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| Found in the box of buttons read on |
I'm caught in time wasters today although I have accomplished several things including another trip to our town post office, which is becoming a daily trek for me. I vowed to not send Christmas cards this year, 44 cents for postage for each seems exorbitant, especially when I can keep up with most folks by Facebook, this blog, email, and cell phone calls. I recalled how in the past when we lived in CA I would have stacks of 200 and more cards to mail and that did not bother me, many of those went to elderly relatives across the country, folks who looked forward to those greetings and with each card I'd enclose a handwritten letter. I loved their responses about how they appreciated the cards and letters. Aunt Ruth (Jerry's) always complimented me on my letters. How times have changed! Well most of those folks have passed on and then came one of those bolts from beyond: I realized that
we, I and my friends and cousins have become the "old folks." I full well knew this, especially as I began to bury cousins and contemporaries, but this reminder gave me pause that maybe I could not just give up the annual Christmas card drill. Besides cards began to arrive and I started to feel like Mrs. Scrooge. It's that Catholic upbringing with the trappings of guilt raising up, a lamentable thing that will turn on me just when I think it's been conquered! So I engaged again, not with the annual one size fits all card/letter but instead wrote a "Merry and Happy" to most folks and even hand addressed the cards this year instead of using my dandy label computerized list. But it has been a tedious daily task which I believe I have now completed, however we will see what tomorrow's mail brings! Next year I will not try to fool myself into believing I won't send cards, I will just plan to do so recalling my 8ball experience of 2010.
I had to hem another pair of sweat pants which I bought for MIL yesterday, a sewing task that is not too daunting, so I accomplished that. And then the diversion began. While I am known to waste hours on the computer roaming from blog to sites yet unknown and on that biggest minute chaser, Facebook, I can also get diverted by physical things.
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| From old Mrs Irwin, Needle packets |
Taunting me from a shelf inside the sewing room was the big cardboard box that I'd taken from Aunt Jinx' stash last year and not yet fully rummaged through. Today was the day as this box holds all sorts of sewing accoutrement's, buttons, snaps, buckles, trims, old needle books, a real treasure trove for a junkie like me. Some like these needle books were from the Irwins, the photos on the covers are entertaining and certainly speak of a different time and place.
I have learned some of these old buttons are valuable. In Lansing, Iowa, one of our favorite places to drive to down the road to spend a day, there is a Button Shop run by an elderly woman in a wheel chair who knows more about buttons than I could ever dream. Her store has nothing but buttons and threads. As I told her about these collections, and all the assorted loose buttons I've inherited and gleaned, she has urged me to bring them and spend a day with her, that she will advise me about them. I learned from her that they used to manufacture the Le Mode shell buttons from the clamshells dug from the banks of the Mississippi right there in Lansing, those were so many of the pearlized buttons of days gone by. She had several old shells showing holes where the round circles had been cut out for the buttons and shells dumped back along the shore from the factory, I wonder if they ate the clams or dropped them back for animals to consume. She is a fascinating woman and I look forward to going through these buttons, some from Holland, Germany, West Germany, and England. That is still on my to do list. Meantime here are just a very few of the collections, look at the prices, 29 cents! That certainly dates these buttons. .
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| The red/orange buttons (left) were made in Holland, 29 cents was the price |
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The two Bon Ton buttons (left) are made of nickel according to the back of the card
The three Le Chick buttons (right) were made in Germany |
Just the other day I was telling Jerry to not pull the snaps loose on his shirt while he was fiddling with it because I had no way to fix those; I remember saying "they are not like buttons!" He will only wear shirts, western style and cut trim, with snaps, but that is an entire other post because those are getting harder to find all the time. Well, he was Aunt Jinx's favorite and I think today she was taunting me from beyond because there were no less than 5 different packets of snaps of all types and attachment tools in this box including some strange looking things that resemble manual old paper hole punchers. So while I was rummaging Jerry came downstairs and became very interested in the box too. He mentioned,. "Didn't you say you had no way to fix snaps? Look at all these!" I can only laugh that Aunt Jinx showing me up again!
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| Here it is the Match flap, I thought |
Besides that little quote above on cardboard, another most interesting item in the box was, I thought a match flap, or match book, you know like matches used to come in when there were complementary matches all over free for the taking. Do they still give away matches for advertising anywhere? This one was from Aunt Hannah's Bread, a brand I do not recall but one that must have been in Pennsylvania. Sorry that it must be Aunt Hannah herself upside down but when I scanned this that's what happened with it opened. It is a silver color and quite dulled, but you can read in the middle that it says "Matchless Mender." I was curious why a match book would be in with sewing miscellany and buttons. However when I opened it there were no matches inside it, but a mini mending kit. I do remember seeing and having such things which often came from banks or department stores as favors. This one from Aunt Hannah's went a step further with something resembling matches inside along with the threads and needle, something to mend hose, nylons! What a throw back to the day when women had concerns over things like "runs." This was too funny and made me have to share my time wasters right here on the blog. And that of course meant more time spent, though I do not consider this a waste no not at all...Here following is the inside of the match book. Have you ever seen anything like this? I remember putting clear nail polish on a run in panty hose to prevent a further mess, but this is a much more refined/intricate approach...
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| Read the instructions |
Well so there you have my time waster, minutes of memory chaser for today....
