Effects of the Sparkling Wand

Margo has been helping me the past few weeks, and it is pure joy to have her with us!

She spiffed up these vintage crystal boudoir lamps, using a hand-held steamer, and don't they just sparkle?


They are about 12  inches tall, and use the small decorator bulbs. Just a warm, sparkly glow for your bedside.

Elisha Ann's birthday :^)

My daughter's birthday today! Here is the bouquet God provided for her in our overgrown yard:

 fragrant apple blossoms, sweet lilac blooms, and cheerful kerria japonica

The joyful growth of Spring has a power similar to that of love: it covers a multitude of sins :^)

Back at The Living Room, the earthly joy of a well-brewed Yunnan tea lifts my soul in thanksgiving. This tea from Barnes & Watson is rich and slightly smoky.

While I'm sipping, I'm reading Isaiah 62 and Psalm 62 in honor of the nation of Israel's 62nd year. God's faithful promises and everlasting mercy are greater causes for thanksgiving.

Tea break is over. Entering more eclectic inventory. Here's a game for you. Can you match each picture to its clue phrase in this list?
~ vintage crystal boudoir lamp (ok, that was too easy)
~ Ecclesiastes 1.1 (at least 3 matches here)
~ selling because there's a new toddler in the house
~ Fitz & Floyd
~ ahoy
~ from an oyster, such beauty
~ "Put me on a pedestal; in fact I come with a pedestal."
~ Isaac Merritt's invention in 1853, upgraded and replicated here in 1998
~ a good place to begin for a beginner
~ also known as "fat", "top", this one is stuffed

New baker's wares coming...

We sold our last Kittyhugs Baking Company cupcakes today.

Moment of silence.

But it was interrupted by the news that a friend of a friend has started a catering and baking company that features...cupcakes!

Next week, Anne Marie of "treats by anne marie" will bring us our first order. Hope you can come and give your considered opinion. Our first sampling (coconut) was very well-received.

Meanwhile, check out Anne Marie's blog from which I have snitched one photo:

Shall we Bonanzle?

Give me a little while before you expect much out of it, but I'm trying something new:

http://www.bonanzle.com/booths/TheLivingRoom
Go take a look and let me know what you think.

Farewell, Kittyhugs Baking Company!

Jacky and Roger delivered our cupcakes today along with the wistful news that they will be closing Kittyhugs Baking Company in the next week. So, it's sad for us, but hopefully the opening of a new chapter for them. Whatever comes, here's praying God's best for them, and that it will be as rich and sweet and fun as Jacky's creative treats have been:

Jacky and Roger, thanks for your helpfulness with our startup, for the great baking, and the sweet memories. And, Roger, do go on the trip to New York! Looking back 5 years from now, you'll be gladder you did than not, don't you think :^)

The Mystery of Rose Congou

A friend's request for a rose-scented tea sent me on a small quest to see why these usually appear as "Rose Congou".

A quick trip to www.freedictionary.com/congou resulted in the basic info:

 "A grade of Chinese black tea, obtained from the fifth and largest leaf
gathered from a shoot tip of a tea plant."
[from Chinese (Amoy) "kong hu tē", i.e. tea prepared with care]

...but here's a delightful site blending tea lore and poetry that brings rose congou into a more lovely focus. Rather than repeat what is offered there, let me refer you:

http://www.teamuse.com/article_031001.html

Speaking of focus, every blog entry needs something pretty to look at, so here is a Royal Albert "American Beauty" teapot worthy of holding newly brewed, fragrantly steaming rose congou:

This trio is part of a 17-piece set in excellent condition, serving four, available at The Living Room:

The Curious Case of the Antique Commode

Here's one of the pieces that came in from the Spokane wheat farm's homestead heritage (although I think they must have sold a few crops before acquiring this one :^)

a round commode disguised as a "library stool"...

...complete with retractable step:

It's been hard finding a comparison, although the top half of the commode looks very much like this piece from "1818", a UK auction house:

So, I'm thinking, the bottom 10 inches with the step stool was an upgrade.

Another puzzle is the actual chamber pot that sits in the commode. The pot fits just right in the commode, and its glaze is aged and crackled (I couldn't find my way to saying "the glaze is aged and crazed", although I think that is the proper term). But it doesn't seem antiquitous, does it?

A bit of sleuthing finds that the Royal Winton Grimwades mark on the bottom, per http://www.thepotteries.org/mark/g/grimwades.html, dates from 1934 to 1950:

So, we have the curious case of a Victorian commode that was retrofitted with a new chamber pot in the mid-1900's.

I hope to show you more of the wheat farm treasures soon, but it is late. Time, perhaps, to retire to the Sherlock Holmes smoking chair, not to smoke, but to sip tea and ponder. Luckily, exactly such a chair was included in the Spokane Connection's delivery. You can just see the old fellow brooding away in such a chair, can't you?

Changes in our neighborhood

Just as Grocery Outlet is preparing to leave this market square by the end of this week (moving down the road by Kenmore Lanes on Bothell Way), the Post Office is preparing to move in. Don't know just when, but it must be soon, because here's the welcome sight that greeted us as we drove up to the store this morning (and, yes, we got permission to post this :^):

Then, the new library will be built where the post office had been.
Reminds me of, "Clean cup! Clean cup!" at the Mad Hatter's Tea Party.
Which reminds me of another cute yard bunny photo to share with you, this one posed on Tom Traeger's leaf art:

A good week coming...

Hoping your celebration of Resurrection Sunday is wonderful! Jesus the Messiah is risen; our Hope is alive.

In the coming week, we'll be showing you some very fun antiques that came in late today from a wheat farm homestead near Spokane, as well as some beautiful Japanese pieces from Patricia Swerda's life estate.

In the meantime, here's a cute image for your April weekend: a yard art bunny with his own little gazebo :^)