The good, the beautiful, the what??

Little late on posting for this week. I unloaded four boxes on Tuesday, I know I said one or two a day, but I just couldn't help my self. So here are the treasures from earlier this week!

The first BIG box. What could it be??

Ahhh ...statuary!

This statue is from Italy!


Next is this heavy bubble wrapped item. What could it be??

This is St.Francis, Patron Saint of animals. Here is a little exerpt from Wikipedia on St.Francis ~ "It is said that, one day, while Francis was traveling with some companions, they happened upon a place in the road where birds filled the trees on either side. Francis told his companions to "wait for me while I go to preach to my sisters the birds". The birds surrounded him, drawn by the power of his voice, and not one of them flew away. Francis spoke to them:
My sister birds, you owe much to God, and you must always and in everyplace give praise to Him; for He has given you freedom to wing through the sky and He has clothed you... you neither sow nor reap, and God feeds you and gives you rivers and fountains for your thirst, and mountains and valleys for shelter, and tall trees for your nests. And although you neither know how to spin or weave, God dresses you and your children, for the Creator loves you greatly and He blesses you abundantly. Therefore... always seek to praise God."My family always had one or six somewhere in their yard and garden. I am SO glad that I finally have my own!


Funny little story ...the blue dot on St.Francis. When my uncle had passed away, two years ago, I flew back home to California for his funeral. While there I wanted to help my parents with his house. Fold clothes, pack up the kitchen, etc. While there my mom said "take these blue dots and place them on the items you would like to have". So as I am unpacking, I am starting to find some items with blue dots still on them. Again, kind of bitter sweet, but I am going to keep them to see how many I will collect by the time I'm done.


This is a lazy susan dish from Japan. I just love the color, and the size. The one I already have is pretty small, this will be great for parties.


I don't know the proper term for this item, but my uncle would have it on his dinning room table FULL of flowers. You can see the black "pot" where you can put in a florist sponge, and arrange a hardy flower arrangement. The brass body is very heavy, yet has delicate flowers on the side.


Next is this HUGE old hand painted tray. You can see the "large" fork below it to put it to scale. It really needs a good cleaning, but I think it would be lovely as a wall hanging.


This next box I call "the box of oddities". It had some mis-matched items that were from his kitchen. Some of the items were newer. Uncle Bill and I love shopping at the same places, particularly Pottery Barn, Bombay Co., and World Market (our favorite). The bowl and plate set were from World Market, the rest of the items were probably from the 60s-70s. All of these items will still be used none the less!




Now, I have saved the last two boxes (that I unpacked that day) for last. The first one is the box-o-lamps, now they are a little dusty, I just got too excited and snapped some pics. So please mind the dust!

This first one just needs a lamp shade. It will be perfect for Brint's library. I love the lamp toper (sitting in front of the lamp), very Roman-esc!

I love this next one. It's flower is shaped like a Lilly of the Valley, just with deep colors.


This is my second favorite. I love the lilly pad base, I love the deep carmel tube flowers, how warm it looks on, and how great it looks on my new chippendale desk.



Now onto the last box. The box-o-books. There was something for everyone.




We loved every book, but we did have our favorites. Brint's was the Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson books.

I loved the World cookbook from the 50s. It had amazing (mostly do-able) recipes from places like Austria, Germany, Bulgaria, France, UK, etc. My plan is to make some of the items from Austria, like strudel, turnovers, and items from France, like croissants. Since my Uncle Bill and Walter made them in their swiss bakery, I thought it would be fun to make them and serve them on the Blue Danube plates, I now have, that they use to serve to us.


Well that's it for last week, I will be working on a couple more boxes tomorrow. So stay tuned!!

Blue Danube

So I decided to open 1-2 boxes a day when I am not working so I won't be over loaded with what needs to be done. That's four days of box peeking fun! I started on Monday. I laid down a blanket on the floor as to have a nice back drop for my pics. Also, I decided it would be a good idea to get an inventory of what I had, for those (knock on wood) "just in case" moment. The first box I opened was the Blue Danube China.

I remember these dishes in my Uncle's house. Every time we went to his house in San Francisco, wether it was a holiday or not, we would arrive in the morning. In his sun room he would have the table set with these dishes, and on those dishes would be the pastries that him and Uncle Walter made in their Swiss Bakery on California Street. There would be danishes of every kind, croissants, or muffins. They would have coffee and I would have milk in my favorite glass, which you will see in a later blog.

Here are the pics you have been waiting to see. They are quite pretty.















Thankfully only one piece broke. Not bad out of two boxes. What do you think?

It has arrived!

My sweet, and dear, Uncle Bill passed away 2years ago in February. I have mentioned him in many a blogs. He lived in San Francisco all of my life. He's traveled the world more times than people go to the grocery store, bringing back MANY treasures from his trips. His design, decor, and ability to host a party would knock Martha Stewart's socks off!! He would say "It's all about the presentation!". His cooking would melt the mouth of Julia Child's, all the while being inspired by the foods he has eaten around the world.

He has given me the love of classical music, art, books, and gardens. He is my uncle (my grandmother's brother), my Godfather, and one of the most important people in my life. My mom and I are his only surviving heirs. When he passed, I flew out to California for his funeral, and to help my parents with his home and items. While there mom handed me a handful of blue sticker sheets, and said place a blue sticker on the item you would like to have. It was bitter sweet, because these were his cherished possessions, yet I couldn't wait to have them in my home. Each item he had I grew up with, listening to his travel stories while sitting on a certain chair, statuary and paintings he brought back from his travels that I would day dream about, and so on, and so on.

Anyway, bless mom and dad's heart, they (over the past two years) have lovingly packed all the items up and paid for a moving company to ship it out here to us. So the following pics are of the movers, and the progress of my house quickly filling up. A lot of the furniture has beautiful form, they just need to be either cleaned, reupholstered, and/or painted ....more blogs to come on that. The boxes are FULL of china, glasses, paintings, sculptures, books, european treasures, etc. There are a few items my parents surprised me with, that are not to my liking, that will go to those in need (like the couch, barstools, bookshelves.)This is a stressful blessing. It has only just begun.

Before cleared out library...


Before cleared out dining room...


As you can see a lot of my walls are bare, not painted, and not much furniture. I have been waiting to see what would go where, what colors to pick, what kind of flooring to lay down, and where to hang what. It's been a blank canvas for a while!

Then the movers arrived. Kevin, the driver, had a beautiful rig it was HUGE. For just driving cross country, it was so clean and shiny you could eat off it. Kevin was SOOOOOOO nice, as was his helper. They were so organized, and were able to off load in two hours. Not one thing was broken or damaged. All my neighbors came out, and cars drove by slowly to see what was going on. I am sure we were the talk of Candler! I love nosey southerners.

The truck was so big, I had to take it in two separate pics. Thankfully, half of the truck was empty. If the whole thing was full, I think I would loose my mind!



So here are the pics of my house quickly filling up!! Oh yeah, we got so many chairs we piled them up in the family room.


Getting fuller...





Here are some close up pics of the big items we received....












Whew ...then there are the boxes! I am going to go through them, take pics, inventory them, and blog so you can see what we got. As always, I look forward to your feedback, and ideas of what I can do with all these items we now have!

Cheerio ...Here We Go!!

I just HAD to post what just happened. Brint and I had first decided to go home to California next year, seeing how I was getting home sick for the beach and friends. Instead, Brint came up with a brilliant idea. "Let's do something different, let's see something different. Let's go where we have always talked about, dreamed about". Where is that you ask, well no where better but the UK. We've been talking about it ever since we were dating.

So we have already been feverishly on the internet looking up flights, rail tickets, places of interest. We plan to go to Edinburgh ~ Scotland, London, Cornwall (Brint has family there), and Bath. Bath the place of my dreams. Bath, the place where Roman soliders once tread. Bath, the place where Jane Austen frequented. Bath, the place where beauty was in high court. Bath, the location of the Royal Crescent.

Well, I was looking at Bath online, and found a couple of places to stay. Now one of the major places to stay is a dream hotel. A place suitable for the Regency period, or even victorian period. This is a little excerpt from a hotel review ~"The Royal Crescent Hotel is an architectural masterpiece turned luxury hotel. Here’s the skinny on the setting from Wikipedia: “The Royal Crescent is a residential road of 30 houses, laid out in a crescent, in the city of Bath, England. Designed by the architect John Wood the Younger and built between 1767 and 1774, it is among the greatest examples of Georgian architecture to be found in the United Kingdom and is a grade I listed building.” Occupying two central buildings in the crescent, the elegant hotel lets guests experience a style of gracious living from a bygone age. Outside in the “secret gardens,” guests can indulge in a sumptuous Afternoon Tea. Dinner at the hotel’s Dower House restaurant is just as good. There are 45 guest rooms, each with their own character, appointed with authentic period carpets, furnishings, and fabrics.". If you desire to see more I urge you to go to their web site and feast upon the images and descriptions. http://www.royalcrescent.co.uk/

Anyway, for fun I requested a brochure, and completely forgot that I had. Until the other day. I went out to my mail box, pulled out the mail, and saw that there was a large manila envelope. I didn't look at it till I was half way down the driveway. I stopped dead in my tracks, and saw the postage mark where this envelope was from. BATH. It said BATH. As tears welled up in my eyes, I was realizing that I received a letter from bath. A letter, where a million letters had been sent back and forth for Jane Austen. Where a million letters of high society had been sent. And now I had first piece of correspondence from the place of my dreams.

I also had tears in my eyes, because this made the trip of our dreams even more real. I just can't wait. I was/am so excited about this piece of mail, I just had to take a picture and post about it. Please see them below!
Can you see the words Bath in the circle and the crown in the postage square ...just gives me chills!


Have you ever been to the UK? Do you have any pointers, or tips for the trip? We aren't going till April 2011, so we have some time to research it all out!

Melancholy and the infinite sadness!

Today has been a melancholy day for me. Not for one specific reason. I knew I needed to find a way to shake it, then I remembered two things. One is the song you are hearing now, by Enya, called Pilgrim. I heard it and read the words at a work retreat where we learned to de-stress, and find our inner peace. Below are the words, for each person it has it's own meaning. I had to fight the tears the first time I heard it and read it. Take a moment for yourself, read it, and ponder what it means to you.

Pilgrim, how you journey
On the road you chose
To find out why the winds die
And where the stories go.

All days come from one day
That much you must know,
You cannot change what's over
But only where you go.

One way leads to diamonds,
One way leads to gold,
Another leads you only
To everything you're told.

In your heart you wonder
Which of these is true;
The road that leads to nowhere,
The road that leads to you.

Will you find the answer
In all you say and do?
Will you find the answer
In you?

Each heart is a pilgrim,
Each one wants to know
The reason why the winds die
And where the stories go.

Pilgrim, in your journey
You may travel far,
For pilgrim it's a long way
To find out who you are...

Pilgrim, it's a long way
To find out who you are...

Pilgrim, it's a long way
To find out who you are..


Below is the link to my favorite talk give by one of the members of the church's presidency. My favorite... Dieter F. Uchtdorf. When ever I need a boost, I read this. Again, take a moment for yourself, read it, and ponder what it means to you. Hope this brightens your day as well!

LDS.org - Ensign Article - Happiness, Your Heritage

Much love~