Angels

'Tis the season.

I found another one.  Seriously, it's the third I've seen in a year or so, and this one was a quarter.

Look at everything even when you've seen a million of them.  (Especially when you've seen a million of them.)

Happy Holidays!

And happy hunting!

December

And I thought I was out of it in October ...

I've been selling some things on eBay.  More like obsessed with it.  I've spent more hours photographing, writing up, and mailing than I have hunting, which is fine since yard sales are always labor intensive.  The fact that this is an internet yard sale shouldn't matter at all.  It's just a different kind of labor.

Anyway, I cleared closets from July to October (steadily - the rest of the year before that intermittently) and I figure I sent half the crap to the landfill, two-thirds of what was left was inherited forward - to thrift shops all around my area - and that last one-third went to family and friends (some) or to the line waiting for eBay.  I've sold maybe ... one-twentieth of that.  Because I'm so tired, I'm thinking I need to donate some more or get a booth at a flea market somewhere; eBay is a pain.  But I'm not completely ready to stop the yard sale yet.  See, I'm using the proceeds to get some things done around here, like this ...

Before:

And after:

Not too bad, huh?  My goal is to get the main floor at least painted and refurbished - this was definitely the most extensive work done so far.  You might notice the bath tile is still the green but I put up a curtain that linked the blue and green - not too shabby for someone with no taste at all, huh?  (But I had to hire a plumber for more work than I'd wish on my worst enemy, and I even had to hire a tile guy - my back, and the rest of me, is currently on a strict yoga diet so I'll never have to do that ever again.)

Anyway, eBay didn't pay for all of it, but between points from my credit cards (the tile, textiles, and towel bars) and selling things I didn't even remember I'd bought (the tile guy), the great deals (mirror) and the tax break I foresee with all that donated stuff (the sink and vanity), the hit to my checkbook wasn't nearly as painful as I'd imagined it would be.  It was even kind of fun.  I'm turning my sights to my kitchen now (I'm thinking the walls should be orange ...)

More on that later ...

Happy Holidays!  And Happy Hunting!

Alive

Wedding over. Guests gone. Four months of my life now just a gut-spot on my mental windshield. Is it really October?

Didn't hunt too much but what I did find is amazing. Pictures of best and quirkiest soon (and the DIY stuff I did) as soon as I catch up on my sleep.

Guess that means another month then.

Happy hunting! And happy holidays!

Busy-ness

I gave up on thrifts and yard sales weeks ago.  Not because I was finding little or nothing (though that didn't hurt) but because ... well, you figure it out ...

Yesterday I paid someone to tear three layers of vinyl and linoleum from my kitchen and one bathroom - porcelain tile goes down next week.  I have a plumber coming next week after that, an electrician two weeks later, and a tree guy at the end of August.  I'm headed toward Ikea tomorrow to fill in some spaces and to find something better for storage and display.  Labor Day I plan to paint - all over I will paint.

In between the DIY deluge, I am tidying the landscape, pulling for eBay (and charity - 12 boxes given away so far), tutoring students and teaching classes.

I'm ready to sleep for a few months, but not until after the family comes in for Head Trip's wedding ... and leaves.  Then I plan to ... zzzzzzz...

Finally, The Answers

In brief.  It's all I have time for these days.

Watch #1:  If you have actually been reading for awhile, you should recognize this one - I inherited it a few years ago.  It was my grandmother's.  My mother told me she had it (and that it was platinum and emeralds), that I would have it one day, and that she didn't know where it lay so she could give it to me "now."  I found it after she passed when my sibs and I went through her two storage lockers, buried in the middle of a box, beneath a small TV, along with all the rest of my grandmother's jewelry.  Not platinum but plated, not emeralds but glass.  Don't care.  It was a graduation present (I believe) to my Grandmama from her father.  (Besides, the earrings that were also in the box - that only I wanted - were gold and about two carats of diamonds.  I remember playing with them when I was a child and knocking out two of the tiny stones.  I fixed them as an adult.  What goes around, comes around.)

Watch #2:  If you said this one, you are right!  Found in a thrift shop, filthy and black in many places, with no band but with a label that said "silvertone", it couldn't have been appealing since it had been sitting awhile.  I opened it, looked at the back ("Belais 18K") and said "yes, please!"  The sapphires are likely synthetic, as was the habit of the day, but they actually look pretty real to me.  (By the way - I cleaned overenthusiastically, with Barkeep's Friend, which is the only thing that would even soften the black crud.  NOT good for that lovely, characteristic swirl on the inside back cover.  :(  Sad.)

Watch #3:  Not even gold plated.  Probably sold at Woolworth's in the day.  Still works, though, when none of the others do (except sporadically)!  What does that tell you?

Watch #4:  "14K Over Metal" (inside back) is just another way of saying gold plated, but with thicker plate.  And over 1/2 ct of real diamonds.  All that bling on a fairly cheap box.  Really don't understand people from the first two decades of the 20th century.

Watch #5:  14K gold plated (even says so), synthetic sapphires.  Very common.  Easy to confuse with #2, huh?  Actually, it looks better than #2 did when I found it so likely, if placed side-by-side then, this one would've won hands down.  Might still, if anyone looks inside the real one.

So, how good were you?

Happy hunting!!