There are some things that attract my attention at antique stores and it’s hard to explain why.  Some of those things are alarm clocks, pocket watches and opera glasses and binoculars.  Maybe it’s the fact that they are beautiful and utilitarian at the same time.  Sometimes those two qualities are viewed as opposites that can’t coexist happily.  If it’s beautiful, it can’t be functional.  If it’s functional, it must be ugly.  I love it when things prove that idea wrong.  With smart phones and jumbotrons, alarm clocks, pocket watches and opera glasses/binoculars have become almost obsolete, but I think they have an amazing decorative quality and often make it into vignettes in my home and photo shoots… I put together a collection of some of these beautiful, yet utilitarian pieces that caught my eye, including these lovelies… You can follow the full collection HERE and follow all of my eBay collections

When I first launched the Mustard Seed Pages, I joked that all ironstone listings need to go through me first.  I have restrained myself from snatching up every nice piece I saw at a good price, but I couldn’t resist this one.  Fluted compotes like these are listed for as high as $90-200 elsewhere online, so when I got this one for $34.16 including shipping, I knew it was a great price for a really nice piece. You know how I feel about ironstone.  This one got me a little fluttery as I unwrapped it.   Thanks so much, Christine, for selling it to me and packing it so carefully. I tucked it away in one of the corner cabinets in my dining room. When I shared yesterday’s post, someone on Facebook mentioned never seeing any toys in my photo shoots.  Well, I figure you ladies with kids have seen

A few years ago, I fell in love with antique european grain sacks.  I bought my first one at a flea market for $20, but I mostly made DIY versions out of drop cloths and paint.  Over the years I’ve splurged here and there on authentic antique European grain sacks, feeling like the durable hemp fabric with its nubby texture, stripes, monograms and beautiful patina of age were worth it.  It’s now become my favorite fabric for upholstery, pillow covers, sewing projects and to use as table runners or just folded on a shelf. Here are a few things I’ve used grain sacks for recently…   And I send my scraps to Ann and she makes me these… I don’t live in an area where European grain sacks are plentiful, so I buy most of them online.  I put together a collection on eBay of some that recently caught my

Yesterday the boys were picking at each other a bit in the morning.  There’s been a lot of togetherness with all of the snow days, cancelled activities and two hour delays, so we decided they needed a bit of a break.  Or maybe we needed a bit of a break from the bickering.  Or maybe both.  Jeff took our oldest with him to an outdoorsmen show and my mom and I took the youngest with us to Ikea.  I haven’t been to an Ikea in years, so I was excited to browse around.  On the way there, my son, who was recently diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, had a low and was feeling pretty bad, so we stopped at Target to take care of him and eat some lunch.  It was looking like we weren’t going to make it to Ikea, but the little guy started to perk up and

Today Jeff and I a were on a mission to get the basement cleaned and organized further.  We did a lot of work on it this summer…putting in new wire metal shelving, having the walls and floor painted, installing lots of lighting and cleaning out a lot of the junk and stuff that we’ve been hanging onto, but don’t really want or need.  All of that work made the space so much more functional.  There was still work to do, though, and that became even more obvious as we were packing up almost 80 orders for the online shop.  We were tripping over things and the tape was in one place and bubble wrap in another and boxes were everywhere. So, we bought some more wire shelving, cleared out a lot of trash and things to take to the thrift store and fine tuned the organization.  I think this space