It is a factory glove, fingerless and meant to hold hot steel.

A rare form, it looks more like art than a work-a-day

item. I have 2 of them in the Hudson Supermarket.

is full of big, fat spaces that I never intended and can’t get rid of.  They require

one to scroll, scroll, scroll…so, my most humble apologies for the imperfection!

It is no surprise that I am crazy about German grain sacks. And even though

I no longer import them in the huge quantities of a few years ago, I sometimes

can’t resist making a purchase.  The hand-drawn reindeer on the grain sack

(below) is a recent acquisition that is so special that I have named a room after

him! Alfred’s Room.

He belonged to, and was named by, my dear friend, Karin, a German antique

dealer who lives in France and writes the most charming blog, found here:

lapouyette-unddiedingedeslebens.blogspot.com

I have this little room in the old 1790s part of my house that never quite got to

be anything but a dumping ground for all the things that had nowhere else

to go.  When Karin agreed to sell me Alfred, this treasured sack from her

homeland, I knew that it required a place worthy of such  kindness and I got

busy making a room ready for his arrival.

I brought in other reindeer.

Including a favorite painting by my great friend, Jennifer Lanne

(jenniferlanne.com)

Made some grain sack curtains, all sporting reindeer, natch!

I looked out the window one snowy day and realized that the lovely bare winter

branches looked like antlers! Even nature was cooperating in creating a warm

welcome for Alfred.

For now Alfred is draped over my little fireside bench.

The bench is upholstered with a Swedish drop cloth from the

1800s and is full of the most beautiful old hand-worked repairs.

My coffee table is a Swedish sailor’s trunk. It is wood, covered

in grey canvas. There is a wonderful brass label on the top…

But, best of all, is the hand-written inventory label on the inside. While I have been

assured that Swedish is easy to learn, I am content, for now, to just imagine what

this pretty thing says.

Whenever I am doing a new room, I run around the house gathering

favorite things. This Victorian pillow is perfect for a reindeer’s room.

This one had to come, too.

A southwestern corner shelf, Vischy baskets, more animals and,

of course, books.

Who’s to say why some things please us so? Colors, shapes, words or maybe just

some long-forgotten memories trigger our senses.

The group below includes a tole box (on the left) that my mother painted

back in the 1970s. During that same period of time, my parents gave me the

oval lunch box on the top of the pile of document boxes. It was my first piece

in old paint and I still love it…and old paint, as much as I did then.

My oldest grain sack. Sigh.

I have had this chair for a million years. It is surprisingly comfortable

and, along with my bench,  allows me to entertain a friend  in my

new room. I hope someday that friend will be Karin!

There are all kinds of things I could do with my new reindeer

grain sack.  A  jacket, a bed cover, anything would be fun.

But for now, I am happy, whiling away some time in Alfred’s

room, looking at his funny little face, thinking of Germany and

wondering what treasures Karin is out there finding right now!

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Tucked in a cranny, under beams in the 1790 part of our farmhouse, the space has

been an unused bedroom, an unused sitting room and an unused writing room in our

time. One day while I was dragging my price tag bag around the house, trying to

decide where I should set myself up, I got the idea that this nice little room was the

perfect place to be. All I had to do was find a perfect table in the barn and I’d be ready

to go. Everything else was already there: an old wicker waste basket, decorated with

papier mache swags and fruit, paintings and other decor that I love.

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Store display cow heads, organ pipes with the most amazing patina. Beams!

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But, what is going on here? Where are these barnyard friends going by the light of the

moon? Are they off to a seaside vacation? A night on the town? They say every picture

tells a story but this one, delightfully, leaves me with many questions left unanswered.

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Below, all is primitive and perfect, from the ladder leaning on a thatched roof to the

chickens enjoying breakfast in the sun.  Someday, when I become a painter, I want

to be just like this artist who (imagining two suns or just not planning ahead), cast

shadows from the trees and from the ladder from two different angles.

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Cows in art are always wandering down country lanes.

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Wandering down lanes. Drinking cool water. Eating fresh green grass.

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In beautiful places.

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Places we would like to be ourselves.

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It all seems so wholesome, so simple, so easy.

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So peaceful.

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Is it any wonder that century after century artists want to paint these scenes and

we want to own them? They make us feel so good.

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What else makes me feel good? Sitting at my desk, looking at this fabulous

6 foot x 6 foot painting (below), another by Jennifer Lanne. I asked her to paint me

something with a bookcase and a chair. She knows me well so there’s no need

to say more. There are two paintings within this painting: one of sheep

on the middle shelf on the left side of the bookcase and the other a painted

pillow on the chair (the pillow’s scene is hard to see in this photo).

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And, of course, the reason for the room:  the price tags!

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I guess it begs the question, why a Price Tag Room?

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It all goes back to the price tags themselves. I have been in the antiques business

for many years and have always wanted my tags to be as unusual and interesting

as the pieces they represent.

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Just like the desire to have my surroundings be appealing, I want the work

I do to please me, to please my eye, to be fun for me and, hopefully, be fun

for the customers in the Hudson Supermarket where I have my public show

room. Writing price tags isn’t a chore for me. It is part of what makes me love

what I do. Having a perfect place to do this enhances the experience in ways I

didn’t expect when I decided to give myself this room.

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In the early years, I made price tags from photos and other printed paper

of heavy stock. There were old tattered hand-made linen maps, restaurant

receipts and anything else that caught my eye.

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When I started selling industrial furnishings, some of the private pickers with whom I had

developed relationships had items, such as the metal machine labels (pictured above),

which I couldn’t resist. I asked for more and now have such a huge collection that, even

if I never purchased another tag, I would be set for life! While a Sharpie does work on the

metal tags, a paper sticker on the back side does an even better job and looks nicer.

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The one above is my all-time favorite. I use it for pricing my most favorite pieces. It has

everything going for it… Money! Trouble! An old car! I just know the waving driver of

this 1940s dream car is having fun, maybe even looking for trouble. The speed lines

behind the car seem to prove me right. I don’t mind at all that I have to reinforce the

string hole. And speaking of string…

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The string is important, too! I use everything from heavy electrical wire to fat cotton fishing

line. The brown waxed twine is from France, the brown with pink at the bottom of the photo

has copper wire inside its cloth webbing. I match the string to the mood of the piece of furniture

and the tag. This is all very time consuming but so much more satisfying, for me, than

writing on the same old, same old, same old little white Office Max tag with its wimpy white

string.

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Storage is a key component of my happy life! Interesting containers make all the difference.

Which brings me right back to that Costco Room which, suddenly, doesn’t seem so weird,

after all!

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