New Halloween 2019! Melted Plastic JOL

This vintage melted pellet JOL wall hanging from the 1970s was found at an estate sale.


(image source)

I came across this ad while researching more about this bit of decor and discovered it glows in the dark!  25¢ was a good deal!  I think I wound up paying close to the 1.25 value though!

New Halloween 2019! Party Napkins

Mr. Husband got me all of these vintage Halloween napkins for Christmas last year!  He bought them off of ebay.  This kind of stuff never shows up 'in the wild' around our parts.  I scanned them all for your viewing and/or crafting pleasure!

This is the back side of the first napkin!  So cute!

I think this one is the oldest of the set.  It's hard to see but it has a scalloped cut edging.

Cute cats!  On the back of this one was a repeat of the JOL.





I love the corn stalk landscaping.




So so cute!  On the back are a few more random dispersed owls.

I tell Mr. Husband that a no fail gift idea for me even if it's Christmas, is vintage Halloween stuff (at a fair price!). 

Addams Fam

This 1953 Charles Addams ad for Remington Rand Typewriters sparked the inspiration for this set of photos featuring a very fun line of Addams Family what-nots being carried by World Market for Halloween this year. The products don't have Charles Addams artwork but next best they showcase photos from the 1960s Addams Family TV series.

Primarily the line is dishware such as melamine platters, appetizer plates, mugs, and napkins.

I picked out just a few things that I really liked, one being this ceramic mug.  There is another mug with Morticia and Gomez also.

I also picked up four of the appetizer plates: two with Gomez and Morticia (for Mr. Husband and I), and one each of Fester and Wednesday.  There was another plate with Cousin Itt but appeared to have been printed far off center causing a major lack of symmetry. I honestly thought it was a production mistake but if you look at it online that's what they wanted it to look like.  Weird, but not a good weird.  I didn't get any of the platters because the print quality was a bit blurry.

There were also paper gift bags featuring the entire family and one with just Morticia.  I think the mugs and little plates with Morticia and Gomez would be a great wedding gift or to use as cake plates for a bride and groom.

Here are a couple of past Addams Fam crafties from the MhICTY archives:
Beware of the Thing
Baby Vulture Decor

New Halloween 2019! Mummy Candy Sarcophagus

Remember when candy would come in fun little spooky cool plastic containers at drug or convenience stores, even when it wasn't Halloween?  The Mr. Bones red plastic coffin?  Or this mummy sarcophagus? 

This one still has it's candy: cobras, skulls, and my favorite design is the vampire emerging from his coffin (nearest to bottom).

I bought this from a very interesting 'estate' sale.
I happened to be perusing the antique section of Craiglist as I do on a very frequent basis and saw a new ad pop up "All must go!".  There were just a few photos but it was clear the owner was a collector and a hoarder.  The sale was being run by appointments and I happen to be the first one to call!  I asked a gal pal to tag along because Mr. Husband would still be at work.  I thought my friend would get a kick out of going on a vintage scrounging adventure but I also didn't want to be alone for safety reasons.   The owner of the vast accumulations was a 70 year old man, Ron, who lived in a huge two story house, every room nearly full to the ceiling. His primary collection was Coca~Cola stuff which I have zero interest in but that was certainly not what he was limited to.  There were 1980s toys, mid-century Christmas, antique apothecary items, 70s clothing, rare and highly collectible ceramics, billions of old post cards, various true antiques (ex: an early 1900s refrigerator), so much stuff packed everywhere in teetering boxes and piles. There was a weird people dynamic going on in this home amongst all of the visual clutter too.  The owner had a friend helping him, Joe, that was younger than me, but apparently they have been friends for quite awhile, both collecting Cola~Cola stuff.  The other people in/around the house I found out were squatting there not paying rent for the guest house on the property and looked quite shady.  I think it may have been his son but stories I was being told were all very...odd. We learned Ron's wife had been a pharmacist, Joe had a PhD in chemical engineering and he had his own house built as a 1920 replica along with being outfitted in period antiques.  We learned that Ron had been taken advantage of by a local antique dealer and was never paid for the things that were selected and taken.  We rummaged for about a hour and a half  while Joe escorted us around since Ron had mobility issues.  Joe was also there to help with price quoting because Ron's suggestions over rivaled even those of ebay.  The house was just so full and overwhelming I can't remember very many details of stuff we saw but I do remember seeing a gun laying out in full view.  I am not a gun expert but as far as I am concerned if it doesn't have a bright ass orange tip, I don't want to be anywhere near it.  This one was all black and was probably a pellet gun but still it made me a bit nervous.  As we were finishing up gathering our piles of stuff (and dodging many little chihuahua dogs and their piles), Ron asked if we wanted to see what he had in his bedroom.  Hello!  Red flags!  I glanced in the room and saw a gun on the bed!  I made my way in the opposite direction and told my friend under my breath that there was a gun in there.  Ron called again from his room and my silly friend went in there!  I stood back for awhile until it seemed to be safe and I kinda poked my head in but I am the overly suspicious type and I don't like to get myself backed into a corner.  I did get to meet a box full of new born inbred puppies while in there. It also turned out it was an empty antique leather gun holster on the bed.  Ron and Joe turned out to be super sweet people and we spent another hour chatting with them and looking through Ron's amazing collection of Florida post cards.
My friend and I bought about 20-30 bucks each of stuff but it certainly made no dent in the copious amount still in the home.  I bought a vintage stuffed Santa, a child's plastic mug with monkeys on it, a few Christmas ornaments, 2 Christmas stockings, a rubber kewpie doll and this candy container, not a lot for 20 bucks but as I mentioned before his prices were a bit high for me.   I do wonder sometimes if "All must go!" ever happened.

New Halloween 2019! Skull Cupcake Pick

I love these vintage plastic Halloween picks!  I didn't own any though until finding this one among a mixed bag from a thrift store.

New Halloween 2019! Candy Tube Toppers

These two candy tube toppers are new to the Halloween mix this year.  For once I can not remember where I got something.  I am leaning toward a thrift store though and it's no doubt that they were cheap (like a quarter each!) or I wouldn't have bought them!

New Halloween 2019! Gurley Candle

Another little doodad I got this year to add to the Halloween collection is this Gurley pumpkin man candle.  It was given to me by friends.

New Halloween 2019! Trick or Treat!

To start off this most marvolous time of the year I am going to be featuring all the new vintage stuff I've gotten over the year.  First up are these two paper treat sacks.  Mr. Husband got them for me for my birthday this year.  Feel free to use the scans for your personal projects, such as these Halloween Treat sacks I made back in 2016.

Ooogity Booogity!

Halloween is creeping up on me this year!

I have yet to start dragging out the demented decor.  Not one bat even pinned on the wall yet!

Very shameful.  I do have a few spooky fun projects that I have been working on or working on in my mind at least!

I better get this crypt in order so see you ghouls in a bit!

Happy Birthday Party

I just turned another year older.  I don't know how old, but one more than last year.
I decided to do a much smaller theme this year to make it a bit simpler for me, after all it is my birthday.  I also could not think of a particular theme I would like.  I always tease PB and Mr. Husband and say I am going to just buy a set of corresponding party goods at a party store (Shirt Tales, He-Man, Pound Puppies...etc.  It's been a while since I have been to those stores! Ha!) and be done with it.

Then that gave me the idea to have a vintage themed birthday party like one from the mid century.  I am sure there were some party supplies with famous kiddy cartoon characters but not as overly abundant as today.  I searched on ebay for a bit until I came across this partially used set (only 6) of party napkins.  I absolutely love the illustrations so I decided to make them my theme.

I scanned the image and made my own decorated paper cups and banners along with using the colors of the napkin in the paper products.  I stuck the images to the cups using  double sided tape.
Since the vintage napkin shows bits of square confetti, I made my own by cutting up crepe paper streamers.

I bought a yellow bed sheet from a thrift and used it as a table cloth.  Next I laid out the vintage napkins, opened, and some confetti sprinkled about, on top of the fabric.  I then covered everything with a clear vinyl table covering, which I also picked up new in it's package at a thrift.

For party hats, we made our own from newspaper, like the kiddies on the napkin.  Mr. Husband also wrapped my gifts in newspaper.

I made the cake topper from printed images of the cutie birthday kids and laminated them for icing protection and stability.  I made the cat and dog "balloons" like the ones they carry on the napkin from bits of crepe paper streamer and the wire "string" is from bread ties with the paper stripped off.  I also did some DIY on the cake sprinkles.  I already had some orange sprinkles in my stash but not yellow or blue.  I knew that I would not use these colors in the future so best not to buy them.  I made my own by dying some white sprinkles I had the two colors.  I did it the same way you dye coconut.  I placed some of the white sprinkles in a little glass jar with a lid and dripped in a bit of food coloring such as the type used for dying Easter eggs and then gave it some shakes to distribute the color.  I then poured the sprinkles out onto a cookie sheet to let them air dry.  They worked really well I thought, cheap too!

I only decorated the dining room table instead of my norm of removing everything in sight such as wall hangings, plants, lamps, and nick knacks.  This did help with simplifying matters for myself.

It was fun finding a cute vintage birthday piece to use as inspiration.  I think I may do this for my future birthdays, then when I have a decent sized collection, showcase all of them together for my birthday decor, there on out.

Here are the scans from the napkin, all four sides, if anyone would like to use them in their own birthday ornamentation!

PBN DIY Bostie Babies

I'm super excited to show off this set of Paint-By-Number crafties I did showcasing my favorite critters, Boston Terriers!



These were not a vintage unfinished set that I just merely painted.  The story starts with my trying to locate/obtain wall art for our still in the midst of decorating, living room.  The main focal wall needed something spectacular and you can't get anything better than Boston preciousness contained in the format of PBNs.  I started my search on ebay and miraculously there was a set!  Only they cost 120 bucks.  That's a bit steep for me, as you all know of my extreme tight wadding ways.  I put them in my 'watch' list and periodically checked for a more reasonable set to pop up for sale...which never happened, these were the only ones.  So I got to thinking, PBNs were made for the amateur to do as a simple hobby past time, so surely someone with a bit more advanced talent (with a even stronger desire to pinch pennies) such as myself should be able to just make a set. And that I did!

The above photo is from the ebay listing and happens to be a good quality, fairly straight-on photo shot with very little angle distortion of the subject matter. Perfect!  I already had a set of large metal frames I wanted to use.  I then purchased a pack of cheap canvas boards in a size that would work with them.  I then saved the PBN images and lightened them up a bit in an image editing program so I could distinguish each color and it's borders better.  I printed the images the size of my canvas board using a wide format printer (they were bigger than a sheet of regular paper) at our public library.  Then came the task of tracing each color block and working out the paint colors.  I was able to differentiate 8 colors, 5 of them being shades of black, white, and greys.



The original painting had a lovely green background but since my walls are all ready that color I decided to go with a contrast and chose one of my accent colors, teal.  Next came the most tedious part which was transferring the image onto the canvas board.  I didn't have any carbon paper so I had to go low brow with it.  For this process you simply turn your paper over and cover the back with shading scribbles from a graphite pencil (6B).  Then place your image right side up, graphite scribbles against the canvas and use a ball point ink pen to trace around all the lines.  The graphite will transfer to the board faintly.  I went back over the lines on the canvas with a pen and numbered all the spots according to how I thought the colors translated. I then mixed up little containers of all of the paint shades, hoping I made enough to get me through both canvases.  Finally came the best part: painting, which was actually pretty fun!

Here they are on the focal wall as a set.
And below with the green display shelf (still working out this area decorating-wise).



I am pretty stoked with how they turned out...but even more so with how little they cost me to make...3 bucks!!!!  All I had to buy was the canvas boards and one thingy of teal paint.  I already had on-hand plenty of black and white paint.  I didn't even use 'artist paint', I used craft acrylics that come in those small plastic squirt bottles.

The vintage set of the Boston Terriers PBNs on ebay did eventually sell, I would guess to some Mr. Moneybags collector, but I am just dandy with my set because...



If you are gettin' the itchin' to do one yourself, check out
The Paint By Number Museum
for some inspo!

🎨🎨🎨🎨

Hummingbird Cake

Hummingbird Cake.
It may be the best cake I have ever tasted or made.  Mr. Husband and I were first introduced to Hummingbird cake during our visit to Mammy's Cupboard.  I don't do many repeat recipes but this one has now made it as both mine and Mr. Husband's birthday confectioneries this year.

I found a basic recipe in a book I own called "The Treasury of White Trash Cooking" by Mickler & Mickler, but added a bit of my own this and that to it.

Hummingbird Cake Recipe

3 cups all purpose flour

2 cups sugar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ground cloves

1 tsp baking soda

1 1/4 cups canola oil

3 pre-beaten eggs

22 oz can crushed pineapple, not drained

2 tsp coconut extract

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1/2 cup shredded coconut

2/3 cup mashed banana (about 2 bananas)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Combine dry ingredients in a large bowl.  Stir in eggs and oil.  (Do not use an electric mixer for mixing this cake). Blend in extract, whole can of pineapple, nuts, banana, and coconut.  Spoon batter into greased and floured cake pans. Should be more than enough batter for three 9 inch round cake pans.

Hummingbird Icing

8 oz cream cheese

1/2 cup softened butter

16 oz powdered sugar

(optional: 1 tsp coconut extract, 1/2 cup chopped walnuts)

Cream together butter and cream cheese, adding small amounts of powdered sugar to the mixture til all is cohesive. Blend in extract and add nuts. I like to add the nuts on top of the iced cake rather than mixing them in.  I think it looks better.

The cake pans I used were some I got from a 50 ¢ a pound bin sale from a thrift store.
They were a premium you could order from Spreckels Sugar Company (since 1898, still in business today).

Mine is missing the small top cake pan, it probably wound up on the bottom of the bin, or even in another bin across the store.  But it would be an easy fix using an empty potted meat can!

Estate Sale Scores

Here are some great finds Mr. Husband and I scrounged from a few estate sales and the flea market recently.
99 % of these things came from one sale.  It was listed as an indoor yard sale, no pictures, no hint of anything old or neat in the wording, but it was on my radar because everything was advertised as costing between 25¢ up to a dollar. I love cheap! It was the last stop of our Saturday morning saling trek, which had to that point been fruitless.  When we entered I could smell that old hoarded kinda aroma to the house but it wasn't piled up.  The first thing we found was this little vintage Florida water globe but not too much else.  I then noticed the garage and it was full of bags and boxes...and major evidence of rodents.  Mice in their "natural habitat" freak me the flip out.  I know that sheds and garages are the best places to find awesome stuff (if you are into junk like I am into)  but I will (and have) go screaming and running if I encounter one of these nasty beasts.  I figured since I had Mr. Husband with me I had back-up...only he is afraid of roaches...

So here are the things we found in the trenches:

Mr. Husband is a good scrounger and he found this cute old packaging of steel wool.  I love the "elephant" font and the elephant graphic!

Got the mother load of fruit/veggie magnets!

Some cookbooklets...never can have too many!

Love these!  Paper placemats!

Two queen sized flat sheets.  I like to use them for fabric for making clothes or mock ups.

Vintage RIT boxes.

Mr. Husband and I were the only ones scrounging in the garage and had a blast.  We never came in contact with any undesirables but made sure we didn't go digging in boxes that were clearly nothing but mouse nests.  We also found the 'end all to end all' of estate sale items at this sale however I have to save that for later.  Our total for everything above was 5 bucks.

The next day we decided to check out the flea market which usually doesn't turn up much.  But we did come across a big stack of 1944-1957 Better Homes and Gardens mags for only a buck each, we got 10.



And then, tacking this onto the end was an estate sale we went to the weekend before where we bought this amazing lampshade with finial (pictured in my house)!  It was attached to the world's ugliest lamp...which I'll have to photo another time.  I kinda have plans on making it a new lampshade worthy of it's hideousness.  When I asked how much it was, the guy retorted with "how much do you think?"  I didn't give an answer because I couldn't read if he thought it was a high dollar item....or a piece of junk. We looked around some more and asked him again which he said "how about 15 bucks?"  While that is high on my garage sale limit...it's certainly not when it comes to mid century lampshades!

But to round it all out he threw this in for no extra cost!

Recent posts have become a bit heavy in the estate/thrift score area but I'm sure I'll have some baked good or treat edging it's way in the near future again.