common ground

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Heirlooms Party

I'm a pretty sentimental gal, so I'll be right at home at this Heirloom Party

I have some great memories of my childhood, and being the oldest sibling in my family, I was of course the first to leave the nest. My Dad's mom and dad were in their 40's when he was born. Old by the standards of 1929, so by the time I came along they were in their late 60's early 70's. One clear memory I have is of my grandmother's upstairs bedrooms that had been my dad's and uncle's, was an old sideboard that contained old papers and ephemera. She had been a schoolteacher for a while, and was a packrat. (Now I know where I get this from) The old sideboard had been her mother's and was crackled with old varnish. It seems that each year a new coat would be put on to "spiff it up". So many layers of darkend varnish were covering an oak beauty.

My parents gave this to me after my husband and I were married. We took it to a professional furniture restorer to remove the many layers of grime and varnish. It was in my Dining Room until we moved to this house, and now it's in our family area in the basement. It has a shelf underneath that holds some silver trays and collectible Crabtree & Evelyn bisquit tins.

Original Hardware and beveled mirror.

An old Hull apple cookie jar and stove set were also from my Grandmother's kitchen.

The salt shaker met an untimely fate a few years ago,

so I need to give Mr. Pepper his mate back.

This red velvet autograph book is also hers,

with entries from friends which date from 1889.

I wish I had a "macro" setting so you could see

the handwriting flourishes on some of the pages.

And a foil decal of a bird in flight.

Thank you for letting me share a few of my heirlooms.

Have a sweet day full of memories,

Debra

Inspirational Home...the Rest of the Story

My last post was dedicated to "White Wednesday", so I shared photos of the white displays and vignettes at Inspirational Home. If you have not seen that post, be sure you check it out after this.
Inspirational Home is located in Galloway, an eastside suburb of Springfield, Missouri. It's a great little tree-lined area that dates back to the early part of the 1900's. The particular building that now houses IH, was built in the 20's as a filling station complex. IH is located in the residence of the family that owned and operated the gas station.

Before Debra started her business I was involved in a great little antique boutique called "Wild at Heart" that was the previous occupant. So this physical building was my second home for 2 years. I have such fond memories of being there, as I rented space upstairs.

Be sure to click on the images to enlarge them,

as you don't want to miss anything!

Debra Moore is an interior designer, who decided to open a storefront in the spring of last year. When she took possession of the space she opted to remodel the interior of the store, as it was needing attention. She spent about 6 weeks painting and cleaning and polishing the place to make it her own.

She was open for only a very short time when we had severe flooding in the area and the building was under 3 to 4 feet of water. She opted to stay and the landlord totally redid the building, taking down walls, installing new floors, plumbing etc. She came back bigger and better than anyone could have imagined!