curiousity shop

currently eyeing

...peeling, painted wood.  

It seems more and more my eye is drawn to the decayed and the vintage. 

 

I took these photographs on a long walk in Skagway, Alaska, where I happily ran across all sorts of beautiful deterioration.  

There's a certain charm to buldings that have fallen into disrepair... like the deep wrinkles of my granfather's face, the peeling paint indicates a long, and interesting life, and I love to imagine the stories that are held within these walls.  I daresay I might one day live in a little, refurbished cottage myself!

learning to love you more (assignment no. 53)

Advice to Alissa at age 17:  

1.  You might never again experience the depth of family that you have had at this church you have attended all your life. You will move on to a new spiritual family in 5 years, and it will feel weird at first.  It's not a parting, but an extension.  Good things are ahead.

2.  That boy you like is leading you on.  Just because he acts like he is in love doesn't mean he is.   There are better boys to come, and soon he will be just a "blip" in your story.

3.  Don't lose touch with Jenny.  She is the truest of friends.

4.  Don't fight with Dad about the cereal.  Let him win so he can still feel like he has authority.  Soon you will move out, and you can eat whatever cereal you want.

5.  Rescue all those beautiful relics from the milkhouse on the farm.  One day you will have an eye for vintage items, and daydream about roaming around all those barns full of free antiques.

6.  When Laura finds a new best friend, don't let her go so easily.

7.  Don't let Jeff and Dave make fun of your music.    They think Nickelback is cool!  What do they know?  In ten years, they will just be discovering what you have known all along.

vintage mint sheets

As a 12 year-old kid, I went on a brief foray into the world of stamp collecting.  Mainly I would just carefully steam the stamps off the letters my family would receive, and delicately place them into my wax-paper-lined stamp-collecting book.  At the time it all felt very official, and I would often marvel at the little vignettes and old-school typography.  What a find today, to come across a book full of mint sheets from the late 60s. Given to me years ago by my Grandpa Jantzen (and purchased long before I was born),  the collection is entirely middle-eastern in origin, and worth decidely more than my own initial collection of individual stamps.  I really love the vintage illustrations and fonts, and am already dreaming up ways to showcase them properly in my home.

A sheet of stamps from Israel.

Futuristic images of satellites on these stamps from Ras Al Khaima (United Arab Emirates)

I adore these bright brontosaurus stamps from Fujeira (U.A.E.), dated 1968.

These stamps bear the name, "The Mutawakelite Kingdom of Yemen," and are dated 1967.

I love the rich colour of the portraits featured on these stamps from Dubai, 

celebrating Children's Day, 1968.

Two more sets of stamps from Fujeira (U.A.E.) featuring weather balloons (?) and locomotives.

These feature a metallic silver background, dated April 1969.

hermes 3000

I like to make stuff.  Especially stuff out of paper.  And this week, I've been working on homemade valentines for all of my most favouritest people.  In the midst of cutting and pasting, collaging and tea-dying, it occurred to me how charming it would be to afix type-written phrases to my petit works of art.  Ever since, I 've been longing for a vintage type-writer, to tap out all of my most ardent thoughts (this one, at threepotatofour, particularly caught my eye).  

What a sweet surprise tonight, then, to receive a Hermes 3000 typewriter, rummaged from the very back corner of my grandparents basement (in the ping-pong room, to boot!).  Circa 1958, it is the very same machine on which my grandpa typed each and every university paper in the late 50s.  I think it's marvellous!