Buttons and buckles on cards, oh my!

Hello friends. I hope you're having a great Saturday.

I guess it pays to let family and friends know about the seemingly weird items we collect for our art, even though they often look at us like we are nuts for collecting what we do. The other day Mr. Perch (aka Hubby) and I went over to his sister's for coffee. She and my brother-in-law were cleaning out some stuff and deciding what to pitch. She said she had something that she knew I would use. You guessed it! Old buttons and buckles. It seems that they belonged to his mother many years ago. She was a big crafter and he said that she had a room full of stuff at one time, unfortunately long before I came on the scene. When my sister-in-law handed me the button and buckle cards, I could barely contain my excitement! I think that they must have been display cards. Of course, some of the buttons and buckles had been used long ago, but that contributed to the charm of the cards. I have scanned these for you to look at and use in your art if you would like. For fun, I also scanned the label that was on the back of the smaller cards ("Made in England"). The larger card was from a company in NY; check out the old-timey phone number at the bottom!

I think it would pain me too much to actually use these buttons and buckles, so I guess I'll just keep them to look at as they are. I can't help but wonder where the missing buttons went. What garments did they end up being sewn on?

I hope you enjoy these. Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Sue

Hunting goodies....

Wishing you a happy Tuesday from The Perch! Fall is now really in the air here...cloudless blue skies and cool in the mornings, warming up a little in the afternoons to the 70's.

Yesterday the beautiful weather made me want to take a drive, so I headed out to Vintage Village in Raleigh, NC, not far from where we live. It is a grouping of cute little cottages and cabins housing different vendors who sell the most marvelous vintage stuff at very reasonable prices. It also includes SuzAnna's, which is in a large building that also houses several different sellers. If you are trying to find anything particular, this is the place to come! (Note: This is where I purchased the items in my earlier post, "Farmhousing the Kitchen".) In a future post I will share some of my more recent finds, but in the meantime I thought that you would like to see some of the pictures I took while there.

Here are two of the entrance signs down by the road...

...and some of the shops...

...and inside SuzAnna's...





I couldn't resist purchasing the little boy's
dress on the left!



Well, I hope you enjoyed the tour! Have a great day.

Sue

Hooray for the first day of Autumn!

"I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself,

than to be crowded on a velvet cushion."

--THOREAU



                         

                         

Buttons, buttons, buttons....

Happy Sunday!

I have been trying to organize my workspace a little and decided to sort out my collection of old buttons, which I like to use in collage and fabric art. Hmmm....how to sort? Some are still on the original cards that they came on. Do I sort these by color, type, or theme?  I love these because the cards are so interesting and I marvel at the price that was paid for them "back in the day". Sorting by color or theme sounds good, as the cards will likely be used on a collage.  I have some buttons that were tied together and are all different. I like these a lot as they make me think of that lady who so long ago saved every button that she had left over from another project, and kept them tied together so that she would know where to find them. Sorting most of these will not be a problem, since most of them are beige. And, most of my buttons are loose, so I have put them in old mason jars. A no-brainer on that one.

I did sort some of the buttons so that I could take the following pictures, but I think I'll put them back in the big jar that they were in and worry about it another day! Maybe I'll clean my freezer instead.

Buttons on cards...



These are all pearly buttons on on green cards.

 


Look at these small buttons for children. I love these!

  


These buttons all have some bling.





Pearlies. Note the ones on the string at the bottom! Paid only two dollars.

 

And of course, buttons in jars...



I hope that you're having fun with your collections today!

Sue

Some More Fabric Art and Garden!

Good morning! I hope that you are enjoying the beginning of a great weekend.

In a recent post I promised to include another fabric art piece that was part of a set that I did in red, black, and beige, so here goes.

Also, here is the picture should you like to use it in a piece of your own art. I can't believe that someone just cut out this beautiful photo from an old album and could possibly part with it. This is exactly how I bought it.

When I initially tried to download these pictures to Blogger it looked like they did not "take", but I discovered that they were indeed in Picasa. Still learning the ropes on this! Another pic that I wanted to share was the following one that I took this summer of a Double Tiger Lily. I guess that I am thinking of Fall and all things orange. This lovely was about 3 feet high, and bloomed for at least six weeks. This is not part of the daylily family that I showed you in an earlier post. 

I have been dreaming about some anticipated art projects, but the weather has been beautiful and I have found it hard to stay indoors (potted some mums this week!).

Have a great day!

Sue

A visit to Stonewall Kitchen

Hello friends. I hope that you are having a good week!

A couple of days ago my husband was yet again a willing victim of one of my kitchen creations. Each July we drive up to New England to visit family, and we usually take a few side trips to new places and revisit some others that we love. On this year's list was a visit to Stonewall Kitchen in York, Maine. If you ever visit specialty shops, you may have already seen their label. All of their food products are delicious. The store at this location also processes their food and has a cooking school where I would love (!!) to take a class. They also sell some great stuff for your kitchen. So-o-o, needless to say, while we were up there I bought a bunch of specialty items, and used one of the products in one of their recipes, which came out delicious. It was the Stuffed Chicken Breasts using their Fig Raisin Chutney. You could probably use any chutney that you have on hand, but I am a lover of anything "fig". If you would like to try it, the recipe can be found at the Stonewall website, which is: stonewallkitchen.com. You can search recipes by the product used, in this case Fig Raisin Chutney.  (Sorry, I tried for the first time to work linking magic on blogger, to no avail, and finally gave up. Will keep working on it!)

I deviated from the recipe slightly by securing the rolls with toothpicks, and not cutting the chicken rolls into pinwheels before serving, as they did not slice very well. I used the goat cheese, but next time I think I'll try it with Brie. I considered the possibility of sometime making these very small and serving them as snack food at a gathering, as I prepared mine a few hours before actually cooking them, leaving them in the fridge on a plate covered with foil. Oh, and I did finish them off in the oven as I am rather paranoid about eating chicken that has not been fully cooked. Before putting them in the oven, I added a sprinkle of white wine to the pan. Not uncommon for me to do that!!




The Product


I can't resist a beautiful garden, so below are some pictures taken during our visit to Stonewall:

 I hope you enjoyed the tour. Eat well and stay well!

Sue

A Day of Reflection and Thanks

Hello friends.

I thought that this day should not be about pretty gardens, home decor, or creativity, but rather a day of reflection and thanks. We all remember where we were on that awful day 11 years ago. I remember that I was at work,  and we were all called into the conference room to watch something on TV. It seemed that a jet had accidentally crashed into one of the World Trade Center towers up in NY.  I was living and working in Florida at the time, but had grown up in New York not far from Manhattan, so I couldn't believe what had happened. I thought it must have been something like when the Empire State Building was hit by a plane many years before. We watched in horror as a second jet hit the other tower, thinking briefly that it was yet another accident, and what were the odds of that? As the truth unfolded, we accomplished little that day and worked at our jobs through a fog of shock.

Years before the events of 9/11, my Dad had worked in the City, watched those towers being built, and had worked in one of them for a period of time. I could not help but identify with those that on that morning watched their spouses going off to work and their children heading out for school, never realizing that this would be the last they would ever see them again. To this day, like so many of others, I cannot think of that time without a catch in my throat, a tear in my eye, and a loss of breath. It is the same feeling that I get when I am reminded of the Kennedy assassination, and the little boy that saluted his father as his casket went by.

I was, and still am, thankful for first responders, unsung heroes, American flags that fly everywhere, and living in a great nation that comes together when the need arises.

I hope that you and yours have peaceful day.

Sue

Summer's End and Daylilies

Good morning! I'm sorry that I haven't posted in a week, but the days seem to have gotten away from me.

It was so nice this morning to wake up to the temperature being only 55 outside, with little humidity. My neighbor and I walk each morning and it felt GREAT not to have to work up a sweat! So...naturally, since we are supposed to have days in the low 80s this week with cool nights, my thoughts are on getting my garden ready for Fall.

My favorite flower in the garden is the daylily. During the summer I cross- pollinated some of them and was blessed with several seed pods as a result. It is recommended that you chill the seeds for about 3 weeks in the fridge before planting them, and a lot of them came due for planting this weekend, so I was busy with that. Note, there are many good sites on the Web that detail this process, so I will not bore you with the scientific chatter here. It will be fun to see what I get when they finally bloom next year or the year after.

Of course, with Fall coming, I have been reflecting a bit on our daylilies when they were in bloom. Our garden is only three years old, but I have managed to accumulate about 130 different varieties, so here are photos of just a few:

I obtain daylilies however I can, whether it be from nurseries, garden club plant sales, divisions, roots, or by mail order. Some of the prettiest, however, are the wild ones that you see growing by the side of the road. I guess there is something so special about beautiful flowers that were lovingly planted so many years ago and managed not only to survive, but to multiply year after year.

We are fortunate in that we live in farm country. The picture below shows an old abandoned farmhouse a few miles down from where we live. You can see the house if you look really hard through the trees. (Sorry, but it was hard to get a good picture.) Were these flowers planted lovingly by a farm wife one day before she had to cook dinner? Or perhaps by her children as a relief from their summer farm chores? In May, my gracious husband assisted me by digging out a few clumps to move to our house. They bloom only in orange. Of course, you can see by the overgrowth in front of this old house that it was not an easy feat; we went out there with long sleeves and jeans, big shovels, and ducked poison ivy all the way! Oh, did I mention the bug repellent? Footnote: They are doing well at our house, but will not bloom until next year. Worth the wait, I daresay!! And hopefully, the person who planted them so long ago will be happy that some of her plants will be nurtured by another generation of gardeners.

Well, I hope that you are enjoying your day. Until next time!

Sue


Labor Day



Photo from shorpy.com

"All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence"--Martin Luther King

Let us be grateful for the work opportunities that we have, and hopeful for those who are without them. Sue

Linguine Salad to Share with Friends

Greetings from The Perch. I hope you are enjoying your long weekend as I am.

Yesterday our neighbors had a get-together and we all brought a dish to share, so I made one of my old favorites, Linguine Salad. It is a snap to make, pretty to look at, and most people really enjoy it. The recipe was given to me by a gal who worked with me in Florida many years ago, but sadly, she has since passed away. I still have the copy of her handwritten recipe, which makes this dish all the more special.

Here is the recipe if you would like to make it. Enjoy!

Linguine Salad

1 lb Linguine, cooked, rinsed and drained

One large tomato (or 3-4 plum tomatoes), chopped fine

One cucumber, chopped fine

One onion, chopped fine

½ jar McCormick’s Salad Supreme Seasoning

Salt and Pepper to taste

6-7 oz. of Kraft Balsamic Tomato Basil "Anything" Dressing (Note: Use regular dressing, as the salad will be too dry if you use the low calorie versions.)







Mix the chopped ingredients together, adding the salt, pepper

 and Salad Supreme Seasoning.

 Add the cooked pasta and salad dressing, and stir well. Chill. Top with basil leaves just prior to serving.

I hope your weekend is being spent with family, friends, and good food!!

Sue