Garage Sale Finds, Makevers, and Tea Time Tuesday

I found this delightful little chair at a garage sale a couple of Saturdays ago and was happy to purchase it for $2. My husband was a bit mystified as to why I would want it. He wondered what I would do with a chair that has such a low back on it. I told him not to worry, I would find the perfect spot to use it!

I knew I didn't want it to remain in its existing state of drabness and when I saw what a lovely makeover Lili over at Fearless Nesting did with a small table recently, I decided I would use her ideas for inspiration in my own makeover project.  

My first step was to give it a good coat of glossy paint in a buttery cream colour.

Next, I took fine sandpaper and sanded off areas where the chair would normally show some wear.

Lili recommended a wonderful site where you can download for free some beautiful vintage images, including the lovely tea rose she chose to decoupage to her table. Unfortunately, I don't have a colour printer, so I went looking at Michael's instead and came up with a piece of scrapbooking paper that reminded me of vintage wallpaper. At yet another garage sale, I found a remnant of material that I just knew would go perfectly with the chair and with the scrapbooking paper. I just love the mixture of chocolate brown and soft pink!

I debated different shapes that would go well for the decoupage and finally cut out a circular shape for the centre of the chair back, along with a few other pieces so it wouldn't look quite so symmetrical.  I glued them into position and then applied two coats of high gloss modge podge. And here's the end result:

I'm so pleased with the way it turned out and the fact that it is just the perfect size to fit in our bay window as a neat little reading or occasional chair.

And before I go, here's another little garage sale find that I am extremely pleased about.

It's a very tiny little cup, a tea cup?  or perhaps a demitasse?  I haven't had a chance to do any research on it yet, but it's marked R C with a crown symbol and then Versailles Bavaria.  It's absolutely gorgeous and in great condition although there is a small chip on the saucer.  I have a tea cup collection and I'm so pleased whenever I find something unique to add to the collection.

The funniest thing was they wanted only $1 for it, but were asking $5 for a Hannah Montana key chain that was right beside it!!!  I thought that was just too funny for words.  Nothing against Hannah Montana, or against key chains in general, but I'm guessing my little Bavarian cup and saucer might be worth just a tad more.

And in honour of my new-found tea cup, I am participating today in Tea Time Tuesday at one of the most beautiful blogs I've come across, Rose Chintz Cottage and Inspiration.

Sandy has asked us to include an inspirational saying, quote, or poem.  Here's one I thought would be perfect for such a lovely sunny Tuesday.

The Sun Never Says

Even after all this time

The sun never says to the earth,

"You owe Me."

Look what happens with

A love like that, 

It lights the Whole Sky.

From the Gift of Haviz

Translated by D. Ladinsky

An Archeological Dig in my Garden

Yesterday when I was planting our garden, I came across a selection of broken china shards that have surfaced since we last cultivated.

It reminded me so much of when I was a child and would spend hours playing outside in the summer. One of my favourite "games" was to play with all the pieces of broken pottery and china that would turn up every time some part of the farm was tilled. This was especially true of the garden closest to our house.

I loved to play with each piece of china and imagine what it had been in its previous life - a tea cup?  a dinner plate? I would spend hours making designs with the broken pieces - temporary mosaics that changed at a whim. And then I would try to imagine the very first person who owned the china and wonder what they were like and what they served to eat on the china. I think this is probably where I started to fall in love with fine china. And now, years later, I have many lovely (and unbroken!) tea cups, plates, etc. to play with.

And yet, still, when I came across these pieces yesterday,

they caught my fancy in a way that the cherished fine pieces that fill my china cabinets don't quite do. These two pieces look like they might have come from a plate. They are fairly heavy china and remind me a bit of the kind of plates that were used in old diners. Perhaps they belonged to my mother-in-law. I wish she was still here so I could ask her, because my husband is not likely to remember. He will remember a delicious meal in complete detail but never notice the plate it is served on!

It's probably partially caused by nostalgia for my childhood, but I still think there is something special about found china pieces. I think the mystery of the broken pieces is what attracts me ... I know that they were once something of beauty, treasured by a household and if they could speak, they would tell me the story of where they have been and whose lives they have touched. Which inevitably leads me to wonder who will find my pieces of china one day down the road? Will they turn up in some garden hundreds of years from now, shiny surfaces and colourful prints hidden beneath clumps of dirt?

I hope someday that my china will give another little girl great joy. That she will find the pieces and play with them, solitary games that fill her with a sense of beauty and of history, and teach her to love vibrant colours and delicate prints they way I do.  It almost (almost, but not quite) makes me want to leave a codicil in my will, that all my china be broken into pieces and discarded rather than leaving it intact to sit unused and bored on a cabinet shelf, when it could be scattered like seed in a garden, waiting to be found.