Hearts: Gifts from the Sea

Happy Valentines Day!

My gift of hearts for you.

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Driftwood...

Sea Glass...

Stones...

Love and beauty are found everywhere!

Have a wonderful day!

February Greetings

"All Nature seems at work,

Slugs leave their lair.

The bees are stirring-

Birds are on the wing,

And Winter slumbering

In the open air

Wears on his face

A dream of Spring."

--S. T. Coleridge

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Happy February my friends.

I can't believe that we already a few days into this month.

Where did January go?

In this part of the country,

February usually marks the beginning of the end of winter,

and I must confess that though our winter was relatively mild,

I am looking forward to spending time outdoors

and working in the garden soon.

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The beautiful image above is once again taken from:

Nature Notes of an Edwardian Lady,

the compilation of works painted by Edith Holden,

which she entitled "Nature Notes 1905",

and which I previously wrote about here.

I hope that your February has gotten off to a wonderful start!

Happy New Year 2017!!

Happy New Year friends! I can't believe that 2016 is behind us. Where did the time go? I hope that you had a great holiday season.

I thought that I would share the above print for this first day of January. I scanned it from a vintage book that I purchased some time before the holidays. The name of the book is Nature Notes of an Edwardian Lady and it is a compilation of works painted by a gal named Edith Holden, which she entitled "Nature Notes 1905". The book is filled with her beautiful watercolor paintings of flowers, plants, birds and butterflies. Also included are landscape scenes featuring other animals, along with Edith's personal observations of the nature and wildlife in her native area during Edwardian times in England. Apparently this book was compiled from her original works, where her hand-writing was done only in rough draft.

Throughout this year I hope to share with you some other beautiful pieces of her art. I also purchased a book about her later works, and a third one about Edith herself. Needless to say, I have not had time to read them yet!

I hope that this year brings you great joy, good health, and time to do the things that you would really like to do. Thank you for visiting my blog this year and leaving lovely comments. I treasure your friendship!

Edwardian Postcards: Grete Reinwald

Hello to all and happy Tuesday!

Prior to the start of the holiday season, I was doing a search on Etsy for Edwardian seasonal postcards featuring children. I happened upon quite a few of one particular little girl who was just beautiful, and wondering who she was, I finally found some that were labeled with her name.

She was Grete Reinwald (May 25, 1902 – May 24, 1983), a famous German child model when she was young, who then went on to become a stage and film actress. She had the sweetest face when she posed for the postcards, so I couldn't resist buying a few, seen below, and will hopefully use them in some future art pieces. I think you will agree that they are so pretty, and you may even already own some postcards with her on them.

You may find additional information about her on the internet, but I found a one-time blog post particularly informative, and you can read it here.

I love these and thought that they will make

some lovely Valentine Day's and spring, or Easter,

greeting cards...

These Christmas cards are stunning, I think.

Of course, I love the sepia-toned variety...

...but the hand-tinted ones,

with just a trace of color,

are also so lovely...

A real collector of post cards probably wants those

of the mint variety, with no writing on the back,

but I am partial to ones where I can see the

postmark and stamp,

not to mention the beautiful handwriting of those

who lived so long ago...

Though in the past I have not been a fan of some of the

Edwardian postcards because I thought the children

looked too "posed" and the coloring too fake,

this season I revised my opinion of some of them,

and treated myself to these few as a Christmas present to myself.

Have you bought anything new lately for your self?

If so, what was it, and how will you use it?

As ever, thanks so much for stopping by to visit.

Christmas in July: Vintage Santa Photos

Merry Christmas! Well, not exactly, but I am celebrating "Christmas in July" in my etsy shop by listing a few vintage Santa Claus photos.

I have scanned six photos from my personal collection 

and made them available as digital downloads....

They would be perfect for holiday cards or gift tags.

Or, a few of them would be lovely incorporated into a Christmas banner.

If you like them you can find them here.

I would love to see what you might make with them!

Don't eat too much Christmas ham today.

The Patience of a Dove

Hello!


For what amounted to almost two weeks up at The Nest this past trip, we did a bit of bird-watching, and it was all done right from our little screened porch.


Early on, we noticed that a mamma dove was sitting on a nest that she built on top of the outside of our neighbor's air conditioner. Smart little lady that she was, she had the carport roof over her head and was up high enough that no one could easily spot her. For the whole time that we were up there, she sat on those eggs morning, noon and night, getting a reprieve once in a while when papa came to relieve her. She would then fly off for a short while and he would sit on the eggs.

I think that these were mourning doves, which I have read are also referred to as turtle doves. I hear that they tend to mate for life and remain monogamous. Able to raise up to six broods a year, both parents work together to incubate their young.

After spending two weeks watching the patience shown by these beautiful creatures, I could not help but admire them and feel a little sad when we had to leave without seeing the babies hatch. I hope that they are still in the nest when we return.

Do you see the mama bird?

This was the best photo that I could take

without getting close enough to disturb her...

And speaking of mama birds,

today this old bird

effectively becomes the mother of a forty-year-old daughter.

Birds fly.

So does time.

Happy Birthday Kym!

Have a beautiful day!

Just think...

At the end of 2015 I purchased an inexpensive 2016 calendar. The company that printed it is "DaySpring", and the tag line under the company name is "Your heart. God's love". The cardboard that supported the calendar was not just a plain piece of cardboard; on it was printed the most beautiful sentiment which was credited to Roy Lessin, the DaySpring co-founder. This has been sitting on my desk ever since, and I read these words of inspiration every time at sit down to post to this blog. Here I would like to share it with you.

"Just think,

you're here not by chance,

but by God's choosing.

His hand formed you 

and made you 

the person you are.

He compares you to no one else--

you are one of a kind.

You lack nothing

that His grace can't give you.

He has allowed you to be here

at this time in history

to fulfill His special purpose

for this generation."

Underneath this sentiment was also printed the following,

a verse which we have all seen before

and one of my personal favorites:

To every thing there is a season, 

and a time to every purpose under the heaven.

ECCLESIASTES 3:1

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I thought I'd share the photo of the baby in the pram.

I haven't shared a photo with friends in a while,

and wanted you to have this beauty.

Right click and save to your computer.

 

I wonder what God's purpose was for her?

For me?

For any of us?

I guess that time will tell.

To Dorothy from Lillian: A Story (Part Two)

Did Dorothy live in Louisville, KY, 

or is this only where the church was?

Did she spend the summer of 1927 at the

Crab Orchard Springs Hotel

in Crab Orchard, KY,

where she received this letter?

Dorothy was a model in a style show at the Elks Auxiliary

February 9th.

Was this the following year?...

How did the little boy in the toy plane relate to these gals?

It is surely an adorable photo...

The fold-out caption in the photo below on the left

states: "And those button pictures --why,

Martha Gunterman and everyone else 

were wearing them".

Have you ever seen those photo buttons in antique stores?

Did photographers come around and take the photos

for them?...

Some more local goings-on,

and at last,

another letter mailed to Miss Dorothy Reck 

in Louisville, KY.

Her name has appeared 

quite often in this scrapbook...

And on the next-to-last page,

far right on top,

there is a newspaper photo of pretty Miss Reck!...

So what was the relationship of Lillian to Dorothy,

and why did Lillian give the book to her?

Here is a glimpse of the letter that was sent from Lillian to Dot

at the hotel in Crab Orchard Kentucky...

They were cousins!

And who was the "mixed media artist"?

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As promised, this was the favorite of my antique finds

from Florida.

I started looking at this book in the shop,

and couldn't bear leaving it there and never finding out

 more about Lillian and Dorothy.

After reading all of the pages,

(a lot more than I could show in these posts)

along with the few letters,

I still don't know much about them,

and didn't see any photos of Lillian.

I didn't want to show you all of the letters,

as it seemed that they should remain private.

I hope that you enjoyed looking at some of this sweet book, though.

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Dear Lillian and Dorothy:

My name is Sue.

It was nice getting to know you.

How did your lives end up? 

Did you remain close to each other throughout your lives?

I'd like to think that you did.

To Dorothy from Lillian: A Story (Part One)

Once upon a time,

in the 1920's,

a young gal kept track of the local

happenings that related to her life.

Her name was Lillian.

Upon the graduation of Dorothy,

Lillian gave the scrapbook to her...

Lillian kept track of sorority members,

theater parties,

bunco parties,

and birthdays...

...requests for submissions

to their school newspaper...

...not to mention Freshman stunts to

advertise school plays...

...and what appear to be other local happenings...

Who was Lillian, 

and who was Dorothy?

They weren't much different than the young

gals of today,

admiring the good looking athletes...

Photos of friends were lovingly clipped

from newspapers and pasted into the

scrapbook...

...along with well wishes,

class schedules,

and letters to Dorothy...

Who was Lillian?

Who was Dorothy,

and what did she look like?

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To be continued!

Some finds along the way...

Happy June! One of the prettiest months of the year, I might say.

I promised you that I would show you what I purchased at Retro Rosie and Cobwebs when we were in Florida, so here goes!

Some great vintage photos.

Do I collect these???...

Vintage fishing lures,

which were packaged with the old maps...

Two Victorian circle wheel silk braid trims.

They also came packaged with the old

Montgomery Ward catalog page you see behind them...

Pretty little trinkets that came packaged

with this old original baby photo...

The second best find was this old garden shovel...

Can you not resist the blue patina on the handle?

And no, I will not be using it in the garden...

Did you catch that I said that this was the second best find?

I will share the first best find on another post,

as it may take more than a few photos to tell the story.

Stay tuned!