Vintage cookbook inspiration

One of the many things I collect is cookbooks. Like many collections, it started innocently. I liked the covers on a few cookbooks and picked them up. I must have felt they were lonely and now I have a whole lot of cookbooks. Some of my cookbooks are stacked on my new retro styled stool. The top Better Homes and Gardens cookbook came out of one of the auction boxes I recently blogged about. It's one of my favorites.

 

 

Recently I went through my cookbooks, looking for some dinner time inspiration. I was in a rut and needed some help.

 

One of the cookbooks I went through was this Betty Crocker book. I didn't find any dinner inspiration, but I did find this: 

Breakfast in bed made easy with a muffin pan. I love such simple ideas. I however took the idea another way: 

It's movie night kid's trays! Kind of like the theaters have. The best part: no bickering over who won't share the popcorn. And their drinks all stayed put in the built in cup holder.

Chalkboard redo

I picked up this chalkboard at a thrift store recently. I didn't take a before picture, but I'll tell you it was ugly. It would have been better if the previous owner had left the frame as bare wood, but for some reason they decided to paint it a hideous brown. In the Crayola box I think it would have been burnt Sierra. I thought about replacing the cork board because there are colored chalk squiggly lines on it, but in the end decided to leave it as is. It's going to be mostly covered up anyway. Plus it looks like pretty much everything else around here that the kids have put their own special touches on. 

I put a couple of coats of an off-white spray paint on the frame before applying the blue. Then I roughed it up quite a lot. I had envisioned this going in my bedroom, but it looked really good in the kitchen. 

More hotel postcards

There were two postcards that didn't make it into the pack I sent my sister:

  This one is from Tower City, ND. Love this postcard. I don't stop at Tower City often so I can't remember if the cafe is still there or not. I do know that there's a good little bakery with really good homemade bars. The gas station is still there, but I don't think the garage is. My memory fails me so I'll have to stop there the next time we go through. I'll be the weirdo taking a picture of the Tower City gas station so I can get a comparison picture. 

This one is from the Biltmore Motor Hotel in Fargo on Main. It's now the Kelly Inn. From their website I learned it's the only outdoor pool at a hotel left in Fargo. I remember it because it was here that we had a little get together after I graduated from NDSU. Awww, memories.

Treasures for my sister

I picked up this 1947 Kerr canning booklet at Junkfest last year. I think I got it in a bundle of stuff, but hung on to this because I love the "Modern Homemaker" cover. I haven't done anything with it and my sister likes canning so she's getting it.

 The inside has great illustrations and pictures and is filled with recipes and useful canning tips. There is also a centerfold only a vintage loving woman would love: Canning labels! They are pictured on the right, but didn't scan in great. You can see them a little better if you click on the picture. 

I also ran across a bundle of hotel envelopes, stationary, and postcards at a rummage sale over the weekend that my sister will be getting to add to her hotel collection. I paid a whole 50 cents for a pretty good stack of stuff.



This is a great Holiday Inn envelope. There are also some really nice graphics on the back.



This was one of my favorite postcards from the stash. Gotta love the ladies relaxing around the pool. This hotel is in Springfield, Illinois. It's still there, State House Inn, but alas, it doesn't look they have a pool anymore.

Hope you like your new treasures, Mrs. G! They'll be in the mail shortly so be on the lookout!

My junkin' buddy

I've got a new junkin' buddy. My son Torii. I have Storage Wars to thank for his interest in auctions, he's a big fan. We went to an auction a couple of weeks ago, but didn't get to stay long because we had other commitments. We were both bummed because there was a lot of good junk. Torii did get a couple of globes and I got two big boxes of cookbooks. There were so many cookbooks. I could have easily gone crazy.

I also picked up two boxes of arrows, which Torii bid on for me. I stuck some arrows in a vase, but I still have a bunch left. Not sure what to do with those yet.

Since we didn't get to stay long at the first auction we went to another over the weekend. Torii got a map garbage can that will look great with his globes and I just got a few little things. We may go to another auction next month and Torii is also thinking about tagging along at Junkfest. It's so much fun having a kid that's excited about junk!