Carole’s Country Store Blog

Yesterday a friend from New Jersey asked me to meet her for lunch and do some antiquing too. It was Side Walk Sale Day in Mullica Hill, health New Jersey this past weekend and I was really hoping to find something special, and I did!!

This is a 18th century Redware shaving mug. I was happy to see some provenance on the bottom, which says it was found by Bee Man, or is it Beeman, in May of 1965, in a town called Sandy Ridge, which is in Hunterdon County, New Jersey, and it was found in a chicken coup and sold for $5.! When I saw it I just fell in love with it. The color is beautiful, not  red, but more of a mustard color. I could not resist buying it, and offer it to my customers. There is a shaving brush that came with it, part pewter and wood, and another piece that looks like a refill. Not sure what the bristles are, but they are not horse hair, but it is made from some kind of fur, very soft.

Hope you like it.

Happy day

Carole

Yesterday was such a beautiful Spring day. I asked my two best friends, for sale Carole O’Neill and Louise Tietjen, tadalafil to drive with me to Langhorne, Pennsylvania, to an open house at the home of antique dealer Linda Grier. She lives in a charming early house, surrounded by perfectly tended gardens. Nestled in the middle of the gardens is a quaint little shop where she sells her antiques, when she is not doing shows.

Don’t you love this old bee skep! I was so tempted to buy it.

After our visit with Linda, we were ready for lunch. Her street was so charming, with so many wonderful old homes, we decided we would walk to the restaurant. I just had to take a photo of this house with all the colorful parasols . So whimsical and fun! It made me happy just looking at it.

Across the street was the Langhorne research library, established in 1680 by the Friends Meeting.

The little coffee house where we had our lunch was in the home of Edward Hicks, known for his Peaceable Kingdom paintings. This is particularly interesting to Carole, as you might know has sold many wonderful Peaceable Kingdom paintings of her own.

We had a nice lunch and now it was time to head home, but before we left, I just had to get a picture of my best buds!

When we got back to my house, Carole and Louise brought in their new pieces of art to sell in my American Artisan Store., a painting and hooked rug. Aren’t they wonderful! Such talented friends of mine! I’ll have them for sale either today or tomorrow.

HAPPY DAY EVERYONE!

Carole

There was a time when it seemed that every rural family once owned a “milch” cow, buy viagra a cow used only for it’s milk. The milk was kept cool in crocks until the cream rose to the top. When there was enough cream, store which took one or two days to get, it was put into a butter churn, which most of you are probably familiar with, but it looks like a barrel with a plunger with a disc on the end.

A woman or a child would agitate this plunger up and down for about 60 minutes. Soon they would have butter, which would then separate from the liquid. This liquid was called buttermilk. The butter was then scooped out of the butter churn, rinsed, and pressed with a butter paddle to get out the excess liquid.

Sometimes the butter was very pale in color, which was considered to be undesirable. Carrot juice was added to give it a more golden color.

The next step was to pack the butter into molds. These molds had decorative designs in the forms of animals or flowers. Each individual design represented the farm the butter came from if the butter was to be sold at market.

The butter that was left was packed into a wooden bucket called a firkin.

I’ll bet your children would be surprised to learn where butter comes from. Why not show them by making your own? Measure a half pint of cream into a quart jar that has a tight lid. Make sure the lid is screwed on tightly, and let them shake, shake, shake, and they will see that soon they will have butter!

Remember Blessings

Carole

If you are lucky enough to have a friend that makes life more joyous, cialis someone who is always there for you when you need someone to lean on, sickness you are blessed. My friend Louise Tietjen is one of those people. I have known her for a very long time, she is one of my best friends. She is not only a good friend, she is also a very talented one. Louise lives on a beautiful historical property called Dogwood Farm, and it is there that she creates her beautiful hand  hooked rugs.

You might already know that her hooked rugs are available on my website in the  American Artisan Store, but did you know she has now created her own blog where you can read about her, and her life on Dogwood Farm, and at the same time keep up with her latest offerings. This gorgeous rug above is one of the beautiful rugs she now has for sale. I hope you will stop by and take a look.

Carole