll only stay 5 minutes." Here's what I grabbed: The white chippy flower cart, of course,

Handknit bunnies and tiny vintage Easter chicks (who will join the rest of the collection on our mantel next spring),

Handknit chickens and a shell night light for the hut,

A bunch of resin flowers (for repurposing),

Gurley candles for Easter (the one on the left combines the religious with the pagan ~ a cross, an angel and a bunny ~ in a really tasteful way, dontcha think?),

and more vintage gems: The Santa and the pink umbrella dogs are old celluloid. I've never seen the Gurley church candle before. These will all be in my Etsy shop at Christmas.

Star reflectors for Christmas lights (also for repurposing),

and a church made out of wood by the (now adult) brother of the gal running the sale. As I added it to my pile of purchases, she says to me, "Make sure Craig doesn't see you taking this out of the party room!" Apparently, Craig ~ who at the time was slurping his Big Gulp in the garage ~ made the church when he was a kid and will be furious when he realizes that his sister put a 25 cent price tag on it. I'm all like, "Oh no, I am not going to be the cause of a family feud on NE Shaver Street!" But then, I couldn't help it. I had to know. "You actually called it 'the party room'? I wish I grew up in a house like this!" Sadly, she didn't have much of a sense of humor.

Anywho, I was very careful to not make eye contact with Craig. He must have given her the stinkeye, because while I was busy maniacally looking for more stuff, I heard her snap at him, "I'm selling it for a quarter; no one else wants it!" So, if you ever run into Craig, tell him his church will be on our mantel, every Christmas, until doomsday.

He even decorated the cut out windows with Christmas cards!

And finally, a pig cutting board that I can actually use. It was also a quarter.

Not bad for 5 minutes! What's the fastest time you have ever clocked at a sale?

Please don't make me eat this

Imagine my delight when I saw these cans on the shelf at our grocery store in Portland, Oregon. Spotted Dick is a sort of British bread-pudding-with-currents thing. But in a can? And the name? I don't think so.

On second thought, I think I'll bring a couple of cans to my friend's upcoming 40th birthday knitting party and see how it goes over with the ladies. I'll keep you posted.

We have a winner!

Here are the giveaway goodies to mark my 200th post:

Found these gorgeous tiles at a recent estate sale. Got 14 comments...

Put 14 tiles in a hat....

Emma was my lovely assistant....

Look who won....Lisa was comment #14....Thanks to all for playing along!

Lisa ~ Please email or leave a comment so I can contact you!

Let them eat...a cookie!

Bonne Fete Nationale! It's Bastille Day in France, the (sort of) equivalent to our 4th of July. My friend Beth brought me this cookie. I wish I was in a Paris bistro right now, dunking it into a cafe creme. Merci, Beth!

Here is what the E.T. will look like tonight. Those Frenchies sure know how to party!

Let there be water!

Remember my post about the abandoned house with the dead "landscaping"? Well, last Friday it was hot here in the city of roses. Very hot. I've been tossing and turning about whether I should take the plants, but in the meantime, I decided to bring them all a cool beverage. Emma helped me roll a garbage can full of water down the street and we used a bucket for scooping.



Emma ran back to the house for the watering can (do you still call it a "can" when it's made of plastic?)...


Her friend Fia helped too....

When we were finishing up, I saw the neighbors who live to the north. I asked if they knew what was going on with the house. The husband said that no one has done any work on it in over a year. That the cops came last winter when the frozen pipes burst and turned the water off. That it used to belong to a Portland Trail Blazer, he put it on the market when he got traded to Atlanta, couldn't sell it, and donated it to the Boys & Girls Club as a tax writeoff. When I mumbled something about wanting the plants, the wife sneered at me and said "You can't take them, they belong to someone!" I wanted to holler..."The house is uninhabitable, it's a safety hazard, windows are kicked in, there's graffiti and and clearly no one cares!" But I just mumbled a little more and skulked away. And to think, I was this close to digging up those plants and bringing them home...Woe is me!

P.S. Scroll down for info on a fab giveaway from One Gal's Trash