Modern Dear

Rather than trying to make one ridiculously image heavy (and explanation soaked!) entry about my ever changing abode decor, I'm going to share bits and pieces with you now and again. New projects, findings, creations, and repairs are a constant, anyhow.

This book, Modern Clothing, is a 1938 original I found at an antique shop in a small town somewhere between here and Atlanta. If you know me, you know my obsession for old hardcover books. The older, the odder the language. The golden deer candle was found for less than a dollar at the Fairgrounds, and the doily is one of dozens I have acquired from Grandma.

Excerpt: Problem 4: What are good buying habits?
Courtesy. What would you list as first in the list of desirable shopping habits? Certainly if you were a saleswoman you would place high on the list, and probably first, the habit of Courtesy in one's treatment of others. The impatient shopper who announces after a brief wait, that she hasn't "all day to spend and why doesn't the store get some live ones so people can be waited on some time in the natural lives," stimulates by her lack of courtesy a discourteous retort from the saleswoman. She may find her shopping attempts made difficult because no one wants to wait on a troublemaker, and so she is passed on from saleswoman to saleswoman, as rapidly as possible. Her own discourtesy has cost nervous energy and has led to disappointment and wasted hours.
The shopping list. Second in the list of desirable shopping habits should be the practice of making and using a shopping list. Such a list may be made to express one's needs, and to indicate the relation of the mode or fashion to those needs. For example, the shopping list may read:
1 blue tweed coat, unfurred, leather buttons, not over $35
1 felt hat to match, not over $3.50
1 pair blue shoes- sports wear- not over $6.50
1 pair pigskin gloves (advertised at $1.50)
The detail as to color, buttons, and lack of fur has been previously determined from fashion notes. With such a statement of her needs in hand, there is no occasion for the shopper to spend time looking at fur coats, Japanese kimonos, or Turkish bath towels. She knows she wants to look at blue tweed coats of a given price range, and proceeds forthwith to the matter at hand. She may have to forego the leather buttons or make other concessions, because of the limitations of the store, but in every way the possibility of getting what she wants is greater because she knows what it is.

I love these books. They make such wonderful bedtime reading. I also love knowing the costs of things and the necessities of other periods.

This old George Washington was found at a thrift store for about a dollar. I kept him in a closet for a long time, while considering painting over his face to save the frame, or trying to fix the unattractive scratches. Eventually, I pinned on a bow with some vintage lace I had found at the flea. (I collect old lace, I wish I knew how to place them in decades!) The sweet little deer was given to me by a friend, and the heavy damask gold curtains are a secret.


My fireplace is made of unsightly yellowed tile, very unfitting to the lovely rich wooden frame, and a first matter of business was masking that with pages from a 1950s heath and business book. Until I found a better solution. Which I still have not. Here upon the mantle sits a handmade leatherbound journal I bought at a street market in Florence, Italy, a framed and lace-embellished page from a 1930s screenplay, a wooden Cloverbloom cheesebox (rare, circa 1940s?) I found at the Fairgrounds Flea to house some tea lights, a music box from Sloane, and scrabble letters from my table at a friend's recent wedding. Offset by old bronze deer, Fairgrounds Flea (I think these were $3?!), old books from a friend, including "Due to Lack of Interest Tomorrow Has Been Cancelled", weathered brown tags which I use to label items and instructions around the home and for gifts, flowers in a tiny Dulce de Leche jar (another gift from S). I keep lots of old jars around the house for flowers. I think that's very important.

People keep telling me to google specific things and I just keep forgetting because it is such an affair. I still love not having the internet, but it is still quite inconvenient for a small percentage of my week.