A broken furnace

This could have been me one day last week. I got up, and the house felt chilly despite the wood stove cranking out it's heat. I looked at our thermostat, and the house was 67 degrees. The furnace was not running.

Oh no.

I went downstairs, pulled the filter out, and it started running again. Whew! Just a dirty filter!

That evening, George met me at the shop, and instead of going home, we decided to go out to eat, and see a movie.

Our nice evening came to an abrupt halt when we got home though. The furnace was off again. And the fire in the woodstove was out.

We discovered the batteries in the thermostat had corroded. We cleaned that up, put in fresh batteries, and turned it back on. Yes! Heat!

But this morning, I got up. The house felt chilly. I looked at the thermostat. The house was 67 degrees. The furnace was off. I felt like I was in a real life Groundhog Day!

Oh no.

When George gets home from work, he will look into it further. Hopefully we just missed something. Like a mouse. In the fall, he took the furnace door off to do a little checkup before winter, and discovered a couple mice had climbed up into the furnace guts where they.........well, let's just say they met their Maker right there inside the furnace.

It's relatively warm for winter right now. 30's today. 40's tomorrow. But we are supposed to be back in the single digits by the weekend.

The woodstove is great, but it only does so much. We need that furnace! 

Vintage baby treasures

How precious are these vintage baby clothes, and quilt? Say it with me now... "Awwww".

A little closer view of the quilt. I always wish these treasures could talk and tell their story. Who made the quilt? Mommy? Grandma? An aunt or close family friend? Was it a boy or girl? What was the baby's name? What year was the baby born? And wouldn't you love to see a picture of the baby?

Ah. Well. We will just have to use our imaginations I guess. 

All we know for sure is that they are absolutely precious.

All of these are for sale in our shop.

What sweet decorations for your home!

Farm themed display window

One of our display windows has been filled with farm decor.........

The tin signs and canvas pictures are imported items. 

I love how bright and colorful the tin signs are! 

I painted the wood signs, using some scrap lumber.

The Farm Life sign in the bottom right is a piece of barnwood.

A friend made the fabric sheep on the stand.

The vintage pump is missing it's handle, 

but still makes a cool decor piece.

In fact, just about any vintage item from a barn

makes a cool decor piece!

Baby Shower

We are in full baby shower mode around here! Our daughter-in-law is expecting in December. Our first grandchild! A boy!

We are having a small shower in our house tomorrow afternoon. Our daughter and I have been getting decorating ideas from....... where else? Pinterest!

And even though she lives 5  hours away, the magical thing called the internet is allowing us to share ideas with ease. But nothing compares to doing it in person, and she is coming home today. Yay! The flurry of actually putting together our ideas will be taking place soon. I will post pictures once everything slows down again.

In the meantime, our daughter-in-law is traveling 2 1/2 hours today to attend the shower in her hometown that her family is having for her.

Yep, full baby shower mode around here!

Canning Applesauce and Preserving Memories

This was my day yesterday - canning applesauce.

To be honest, I don't like working up apples. I enjoy canning, but I find apples to be very tiresome. Cutting them up, cooking them to make them soft, running them through the strainer, and finally reaching the canning stage......... lots of work! But totally worth it.

Anytime I can, memories come flooding back. Mostly of me and my mom canning together, which we did every summer. She has been gone for several years, but every single time I can, I hear her voice guiding me in the steps. I am so glad I paid attention! I treasure those memories more than I can express. We shared many happy times as we "put up" food for winter. 

With apples though, the memories also include my dad. They had several apple trees, so I can see him picking them, and bringing them into the kitchen in one bushel basket after another. If they didn't have a good crop, they would buy apples from a local orchard. When my kids were small, the orchard owner would sometimes drop off their order at their house. She was a story teller, and I can still see my kids sitting there, soaking up every word she said.

Dad didn't usually help with the canning, but he did with the apples, because they would put up several bushels. So every fall, he and mom would turn their kitchen into an applesauce factory. Mom knew which varieties to cook together to make the best sauce. I remember one year when the sauce came out pink from the red peelings. It was delicious!

There was much more preserved in that kitchen than food. I miss them both terribly, but am so very thankful for the lessons... and the memories.

History and a Fall Festival

My shop is on Jefferson Avenue (in Moundsville, WV). Jefferson is the main business district in our small town of around 10,000 people. It's also a street full of history, starting in 250 BC. Give or take a year.

What is this, you ask? It's a burial mound. Yes, you heard me right. It's the Grave Creek Burial Mound, built by the Adenas waaaaaay back in the day. This old postcard shows it had become a tourist attraction in the 1800's, and still is today. When you drive by it every day, you kind of forget how special it is. But every once in a while, I will just stop and look at it in amazement. You can read more about it.here.

In a bit more recent time, still on Jefferson Avenue, the West Virginia Penitentiary was built... in 1866.

If you were just driving by, you might at first think it is a castle. But a closer look would reveal the bars on all the windows. The prison closed in 1995, and is now a tourist attraction. Thousands of people come throughout the year for the daytime tours of the prison, and the night time ghost hunts. Interested? Read more here.

Moving up in history just a bit more, we come to last Saturday, September 20. 2014. Besides the Grave Creek Mound, and the former WV Penitentiary, Jefferson Avenue also features the main business district in Moundsville, and last Saturday, it featured the Fall Festival on the Avenue. The main feature of the festival this year may have been the weather. It was an absolutely beautiful fall day to showcase the 70 craft tables, and the shops, along with food, music, and other attractions. Around 5000 people came out to enjoy the day.

For the first time this year, we reserved the 2 spaces in front of our own shop for ourselves, and sold pumpkins right on the street.

Besides filling the booths, we also had a display on the sidewalk, making it quite full in front of our shop.

It was a very busy day! Quite a few of those 5000 people made their way into both our booth, and our shop. Kevin and Katie manned the outside booth. George and I ran the store. It took all 4 of us to keep up. In fact, we could have used another helper or two. We needed runners with wagons to take pumpkins to customers cars. We sold lots of pumpkins, but we would have sold more if we would have been able to take them to the cars. Something to remember for next year.

By the end of the day, we were all exhausted. And happy that the day had gone so well. Looking forward to next year! 

Lazy Days of Summer? Don't Think So!

What a crazy summer.

It's actually a bit of a blur.............

I guess what we'll remember most about it is the produce we started selling in front of the shop. It's a long, long story, but the end result was the addition of a farmer's market to our business.

It all started with a simple lemonade stand. George built it - I think he did a great job on it! 

Then we decided since we were setting up outside, we may as well add a few baked goods.....

And then came the garden produce.....

We did not grow it ourselves. We did have a garden, but it was nothing to brag about, let alone sell anything from. We actually bought the produce from the Amish, who have a way with gardening!

The garden produce is winding down with the approach of fall, but that means the pumpkins and gourds and corn shocks and Indian corn are in full swing!

In fact, they are taking over our shop! But that's ok, I LOVE fall!

Every summer is busy it seems. 

But this one has been our all time busiest. 

Fortunately, we did get a chance to relax before all the craziness started.

We spent a few days at the beach in June.

We are very tempted to do it again in September. 

Or October.

Or.....

Well, anytime sounds good!

Remind me to keep this blog updated. 

It has been suffering lately,

but we'll see if it can be brought back to the front burner.