Purl Buttons: February 2015

2.24.15--HOLY GRAIL OF TEA TIME TUESDAY

Yeah, I might pawn my car for this one. Probably still not enough cash...

If you are ever in the neighborhood of Grays Antique Central, pick this up for me, will you?

2.17.15--TEA TIME TUESDAY

HERE is the just the tea caddy for a breakfast nook. It is compact, spare of detail, and quite feminine and lovely. I believe it is Tiffany but the link goes to Britannia Fine Antique Silver. There are some lovely things on the page but this is not one of them. I believe it sold before I could pawn my car.

2.11.15

Locally grown food at the WalMart?

I don't care for the BIG BOX stores anymore. They seemed to be convenient, and often I could make one stop instead of several to accomplish tasks and errands. Then they grew, including entire grocery stores, ophthalmology offices, optometrists, dentists, hair salons, pharmacies, and fast food chains. Made in America ceased to be the motto as they sought more and more cheaper and cheaper products.

Now, some of these places are closing, right at the time some of the small towns are "finally getting our W******".

I moved to my small town after living in a metropolis. I could see the trend for the Big Box. When the Big Box moved in to the big city where I lived, strip malls with small family businesses crumbled. Picturesque "Avenue" type shopping gave up many of the unique stores that made the Avenue special, in favor of high-priced, over-marketed chains.

Reap THIS, WalMart

Even grocery stores changed as they tried to keep up by offering more and more non-grocery items, sometimes reducing the variety of food offerings. But life is a cycle and we reap what we sow.

You can guess that I am not unhappy to see some of these Big Box closings. But what to do with the abandoned stores? I hate to take a clue from TEXAS. (Yes, that's right, I am anti-most-of-the-whole-Texas-arrogance thing, not to mention what Texas does that Florida thinks is so grand for education. Education. Don't get me started on that and Texas. Or California.)

In McAllen, Texas, they made their eyesore into a LIBRARY, and what a library!

This library has 16 public meeting spaces, 14 public study rooms, 64 computer labs, 10 children’s computer labs, and 2 genealogy computer labs.

AND a Farmer's Market, which has indoor space during inclement weather. All of this I read about at http://growfood-notlawns.com

Thank you, WebUrbanist. I enjoyed being in Texas today.

2.10.15--TEA TIME TUESDAY

Art Nouveau, ca 1906

So beautiful as tea caddies go, but alas, it is silver PLATE and not sterling. The design suits me, but the material, not so much. Just as well, it is sold. The listing is found at Titus Omega.

2.9.15-MONDAY MANTRA

Press on. One step, and then the next.

2.6.15

I made one of these last month.

2.4.15

Have you ever been lectured at the grocery store? Not by a family member, I mean, but by a total stranger? A year or two or three ago, I saw these "pods" for the first time.

I reached over my cart for a package and I was considering the cost, convenience, environmental impact. I had just about made up my mind that I could continue as I had long been used to; hefting the heavy container off the shelf, guessing where the line might be in the cap so I don't over detergent the wash, pouring it out over the wash, then digging around to find my glasses among the soiled and now damp and detergent coated laundry.

I wear reading glasses--cheaters--most usually on top of my head unless I have to read something up close or look at where the line in the detergent cap might be. When doing the laundry, my glasses invariably fall off either into the wash or in that narrow space between the washer and dryer where they take a bounce and head for the back wall.

"That's what's wrong with people today," barked a gentleman trundling his cart from up the aisle closer to my cart, "always looking for the easy way."

I instantly imagined his wife beating his shirts and jeans against a rock, just as his grandmother did for his grandfather. I imagined I knew a lot of the important points of his personality. I imagined I knew his political leaning. I imagined I knew what "news-er-tainment" channel he watched. I imagined I knew what he had for breakfast: eggs his wife gathered from chickens she had raised, butter from the cow she milked, bread she baked after kneading it herself, and bacon from the pig she slaughtered in the back yard.

"You may be right," I answered sweetly. (I HAVE learned a thing or two from my parents.)

I had been planning to put the package back on the shelf, but instead I put it in the cart and grabbed another. (No one has managed to beat the rebelliousness out of me. Or the sarcasm.)

Later, I returned to the detergent aisle and exchanged my "easy way" pods for the detergent I usually buy, after making sure my self-appointed mentor was not around.

That was a few years ago. Now I use those pods every week. Not only that, I bought the same type of product for my dishwasher.

I found out that my laundry pods cost one cent more per load than the large container of liquid (which I cannot lift), and two cents more per load than the size container I CAN lift.

I am living dangerously. I spend $.04 more a week on convenience. That is $2.08 more a year.

2.3.15--TEA TIME TUESDAY

Just the thing for me. If I had this, I think I would have to have the dining room redesigned to feature such a lovely tea caddy.

You can find this at the Cooper-Hewitt, where it is "resting" in one of their storage facilities.

Come to that, I might have to just buy a new house in keeping with its quaint, Tudor (actually pseudo-Tudor--this is a Shavian Queen Anne half timbered style) architecture.

I live in a chalet style house. Maybe I should just pass by this one and look for a chalet style tea caddy.