The Sunday Flea

Hi everyone! Here with an update---Lizzy reporting from the flea. Kind of.. Despite the holiday, when everyone should have been home wine-ing and dining and brunching their Mamas, the flea was mobbed. And very very hot. Maybe 80's on the asphalt parking lot surface. It was a shock, because I left a chilly and densely fogged beach...maybe 55 here. As I left the house a friend saw me in cargo pants and a black tee shirt. He warned me, You're gonna be too hot. Next week I'll listen

my mother's day present! Cookies.
Too cute to eat.

Still, I'm glad I went because it was fun and also this week and next week are probably my last markets til Fall. The following May weeks are Memorial Day with the dreaded Air Show traffic, then there's the Strawberry Festival---and then it's summer. Beach time, not flea time. (Last February we thought this day would never come, right?)
I passed up this XXXL white with blue stripes mixing bowl. It was enormous, bigger than my giant bowl I use for my lavender mixing. I swear it weighed ten pounds. Mo could sleep in it.

It was new-ish looking though. Marked RRP [Rainsbottom?] , Roseville Ohio. here

And I decided against some new crappy thimbles because I couldn't get waited on.
A few fun finds...

This is a small platter in a pattern I call Bluebirds.

 Of course I love the discoloration and agey-ness.

The pattern is, I think, c. 1940-1950s. And it was made by Homer Laughlin, of Fiestaware fame. I guess its real name is Empress? edit: the pattern is Bluebird, the china shapes or blanks are Empress. This plate is selling for a whopping $145.oo on ebay. here

I don't collect Bluebird but I'll pick up a piece now and then when the price is right. $1.oo. The bluebirds remind me of the birds that dress Snow White [Cinderella?] in the original Disney film. (You can imagine how much I loved this old classic, as a little girl who loved to sew and loved animals.)

The same mother-son team had this interesting sewing stand. 

It must have been in someone's basement for years, look at this grunge!

I cleaned it only a little, I like the patina but not the dirt.

We can see that the awful green pincushion is a replacement---see the thumb tack holes? It's uglier than it looks in the photos with the green shutter. And it has gold Christmas cord to tie the melon wedges. Gotta go. Should it be replaced with a tuffet in velvet, or made with quilt craps? Should it have a calico hen instead. I'll have to think about this.

Legend has it that these wooden gadgets were made by boys in shop class at school, in the mid-20th century. Do you think it was a Mother's Day gift long ago, a boy made it for his mom? Maybe?

And with diligent rummaging I found a silver plate brush handle.

It's a bit plain but has potential. No marks, worn plating. It will probably get a strawberry somehow.

Back home, Mo and I escaped some possibly catastrophic Mother's Day DIY goings-on and we went for a long walk. Last week the plastic geese suddenly were, well, naked. And then a few days later they disappeared entirely. I was worried. Mo was puzzled.  On Sunday they were BACK! omg! lol! The geese are dressed up in brand new clothes. One has a butterfly costume. the other is a ladybug. But still, you know, geese.

Look at their little outfits.

Their hats are velveteen antennas or feelers.

They are so amusing, we've come to love them. Did their mum dress them up for Mother's Day?
The koi have new lily pads. Which I understand they'll eat but not my problem. We scurried by fast, so no photos.
Have a good week!

love

lizzy

gone to the beach