MEET MAEBEL

Cori and I had a couple of dress form orders come in early this week, and on Thursday, when the dress forms arrived we went to work, first on a style we have done previously using sheet music.  When that was completed by Friday morning, we started on a totally new design for the second custom order.  This one entailed using material and a vintage crochet embellishment down the front.

We really were venturing down new territory with the new design, but like the designers on Project Runway, we just jumped right in, creating a pattern for future orders, and by Friday night, the dress form was almost completed.  All we had to do this morning was apply the graphic artwork and a final coat of glazing with just a touch of metallic added to it.  Don't you just love the porcelain black and white door knob that we found to replace the basic wood finial the dress from comes with?  There is so much about this dress form that Cori and I love.

This dress form will not have to travel far, just across the State to Olympia, WA where it will reside in a boutique jewelry store. The new owner has already named her Maebel, after her yet to be born Niece.  Every dress form we create, is a one of a kind piece of art.  I have to admit, I am totally enamored with this dress form, and have already decided that when we have the time and energy, that I will be making one very similar to this one for my very own living room. 

HAPPY 10th ANNIVERSARY TO US

Ten years ago, on this day, Craig and I were standing on the 10th fairway on a golf course in Carmel, CA at sunset, as the last group of golfers were playing through.  There was a little pond nearby with ducks waddling around, and with no one but the minister, the hotel event coordinator as our witness, and a photographer, we pledged our love for each other and vowed to remain together for the rest of our lives.

I think I speak for Craig too, when I say that the rest of our lives will never be long enough, as we have found in each other the person who brings out the best that we each have to offer.  We truly are each other's best friend, and I can attest to the fact, that no one makes me laugh, and enjoy life more than my husband.

It was a leap of faith, ten years ago, only knowing each other for a few weeks before saying "I Do's", but as I have said before, back then I couldn't find anything wrong with him, and that statement stands true ten years later.  He is an original, walk to the beat of your own drum kinda guy, and his love of all things adventurous has certainly helped me step outside my safe little world I had built around me, and opened up my life to new discoveries and journeys which we have taken to create some great memories together.

I know he knows this, but my love for him goes beyond measure and grows each day.  I'd marry him again in an instant, as my life has been the richer for having had the privilege of being his wife.  To quote Paul Child who said this very thing to Julia........"You are the butter to my bread, you are the breath to my life."  Happy Anniversary Craig..... I love you to the moon and back again.

GOING ONCE, GOING TWICE........SOLD!

I attended my very first auction Sunday, spending 10 hours looking at a lot of items I would have loved to have bid on, watching and listening as the bidding went back and forth, until an eventual winning bid was placed.  Cori and I were among some of those winning bids on quite a few pieces.  It's hard not to get emotionally invested when there is an item up for bid that you really want, but then the auctioneer is talking so fast, by the time you finally raise your card, the price had risen by $10 or $15 dollars.

Such was the case with this little pig hat rack.  Cori took a liking to it, and it started out at $5 dollars, but by the time our card was flashed and acknowledged by the auctioneer, somehow it at $25 dollars before we knew it, and then we were the proud owners.  But wait until I tell you about the next item we were able to take home.

I have to tell you there were some awesome antiques up for auction, and we knew without a doubt that they would be out of our price range, and by night's end, that was indeed the case, but somehow when it came to this table and chairs, the stars must have been in alignment, because for some reason, no one bid on it.  They must have all been distracted by something, because we were able to snag this little gem for only $50 dollars.  We couldn't believe it ourselves, nor could anyone else, when they saw us standing by it at the end of the auction and wondered how they missed an opportunity to bid on it.

                    (So high out of our price range, all we could afford was to look at it and admire it)

(another piece that we admired only, too rich for our pockets)

I will admit, by the end of the 10 hours of sitting on a hard bench, I was ready to go home, but we were the highest bidders on 10 items which we were happy to bring home with us.  Well, we couldn't fit all of them in my truck for the ride home, in fact we had to bring two vehicles back to the auction house today in order to carefully cram and stuff   pack the remaining items and bring them to keep company with the over flow of furniture in need of some love in the garage.

I'm already looking forward to the next auction in March.  As I've said to Craig many times over the last couple of months....."It's a good thing we live in such a tiny house, or we'd be broke with me buying things that I've found while out treasure hunting".   Craig is always quick to agree!

THE TIME HAS COME

I think it's been made clear to me shortly after Craig decided to go team, that this blog would take on a new direction.  No longer did I have first hand insight into what was going on at shippers and receivers, or the ability to capture the changing seasons with my camera, and most evident was my lack of exposure to view life, our life, from the passenger seat of an 18 wheeler.

I miss that lifestyle, the one I thought I would never live back in the day, and more than that, I miss being able to spend all that time with my best friend and husband Craig.  But life is an ever changing entity, and you either adapt to those changes, or find yourself stuck fighting a battle that can never be won.  I count my five years on the truck with Craig, as five of the most happiest years of our lives.  The memories of those years, and the blogs entries that I wrote, fill five very large printed books that we have to enjoy at home.

I realize that the majority of the followers of this blog, have joined us on our trucking journey, and my hope is, for those that might have been interested in that lifestyle, that they were able to find some answers to their questions More importantly, that for all the negative, stereotypical descriptions of the men and women of trucking, that by reading this blog, you came to understand that they are the backbone of this great Nation, that they make sacrifices being separated from family, they miss out on holiday celebrations, and drive in horrendous weather conditions, to make sure you get everything you buy on a daily basis.

So it saddens me to close this trucking chapter on this blog, but I will continue it with what has become my second love.... " pickin' "  and re purposing old furniture.  The title will remain the same, but the background and sidebars will change in the coming weeks.  For those of you who enjoy that type of thing, I'll be thrilled to have you along on my latest journey of "before and afters".  For those whose interest lie in the trucking world and will move along, I thank you for coming along with us on our journey, through the good times and bad, from border to border and coast to coast, it was a helluva ride and we enjoyed the company along the way.

A TOTAL TRANSFORMATION

Cori and I have finally started taking pieces of furniture from our stack in the third bay of the garage, afterall, they have been left there neglected while newer pieces captured our attention.  But we couldn't let this little gem be ignored any longer.  We drug it out from the pile and gave it a good cleaning, then stood back and let it speak to us.  What did it say?  Not a darn thing......so we had to come up with something ourselves.

We decided it needed a lighter color, and a nice cream color it was painted along with a light distressing, but it needed a touch of something else to let it really shine.  So we went to the fabric store and found this black and cream fabric and decided to cover the front of the drawers with it, and then paint the hardware black....and with that, this little beauty was born.

We couldn't stop with just the drawers, so we took a little wood base lamp I had picked up at the thrift store last week, and painted it black.  Then with one of our spare lamp shades we have on had, Cori covered it in the same fabric that we covered the drawer fronts with and finished it off with some ribbon on the top and bottom of the shade.  But we couldn't stop there, and having a vision of our "time worn" collection of this past summer, we adhered an old pocket watch onto the front of the lamp.  We think it turned out just great!

Cori and I spent almost four hours this afternoon, rearranging and putting out new items in both of our spaces at the consignment store.  Some items were put back into storage and some were destined to be revamped or donated.  We were amazed at just how much product we have in both spaces, and hope that in the last two weeks of the month, we can generate some sales.

In trucking news, the weekend had Craig and Roy sitting idle from late Saturday night to early Monday morning, where they delivered a load of bananas in Clackamas, OR at the Fred Meyer DC.  Then it was off to Salem, OR to pick up some cooking oil and transport it to the company yard in French Camp, CA.  They have been there since late Monday night waiting on a team load to be delivered to them there, where they will take it the rest of the way into Phoenix, AZ by tomorrow afternoon.

IF THERE IS A BATHTUB IN THE FRONT YARD.......

If there is a bathtub in the front yard.........you know you're at a house ripe for pickin'.  Yesterday, Cori and I went out on an adventure, driving to the middle of nowhere  Heppner, OR to meet up with Dave, who had told us over many phone calls and emails, that he had some items that we would be interested in.  We met Dave and his son, at a gas station in Lexington, OR and from there we followed him to one of two locations he would take us to.  Oh and by the way?.... the majority of the drive from Lexington to Heppner were on gravel roads only.  As I said to Cori several times through tears of laughter......." Lucy.....you got some splainin' to do"!

We are coming to find out that if there is a plumbing fixture, sink, toilet, or bathtub somewhere on the front lawn, we better don our gloves and flashlights and be ready to get dirty, and dirty we got.  We climbed, and sifted, and dug through boxes and shelves of what most people would call trash, but we prefer to call it unclaimed treasures from long ago.  Dusting off years of dirt and neglect, we found enough items to fill up the inside of Cori's mini van, and I'm sure we brought home an extra spider or two along the way.

It seemed like each item had a story behind it, but the best one involved this green chair.  When examining it, I mentioned the hole in the seat of the chair, to which Dave started laughing.  He said that chair was his Mother's favorite, and would sit it in all the time outside, however, when it rained, it collected water on the seat.  When she complained to his Father about this dilemma, he promptly took his gun and shot a bullet through the seat, immediately fixing the problem.

The old wood toolboxes?  Dave's Father built those when he was just a boy of 12 years old.  The kitchen scale was found inside an abandoned single wide trailer on the property, along with those license plates with the last registration dates of 1961 and 1965.   We couldn't pass up that old wood post gate with the rusty hinges either or the fishing creel that I'm sure could tell a fish story or two.  But we were far from finished picking when we left Dave and headed out to Pendelton, OR to visit Ken.

Once again, the bathtub told us we would be in for a dirty good time, and just look at the garage!  It was really too bad that 80 percent of what was in there was broken beyond repair, but we did manage to find an arm chair, two side chairs. and an old window that would find a life outside of a dusty jam packed garage.  We had a blast,  thankful that there are people that still hold onto vintage items, allow us to go hunting through their out buildings and are willing to part with them.  We look at it like modern day treasure hunting.

NO IDLE HANDS HERE

Cori and I have been busy completing several projects this past week.  First up remember this?

After purchasing four 6 inch legs and attaching them, it turned into a great little coffee table.  It was then painted black and we went to town giving it a distressed look.  We also added a wood applique to the front of the drawers to give it a little something to jazz up all it's boxy glory.  We were very happy with the end results.

This next project, I don't have a before picture of, but it was a frame from a mirror that used to reside on a vanity or dresser.  Cori and I thought it would make a great bulletin board, so we painted it, distressed it, and found some great material to cover a cork board with, and we couldn't be happier with the way it turned out. 

We did a quick little makeover on an old suitcase by spray painting it black and then doing a panel of burlap on each side.  Then we went to town doing a bit of stenciling to give it a little character and make it the perfect decorating accent in someones home.

Oh.....remember that dress form order we had from a trendy little boutique in New York City?   Here is a picture of it inside the store.  Pretty cool if I do say so myself. 

Finally, in trucking news, Craig and Roy delivered the trailer of Tyson meat to the company yard in Bloomington, CA Tuesday and then took a USF load from Fontana, CA to Spokane, WA which they delivered this morning.  They were immediately given a new assignment to pick up frozen french fries in Quincy, WA and are presently headed south, with a Monday morning delivery.

PICKIN' AND GRINNIN'

The last two days we were at home, we had fresh snow falling, mostly during the whole time we were at the clubhouse, raising our blood alcohol level, while watching the Super Bowl.  We were having such a grand time, that I didn't let the three inches of snow bother me at all, either that, or that blood alcohol level had managed to alter my anxiety about that white stuff to non existent.  In either case, we both managed to make our way back to our house on foot without incident.

As always, time off goes by way too quickly, and way too early on Tuesday morning, the house was shut down again, our bags were packed, and we were on the road to drop Craig off at the truck in Spokane, and then I made my way further south to Walla Walla.  I'm actually happy we did leave as early as we did, because having gone without "picking" for five days, I got into Walla Walla in time to swing by a thrift store and then hit the church sale before it closed at noon.

I managed to snag some great little vintage items at the thrift store, and then a large four shelf display unit for our second space for only $5.00.  Shortly after I got to Cori's house, we drove straight to the store to put that shelving unit to good use, then of course, we did a little shopping at some of the other spaces and managed to buy a few items we know we can resell for a profit at the Farm Chicks Show in June.

Cori was able to find these two church pews at the church sale on Sunday, and they have been squeezed into the garage along with all the other many, many projects we have piling up.  We have got to get busy to finish up a few of those so that we can keep finding great stuff, especially since we have a road trip to Heppner, OR lined up very soon, where we have it on good authority, that there is a huge barn with lots of items that will be sure to get our "love of all thing vintage" hearts to do flip flops.

In trucking news, Craig and Roy were busy putting away their personal belongings and grocery items as I drove away Tuesday morning.  They are switching up the driving duties, so Roy has the fun of doing the middle of the night driving, while Craig has the 12pm to 12am shift.  After getting settled, they were given the assignment of heading to Tyson in Wallula, WA and picking up a very heavy load of meat.  So heavy, that they had only 20 pounds of spare weight left before they would have been at their maximum of 80,000 limit.  Good thing I didn't go overboard feeding Craig a lot of home cooked meals while we were home, or they may have been over that weight limit!

WE'RE HOME

We're home, and still trying to figure out how to get into our house, with the door to our house sitting just slightly lower than the deck, after all the snow we have had.  I've resisted Craig taking the saw to the front porch railing to create a gate, but I'm afraid the day has come, and we will soon have an alternate entry to use.  I have to admit, with an opening to the front porch, it will be a whole lot easier to unload groceries and get them into the house.

There isn't any fresh snow........yet, although there is a forecast of snow for tomorrow and Monday.  What we do have is about 8 inches of solid ice left on the ground, which makes for some trecheous walking while outside.  It didn't seem to hamper the herd of about 20 deer that came walking by our house the other evening.

I've managed to get our taxes done and filed, which I'd rather do any day, than the boat load of laundry that Craig brought home with him this time.  We have a plan of tackling that burden tomorrow afternoon, when we head over to the clubhouse to watch the Super Bowl on the big screen TV and partake in all the great food that will be there to eat.

Cori checked by the retail space on Friday, and it seems a couple of our larger items have sold out of our second space.  Thankfully, we had plenty in storage to bring out to fill in the empty spaces.  As I wrote about previously, we have quite a few pieces waiting for us when we start back up again next week, and we are excited to get busy on them.

So not much to report.  Craig continues to hope that a new truck will be waiting for him every time he returns from home time, and as the mileage continues to rapidly get higher and higher on good old truck 296.  Rumor has it that the company has ordered some new trucks, so it's just a matter of time before Craig will get to expereince that new truck smell.