A Little Change Here and There

It can really add up.

In December, when Dad drove out with the two living room shelves he built back home in New Mexico, he also brought a little white box.  This box was very heavy.  Inside were 5 containers of spare change from the last year.  Each day, he would empty his pockets and put the coins in the jars.  For many years, I can remember him showing up with a box, canister or piggy bank weighted down with coins.  I used to roll them up and lug them down to my bank, grateful for some cash in any form.  Nowadays, we can just dump it into a machine at the grocery store and boom.....cash in hand....the foldin' kind.

I was on my way to get two cans' worth converted, when I heard the jingle bells of the Salvation Army bell ringers in front of our store.  The spirit moved me to give these two cans of coins to them instead.  This money hadn't really been mine for very long and I felt it was only right to give the money to them.  Molly and I created a bit of a scene as we worked to shove those coins in the red bucket.  It made us happy to do it.  It was the only right thing to do at that time.  It was fun.

So, later on, I decided to take the other 3 containers to be converted so I could get something fun for our living room makeover and for the new shelves.  Turns out there was $177 disguised as "meaningless change."

Here are some little gems I found last week at my new favorite vintage nifty antique store in town..."Nostalgia."

An English wooden clock.  It keeps great time and has a lovely tick-tick sound.

Another neat little clock for the buffet.

This fern stand polished up nicely.

A telephone book table.  It has shelves on all four sides.  It will be perfect between two chairs with a lamp on top.

Found this very cool 1945 RCA Victor 56x3 wooden tabletop radio in perfect working order.  It reminds me of one my grandmother had on her kitchen counter for years.  As a kid, I had no idea of how cool it was and it got lost through the years.  I don't know whatever happened to it.

It takes a few seconds to warm up, but then it plays such warm sounding tones in AM classic country.  How this thing found Patsy Cline and George Jones, first thing is just awesome and wondrous to me.  The clerk at the shop felt the original plug could be a fire hazard, so he offered to replace it for me which he did in about 20 minutes.  Great service!

I also found this Talbot's Kids denim jacket for Molly.  It's a little big now, but it won't be long until she can wear it.

Little by little, this living and dining room re-do are taking shape nicely.  I'm loving the updates in warm hues of tan, maroon, sage green, brown and cream...the colors of the books, walls, drapes, carpets....it makes me feel happy to be in there even in its unfinished state.

We found some very pretty curtain panels for the bay window last week.  We'll get sheers to match the ones in the dining room soon.  I wanted a bit of a pattern in the drapes, but nothing that would compete with the bold pattern in the rug.  These are just right, and the colors are perfect with the sages green, burgundy and tans of the room so far.