Tis the witching time.

Happy Halloween my bloggers.  I always welcome the moment of time you afford to spend with me.  When I'm not planning my time in the sea, I always enjoy a pleasant ride around the block with my favorite mode of transportation.  Honk and wave if you see me fly by.

Non-commercial, public domain photo. 

No snow for those of us who presently reside in the southern states.  Beautiful, fall weather with the tail end of the northeaster' breeze from up north made it perfect for a little running around with my sister.  As always, sis and I have a marvelous time gossiping, shopping and just being silly.  We laugh so hard and often that you would think we would lose 10 pounds on the sillieness alone.

Not a lot of treasure found,but what I did find was worth the trip. 

Check out this pair.  LOL.  A perfect, late 19 century water pitcher with pretty gold lustre trim.  These pitchers are usually chipped up and cracked and this beauty is in perfect condition. Even missing the crazing often found at the bottom.  Love Love Love the 1850-60s box with pretty aqua milk paint.   The dovetailing on this piece is amazing. 

Closeup of the large pitcher.  You know you got a workout lifting this bad boy when it was full of water.

Found a pair of beautiful Italian tapestries...on the cheap.  Quality pieces and highly detailed. Brought them in to the Queen on Sunday and already sold the pastoral scene above.

My personal favorite. Smaller than the one above but this 18 " by 12" weave is finer and more detailed than the pastoral scene.  

Another unique find.  A hand carved banded onyx vase/jar that stands 11 inches tall.  Very heavy and the label below it says Restoration Hardware.  If you are not familiar with this marvelous chain, then you must visit their web page or store.  The devil is in the design details and this store offers a comfortable yet cerebral design to your life.

A warm and toasty Pendleton motor robe.  These carriage or motor robe blankets are the perfect size to wrap up in when the cold comes to call.  Used on steam ships, travelers would wrap themselves in them as they communed on the wooden lounge chairs...every open Model Car car had a few and of course those who still utilized carriages.  The quality of Pendleton wool blankets lives on and this new, with original tags Pendleton blanket will keep someone nice and toasty. 

A gorgeous and heavy Williamsburg brass chandelier. This bad boy is a big one, almost a yard in width.  Tall faux candles and traditional candle cups.  For those who want traditional American elegance, this chandelier is the perfect choice.

The trees are on fire around our neighborhood and I had to share a few with you. This is the tree in my neighbor's front yard.  What a lovely site that greets me each day.

I am fortunate to work on a beautiful campus at Cisco Systems.  Lots of hardwoods mixed with soft and the views are just lovely.

Brilliant shades of scarlet and orange.

Prettiest parking lot in town.

 What I see as I drive down the campus road to my building.

Happy Halloween my pretties!

 Blessings and treats to you and those you love.  Sea Witch

Hot Apple Crisp

My honey and I spent a marvelous day last Saturday driving around the North GA mountains and through Apple Alley where we purchased several bags of fresh picked apples.  I mentioned in the previous post how much I really enjoyed the variety called "Arkansas Black" and wanted to make up a pan of apple crisp with these meaty apples.    It's an easy peasy recipe so here it is and let me know if you made a pan.

You will need 6-8 apples.   

Peel and slice and put in ice water to keep from turning brown.

When you are finished peeling and slicing, drain water out of bowl and sprinkle 1/2 cup of white granulated sugar and a couple of heavy shakes of ground cinnamon on the apples.  Toss apples in sugar/cinnamon mix and let sit while you prepare the "crisp".  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Crisp ingredients:

• 2 cups of flour
• 1 1/2 cups of sugar
• 2 tsp of baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 unbeaten eggs
• stick of melted butter for final step (do not mix with other ingredients)

Mix all together until crumbly.  Now lay apples in an 11 x 16 baking dish and place crisp mixture over the apples.  Shake a little cinnamon on top of the mixture and now melt one stick of butter (must be real butter) and drizzle over mixture in pan.

Place pan in 350 degrees oven and bake for 40 minutes.

Edges should be browned with juices bubbling along edges.  Of course, the heavenly smell from your kitchen will have men and small children at your door willing to do chores, paint your house, wash your car...anything...for a plate full of this delightful dish.

First plate went to my honey.  I wish I had thought to purchase french vanilla ice cream to put on top.   Nothing like vanilla ice cream sitting on a piping hot plate of out of the oven apple crisp. Sooooo good.  (recipe can be cut in half in you want to use an 8 x 8 baking dish.  Have a wonderful weekend all and autumn blessings to you and those you love.  Sea Witch

Apple Highway

It was a lovely fall weekend in Atlanta with true Indian summer weather making it perfect for a drive into the North Georgia mountains and on to the Apple Highway to buy fresh picked apples straight from the orchards, fresh pressed cider and my honey's favorite...cider donuts.

The leaves are just now bursting with color and we saw splashes of it as we drove into the mountains.

Sunlight through the windshield.

Lake along the highway and just above Dahlonega, GA.

 Large outcroppings of granite signals cliffs are just around the turn.

Ah, I remember these cliffs.  Their were soldiers from Camp Frank DeMerrill (US Army Ranger training camp) practicing rappelling moves and it brought  back memories of my first rappel.  It was on these very cliffs (no more then about 100 feet) that I first learned how to wrap a swiss seat with a rope and then "on belay" and rappel...year - 1974.  Good times.

Nope, that's not family members walking across a meadow.  LOL.  Just a friendly flock of wild turkey's going for a walk.

After a lovely 3 hour drive, we are driving along the apple highway.  Approximately 12 family apple orchards both large and small were open to the public for apple picking, apple tasting, cider pressing and everyone's favorite...fried apple pies and cider donuts.  We purchased several varieties which included Rome Beauties, Cameo, Fuji and a new variety that we had never tasted before...Arkansas Black.  Fell in love the Arkansas Black, a crisp, mildly sweet with a blush of tartness apple with a dark, merlot to black skin.  This is a great eating apple and I'm going to make a simple apple crisp with some of them as well.  Will post that recipe and pics later this week.

Sunday, brought in a few items to the booths at Queen of Hearts.

Nice, Art Deco wool blanket.  The definitive blanket found on American beds throughout the 1930-40s.

Pretty Art Deco bullet boudoir lamp.  This one has a lovely hobnail effect which spreads beads of light throughout the room.

I don't come across true, vintage Halloween items very often as they are highly sought after and usually cost prohibitive for me to purchase.  I lucked out with this great 1940s Halloween noise maker with marvelous lithographs on it.

How cool and yet creepy is this Japanese smoker?  Very popular in the 1930s-50s, the cigarette is placed in the mouth of the smoker and smoke rises out of the ears.  This is one of 7 in a musical series.

I love these yo-yo quilts. 

This is a pretty, vintage table runner from the 1950s.

And finally...had a pair of great wooden shoe lasts that I shoved an autumn pick in and tied up with a ribbon.   These are always fun to decorate for the holidays.  I like the way these turned out.

The other shoe last with a different fall pick.  These make such interesting, autumn decorations.  Hope everyone is enjoying the rest of October.  So hard to believe that the month is nearly over and we will be turning the clocks back on November 6th.  Have a great week. Sea Witch

Occupy your wallet.

If I'm going to support an "occupy" cause then it is going to be "occupy my wallet".  Economic times are tough on everyone and I'm always looking for a way to save a little money. I shop at Hobby Lobby, Michael's and Joann Fabrics for fabrics, trim and embellishments when making costumes for my raviolis.  All offer paper coupons but I usually forget them at the house and often never get to use the 40% off coupon.  I was at Hobby Lobby a week ago picking up more glitter tulle for fairy dresses when the gal at the counter asked if I had their coupon.  I had forgotten it again and she said, "No problem, do you have a smart phone?"  Yea, I do and all I had to do was call up their website, click the coupon button and up pops their 40% coupon.  

They scan the code and I'm golden.  No more cutting out coupons and remembering to bring them and I get to shop more economically...and the coupon loves keeps on giving 'cause I can use it again and again throughout the week.  I love that Hobby Lobby has gone techie.   But wait, there's more!

Joann Fabrics also has a iphone app to utilize their coupons via your iphone and they also have an app for other smart phones to have coupons sent to your mailbox.  Yea baby, because I use their 50% and $5.00 off coupon for fabrics all of the time.

Not to be left out, Michael's also has smart phone coupons.  Love, love, love that I know longer have to carry paper coupons and that a coupon is available at the tip of my smart phone fingers every time I need one. Now that is applied economics.

Now for some dinner savings.  Sold an item on Craig's list this evening so my honey and I met them in our local shopping center (LOL...so clandestine) but it's safe as I don't want to have Craig's list buyers come to my home.  We closed the deal and decided to have a quick dinner at Johnny Carino's.  We had never eaten their before and can be described as a chain that is a notch above Olive Garden.  We were greeted at the door by a friendly hostess and our waitress, Anna, was a doll.  On Monday's, Carino's offers a 1/2 off their family platter meals normally priced right around $30.00 each.  So my honey and I decided to share a Chicken Parm family platter.  Each family platter will feed 3-4 at a table. We added Caesar salads to the meal for $1.49 and while we waited for the meal, we had piping hot, homemade bread with toasted garlic in seasoned olive oil. Heaven. 

I wish I had taken a photo of the platter they brought us. It was huge and filled with four, very large chicken parm cutlets on a bed of spaghetti. Fresh grated cheese all around and we enjoyed a marvelous supper for ... wait for it...$14.00.  Yup, now that is applied economics.  We had so much food left over that we now have our supper for tomorrow evening.  Sweet Anna added two loaves of fresh bread and you just couldn't beat this economical meal by this restaurant. There is quite the menu selection for the family platters and well worth the Monday night restaurant visit.

We will be back again on another Monday as I am dying to try the Lemon/Rosemary chicken.   The price of this Monday offering can't be beat, but what made the meal delightful was our wait staff.  Anna was attentive, charming and fun.  We look forward to being her guest again in the near future.  If you have any good deals or other cost savings apps, please share in your comments so we can all apply a little economic savings to our lives during these tougher financial times.   Sea Witch

 Non-commercial, public domain photos.

It's all about motivation

I came across this delightful International video for water. Ya know, women are simple creatures, a little neon pink light, some fun music and an exercise bike will produce laughter and healthy living.

I gotta get me a bike setup like this. How about you?

A few items found

Busy few weeks and they all got away from me again. I forgot I had a few photos of items I found last weekend.  Not a lot of treasures because it is getting cooler now and the yard sales have all but come to a screeching halt.  This is the time of the year when I really miss living in the midwest...the fall auctions are always a delight.  I love schlepping through the boxes of items piled on the hay wagons.

Found this reproduction antique lock with keys. Works like it should and what fun to have on the back gate if you have one.  Someone appreciated it for what it was because it was in my booth for only 24 hours.

Found a few more blue transfer ware saucers and dessert plates.  I adore vintage/antique transferware and it always moves so quickly.

Pretty serving bowl cover.  So often you find these covers without the bowl.  I used to display a variety of these lids on my dining room wall over a Victorian sideboard. 

A pretty little bone china chocolate cup and saucer. Really fine china with rich cobalt blue and gold slip decoration. 

Found a pretty vintage candlewick cake plate.  It's hiding under the Phaltzgraff coffeepot and oil and vinegar jugs.

Any time I place a lamp on this Victorian desk, the lamp sells.  I've sold three lighting pieces in as many weeks so I moved the pretty  Tiffany Lamp over to it. Besides, I like the way the light from the lamp lights up the eyes on these china doll heads.  LOL

Decided to finally part with this magnificent hand crocheted bedspread.  I has this on an old brass bed in a guest room in the sprawling Victorian we had in Illinois many years ago.  I've been holding on to it for years and came across it as I was cleaning out a trunk.  Decided it needed to move on to a new soul who will love it as much as I did.  Perfect condition with no holes or repairs and is a beautiful ecru color.

So, I need to publish this post and get ready to leave for and apple orchard run. My honey and I are road tripping it through North Georgia today in search of the perfect Apple Pie and Apple Cider donuts.  Photos will follow.  Have a marvelous day everyone and blessings to you and those you love.  Sea Witch

Re-do's

Loving the fall season this year.  The weather has been lovely and this weekend was autumn breezy with cooler temps. Still nice enough to run around in the last of your summer dresses but needing to add a light sweater or jacket.  Did a couple of re-do's over the week and took them into my booths this weekend.   I got so involved in them that I forgot to take before and after photos so all you get are my after photos. LOL

I bought this for $8.00.  A lovely wrought iron chair that had many coats of white and gold paint on it and still had the original seat pad which was a highly stained harvest yellow velvet.  I cleaned it up and spray painted it a satin black and then redid the cushion with a red/orange taffeta with a black velvet brocade pattern.  I love, love, love the way this chair turned out.   Amazing what a fresh coat of paint, pretty fabric and a heavy duty staple gun can do.

Here is a closer photo of the fabric, love the way the light changes the color of the fabric.  Taffeta is one of my favorites because of its iridescence.  I placed on the seat a wonderful "Witch's Sorting Hat" that was hand made by an artist in Northern Florida. 

More Re-do's...I find small black frames throughout the year (mostly from Goodwill at about 99 cents).  I then print out digital photos of crows and bugs and spiders and bats that I made and place them in the frames.  Priced to go at $4.00 these Halloween items sell out each year. 

 Behold, the witch's hat.  I really like the cone shape of these glass inserts for candles.  I picked a few of these up from my local Goodwill and they look great for placing tiny witch's hats under the glass.  I glue them to black plates and hide the glue with a little glitter.  These do not sit in the booth long.

One of my Halloween re-do displays. I have them throughout my main booth and a few in my Victorian booth. Please feel free to "swipe" and then build upon these re-do ideas.   I love seeing what others come up with.

My fox hat sold the weekend I put it out, so I moved the huge, velvet and hologram sequined "Mac Daddy" hat.  Neat hat for Halloween costume.

My sons always wanted over the top costumes for Halloween and my youngest (at age 17) wanted me to make him an Elmo costume for a contest he had entered.  Imagine if you will, a 6 foot Elmo or rather 7 foot once he got the huge head on. The wearer would look through the mouth.  Needless to say, he came home with the $200.00 prize.  He spent the next year visiting children in the local hospital dressed as Elmo.  They loved it when Elmo would come to visit and my son always got a kick out of the shrieks of laughter from the kids.  Both sons are grown with children of their own so it was time to send the costume on to other wearers.  

Now for a few items I found this week.  This marvelous turkey sugar shaker. He is huge and great looking and in perfect condition.  Circa 1960s.  Pretty plum colored silk mums pin for your favorite jacket or sweater.

Nice Pfaltzgraf tall coffee pot with the brown, Village pattern. 

Vintage cardboard turkey.   I found four of these when cleaning out my Victorian sideboard.  Acquired these at a mid-west auction from a school teachers estate.  You know these were on her  bulletin boards every November.  Great colors.

The honeycomb turkey to the left is from 1987 but the huge cardboard turkey was from the same estate noted above.  This bad boy is over 24 inches in length.

These two are also from the teacher's estate.  All four have colors that are true and in great condition.  All date to the late 1950 and early 1960s.

I had this turkey on my table for years but like anything, it's time for him to enjoy another's table.  From the 1980s, it is a pretty terra cotta centerpiece.  

After I got my two booths squared away, I had just walked out of the Queen and into the parking lot when I hear a man say to me, "Hey, stranger."  OMG...Jimmy.  Haven't seen you and Lyn in ages and what a delight to see two old friends from when we all had booths at Vintage Village.   Lyn was in the Queen and hoping to see me so I turned right around and went back into the store looking for my old friend.  There she was, looking as lovely as every, and we got to "gossip" a bit about our lives and our booths.  It's always so nice to meet up with friends, especially those you haven't seen in awhile.  So here's a shout out to Lyn and Jimmy...who by the way have booths in at "the Warehouse" in Monroe, GA.  They always have the prettiest items and at great prices.  I will be visiting their booth during the annual holiday walk.  I know I will come back with treasure.

The leaves are just now beginning to change on the trees in my front yard.  Still mostly green with a few patches of purple showing up, but this leaf could not wait to show off it's brilliant scarlet color.  It was the only leaf on the entire tree that dared to be so brazen so I had to snap a photo of it.

I'm knee deep in costuming for the grandchildren and I will be posting on that later in the week.  Hope everyone had a lovely weekend and...Blessings to you and those you love.  Sea Witch