vintage — Page 4

Some Christmas Finds and a Few More Thoughts

December 11, 2019 at 11:13 am by Claudia

I had an errand or two to run yesterday and I also had to pick Rick up from the bus station, as Doug has been out of town and won’t return until today. On the way to the bus station, I stopped at a local antique shop. Actually, it’s a barn and there are multiple dealers there, including my friend Sydney of Fox Run Antiques. Same place where I found the egg cup cubby. Happily, I ran into Sydney and had a nice chat with her.

I hadn’t been there for a while and I’ve been on a search for some more vintage Christmas. I found two more putz houses:

The green house was made by the Dolly Toy Company, which I referenced the other day.

They were modestly priced at $4 and $5 each, which – for fairly well-preserved vintage – is a good deal.

Then I found another bluebird ornament!

You might remember that I have another bluebird ornament, slightly different in design. It has a “thumbprint” indentation. This one does not. Both of them have the same style of bluebird. It was only $3. I had a brief fantasy of slowly collecting bluebird ornaments and having a whole tree of them, with a bluebird tree-topper. Wouldn’t that be fun? But, since it’s taken me several years just to find two of them, that seems unlikely. If you ever see one, let me know!

With tax, $13 for all three. You can’t beat it.

We had some snow overnight, but it’s just a coating and I can see some of it melting already. Because it was rain transitioning to snow, it was a wet snow and it’s currently coating all the tree branches. Very pretty.

This is my favorite kind of snow because it’s pretty, there isn’t much of it, and the driveway doesn’t need to be shoveled because it stayed wet. If we had this kind of thing all winter long, I’d be fine.

We finished Season 3 of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel the night before last and now we’re watching it over again, which is what we did with the two previous seasons. Excellent. Brilliant. A heads up on upcoming series: Schitt’s Creek returns to PopTV and the CBC in early January and Grace and Frankie returns to Netflix in late January.

Thank you for your kind comments yesterday. I knew you would understand my sadness. Frankly, if you didn’t understand, you would most likely have left this blog long ago because I’ve never hidden the way I feel about these things. I try not to be judgmental – it’s a constant struggle because I’m only human – but those who think of animals as expendable and as beings we shouldn’t concern ourselves with are not going to be my pals. Likewise those who berate me and tell me I shouldn’t waste my worry on animals and, instead, worry about humans – as if caring about one automatically rules out caring about the other. That’s a false dichotomy.

Having ‘dominion’ over animals means caring about and for them. It doesn’t give us free rein to slaughter them or abuse them or hurt them. And I don’t believe we are ‘superior’ to them – far from it.

Happy Wednesday.

A Little Shopping Trip with Don

December 9, 2019 at 11:28 am by Claudia

An all-day-long rainy day. Gray skies, lots of snow on the ground, and rain make for a dreary landscape. I have lots of stuff to do today, so I’ll be settling in at my desk upstairs with Christmas music playing in the background.

I got an unexpected job offer from Hartford Stage for January and February of next year. Just 5 days work spread over several weeks, but it’s on a new production of Jane Eyre, directed by Elizabeth Williamson, who I’ve worked with before and who is an Associate Artistic Director there. I’ll be the dialect coach. It’s always good to know you have some work coming up in the new year.

Don and I took a little trip to the Clinton Shops yesterday. I wanted him to see a vintage camera that I thought he’d like – though I had no idea of the price – and I wanted to see those darned putz sheep again.

While I was there, the owner came up to me and said she follows me on Instagram and that she loved our stories of our trip to Paris. I’ve spoken to her before. Her name is Nina. We had a lovely conversation and while we were talking, her husband stopped by, so all four of us chatted for quite a while. It’s a lovely little shop.

Don looked at several vintage cameras which were modestly priced and he thought about them and thought about them some more. I looked at putz sheep and I thought about them and thought about them some more.

He bought the camera – a Kodak from the 30s, called the Jiffy Kodak. The minute you look at it, you’ll see why I fell for it.

Hello, Art Deco styling! It’s in good condition and I’m happy to say Don bought it. We’re going to put a shelf up above his desk that can hold some of his other cameras – all of them vintage.

As for the sheep…I held one, then another, I looked at their coats and their faces (and the price.) I put them down and walked away and chatted with the owner. Then I went back. I was especially drawn to two of them, no more than 2 ½ inches high. One had an adorable head tilt. The other had big eyes and a fluffy coat. Both of them had pink collars, so they’re girls.

I couldn’t decide between them. So they both came home with me.

Some of these photos were taken late in the day, so I had to position the sheep on my laptop under my reading light.

A little blurry, but you can see the big eyes on this girl.

Head tilt. It reminded me of the way our dogs would tilt their heads when I used a certain inflection while speaking to them.

Most Putz sheep were made in Germany. The name is derived from the German – I’ve seen the definition as ‘put’ or ‘putter around’ as in ‘putz around the house,’ and as ‘decorate.’ Entire villages were made out of animals and houses – a Christmas tradition in Germany and, later, in the Moravian communities in Pennsylvania. They come in several sizes. The two above are on the petite side. The sheep I bought the other day is larger. The Lamb with the Party Hat, which is the symbol of my blog, is very small. Sometimes, you see “Germany” on the collar or on a leg. I have a couple that have the word Germany on the collar.

Putz houses also had their origin in Germany, but once a certain size of electric light bulb became available, cardboard houses with holes in the back for a light started to be made in Japan. They were inexpensive, pennies apiece. And they were also manufactured here, as seen in the house I bought the other day.

I found one yesterday that I bought for two reasons: it was the least expensive, and it had a design I’d not seen before.

The scalloped edge reminds me a bit of a castle, but the house itself reminds me of California stucco homes. I’ve never seen this design before as most putz houses are more traditional in style.

I have no mantle. The top of the piano is already occupied. So I put them on the McCoy pieces I have in the den:

Germans and German-Americans used to create villages, complete with tree branches and various items found outdoors. Eventually, as the Christmas tree became popular, they would often place the villages at the base of the tree. Once the houses became more popular, glitter and snow were added.

The putz sheep were a part of these displays and they were also used in Nativity scenes.

I could put the houses underneath our tree, but I’m afraid Don will forget they’re there and step on them!

I’ve got 10 putz sheep now and I’m going to rearrange them later today. I’m crazy about them.

Happy Monday.

Snow. And Then Some More Snow.

December 3, 2019 at 9:39 am by Claudia

After an exhausting stretch yesterday with the snow blower and the shovel – trying to get through layers of sleet, snow, and more sleet – we figured we were all done.

But then we got about 5 more inches last night. This time, the snow is quite light and powdery. So we’ll be back out there today, shoveling, snow blowing, and salting. The sun is out, as so often happens after a storm. We went outside early this morning to take some pictures because it was so beautiful.

You can see the mountains in this shot. No pristine shed shot, however, as we moved our cars over there so we can shovel. School has been cancelled for the past two days, many businesses were closed; it was a very long snow ‘event.’

Since we were housebound for most of the day yesterday, we did this:

We’re very pleased with this tree; the shape, height, and scent. I would say 98% of the ornaments are vintage, many of them Shiny Brites. There are also some ornaments that I’ve had since I was quite young. And then there are the large creamy bottlebrush ornaments that I purchased when I was working at my friend Heidi’s shop. I have nine of them and I love them. I think that large pop of off-white adds definition to the tree.

Here it is from inside the den:

I love being able to see it from both rooms. Why didn’t we think of this long ago? Probably because of the dogs and the paths they took from room to room. We used to have our real tree nestled back into the corner of the den where the dollhouse now sits. It was the safest place at the time.

We don’t plan to have a big ‘gift’ Christmas. We had our Paris trip (a huge gift!) and we decided the frame (framing is never cheap) of our Paris lithograph is our gift to each other. There will be a few little gifts under the tree, but mostly this Christmas is about the tree and being together here in our cottage. About being grateful.

Happy Tuesday.

Some Christmas Finds and a Few More Thoughts

A Little Shopping Trip with Don

Snow. And Then Some More Snow.

Lambs Like to Party

A Note

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