Samplers

Sitting home all day, nursing low back pain, I wandered around the house, looking for a place to get comfortable. Here are the results of my wanderings. The sampler above is in our kitchen. I bought it at a house sale a few years ago and thought it best expressed our Brooks B&B philosophy. You can ask our friends, Martin and Tanya, if this is how we operate. My mom could vouch for this as well.

 I bought this piece at a Swedish gift shop in Illinois a few years ago. My friend, Lennart, tranlated it for me as follows:   So wonderful the sun shines
                                so pleasing and good
                                her greeting she sends
                                which comes out in gold

Having visted Sweden twice so far, I can tell you that the sun doesn't shine very often and I think this stitcher was trying to channel some rays her way. This piece is in my dressing room. The piece below is in our entrance hallway. I bought it at an estate sale. You know, I am shocked at what relatives will put up for sale. Who could give something as special as this up? Obviously, someone went to a lot of work to stitch this piece and I bet she was hoping that it would be passed down as an heirloom.

 

Speaking of heirlooms, my Grandmother made the piece above, which I had framed a few years ago. When my mom visits, she looks at this and sings the words, so, perhaps they are lyrics to a song?

 



I suppose this is more a piece of embroidery than an actual sampler. I have this near some of my yarn and sheep collection. I bought this at an antique mall along with some children's artwork of sheep.

Above is another beautiful piece of needlepoint purchased at yet another estate sale. Paulette and I often discuss what will happen to the collections we own. We're pretty sure our families won't want anything and our things will someday be in an estate sale. too. This is pretty disturbing topic given that we each own hundreds of "things" and  it inevitably  leads to a discussion about if we should "downsize" now, move to smaller quarters, and just keep a very small amount of things. We usually end the discussion by deciding we'll think about it later and we head to the next estate sale anyway. Sometimes we purchase handiwork just to honor the person who made it, scolding the person's relations in our heads!

I don't think I should tell you the amount of things we have bought at estate sales, on eBay, auctions, tag sales, antique malls, and from each other's garage sales! One time, Paulette purchased something at GoodWill that I had donated earlier! Now we always check with each other before heading to a donation center. Another time I asked Ron to take a mirror down while I tried a different one. Days later, I decided I wanted the first mirror back in place and asked Ron to put it back up. It's gone, he said. Where, I asked. To GoodWill he said. I called Paulette in a panic and we raced to the shop. Sure enough, there it was. I bought it back for $7.00 and it is still hanging in our bathroom to this day!

Well, I certainly hope my back is better by Saturday. Paulette says there is a nice estate sale we should check out......