HELP WITH ID OF VINTAGE SHEET

I found this vintage sheet at my favorite thrift the other day and fell in love with the bright colors.

Reminds me a lot of an Easter dress I had way back in the late 60's. Orange, yellow, green bold design dress. Only I had a bright yellow Nehru coat and yellow hat to match and orange patent leather purse and shoes to complete the daring outfit. I was styling..... I'm surprised I didn't burn some retina at church that day. I don't think I ever wore the yellow coat or hat again, but my girls played dress up with the orange purse when they were little.

Ok, back from the trip down memory lane.

Here is the sheet I need help with. It fits a double bed and I probably won't use it for linens but for a craft project of some kind. Thanks for any help.

Talking to snails, what have you been eating?

What is that blue animal? And what about a purple
moose? Are your eyes dilated? That frog is
definitely on something...

.

Ah, now I see ... all the mushrooms.....

MY NEW MAGIC POTION

I love vintage linens.

Crocheted tablecloths, bedspreads, doilies, tea towels, sheets and just about any fabric that is vintage.
My problem has been getting those nasty stains out of things without destroying the fibers.

My first attack on the stain is alcohol. The alcohol gets into the stained area and absorbs the stain and then evaporates, at least in theory. Sometimes that works.

My next attack is pre-treat and wash. I pre-treat with my homemade soap concentrate. I poured a small amount of the soap base in a yogurt container before adding water to make my laundry soap. This sets up as a semi-solid and I just scoop it out with my finger and rub it into the stain. Let it sit and then wash in a day or so. Sometimes that works.

When I wash the stained item I add an oxyclean type powder to the wash. Sometimes that works.

But, lets face it. Nothing works all of the time on all stains. Blood, chocolate and tomato based stains are the worst to remove. And when you find a vintage line with any of those stains, the stains are vintage also.

What to do?

I was browsing that time sucking web site that I will not name (Pinterest) the other day and came across a recipe for a linen soak that sounded good. I wrote it down. Sorry, I don't pin. If I like it I use it then and not in six months.

My test was a vintage Vera white sheet with yellow and blue flowers on the border. The border was ok, it was the rest of the sheet that was a mess. I could use the border for a craft project but could I "save" the rest of the king size sheet?  I tried.

Into the new soak it goes. I soaked for two days in my washer. And.....IT WORKED.  All of those nasty stains came out.

Now, when I soaked I used hot water as stressed. I did not boil water and add a potful to the washer but I did boil a cup in the microwave to dissolve the borax. Our hot water is at 130 for the DW so I felt that was hot enough. I also agitated all of the ingredients for about a minute before I added the things I wanted to soak. Then in goes the sheet and my cloth "paper towels" with spaghetti stains and gray stains from cleaning the kitchen. The true test for my new potion. I also let the washer agitate for 4 minutes before I opened the lid to let the soak begin. I did go back several times over the next two days and close the lid and let everything agitate for several minutes and push everything down in the water.

What is this magic potion, you ask? Well, I used the formula with bleach because I was using colorfast, mostly white items. But the original post stressed that if you wanted to soak colored items to use color safe bleach, Clorox II, or something similar. I don't have any of that so I don't know what the results of that would be.

Here is the recipe that I found on Pinterest. If it is your recipe, I would give credit but I didn't save the original post so I can't credit the author of this recipe.

LINEN SOAK, COLORFAST ITEMS ONLY
1 cup laundry detergent
1 cup dishwasher detergent (the original recipe said powdered, but all I had was liquid)
1 cup bleach (Clorox or generic)
1/2 cup borax
Hot, Hot, Hot, Hot water
1/2 cup white vinegar, for final rinse
Soak your items in the smallest amount of water that will allow the items to get thoroughly wet and stay wet. I used the small setting on my washer. Use Hot water. If your hot water is not at least 130, add hot water to the tub. Make sure the borax is dissolved. It takes very hot water to dissolve borax.
Soak your items as long as necessary. You can check the items progress and adjust your soak time. And you can soak again if the item is still not quite clean.
For colored items replace the bleach with a color safe bleach, such as Clorox II. Be sure and add vinegar to the final rinse to make sure that the bleach is neutralized. A Downey ball works just fine with vinegar.The vinegar odor will go away when dry.

But, as usual, I went a step further. I got to thinking, always a bad sign, that I need to spot treat some items sometimes and I wondered if I could mix up a concentrate and keep it for special problems. Sooooo, I divided the recipe by 4 and mixed up a small batch. 1/4 cup of everything except borax. Dissolve 2 Tbs borax in 1 cup hot water and add everything else and mix well. Then I put it in a recycled plastic jar so I could shake it to remix when needed.

My trusty pyrex bowl

I had a white shirt that I had just purchased at the thrift store with red sharpie on the bottom. My thrift store marks things to go in the last chance bins with a red X. The red X is supposed to be on the tag, but sometimes they get carried away with the sharpie. I have seen beautiful white items in the bins with red sharpie all over them and passed them up because I thought they were lost causes.

Not a bad sharpie mark, but permanent

I stretched the t shirt across the bowl and just dipped the stained area in the mixture and used my plastic handle to get the spot soaked.
Then I went inside, got a load of sheets from the washer and hung them out on the line. Checked my stain and this is what I found.
Stain was gone!! I estimate soaking time at about 5 or 6 minutes. And that bad boy was gone. Then I took the t shirt to the sink and rinsed the mixture out. Now for some reason the soak mixture turned the shirt light blue, but I rinsed several times and the blue came out. The t shirt was 100% cotton and new and cost 25c so I figured I would take the risk.  I really don't like bleach on most items. I prefer to use something less harsh.

I guess sometime you just have to break out the big guns if you want to blow away the enemy.
Soak On!!

MEET MY FAMILY...MY HALF FAMILY

Now we have all heard about the dangers of posting pictures of your kids and grandkids on the internet. The disturbed individuals that are searching out the cute young things. Well, I don't think I have to worry about that.

I hope this won't attract the wrong kind of people.

Let me introduce you to my half family....

They are a happy little group. That is Fred on the left, except when he cross dresses, then he is Fredrica.
And on the right we have Perky, for obvious reasons.In the middle we have their little one, Bland. Fred is a real clothes horse. He loves all the high end clothing I can find. And when I find women's plus size clothing, he puts his bra on and struts his stuff. Perky loves vintage. She loves the style and feel of the vintage fabric. And their little one, Bland, takes after Fred. Bland is just as happy in a dress as in a pair of snow overalls.

And there you have them. One happy little half family.

Couldn't do it without them!!

IS YOUR MIND IN THE GUTTER?

I had washed these teletubbie sheets and had them folded ready to photograph.

Now teletubbies are very annoying and I am glad they became popular after my girls were older. I watched them a few times when my grandson was a baby and I almost went crazy.
But silly ol' me thought they were for kids.

I hope I'm not the only one that sees that.

LOOK IN ALL THE NOOKS AND CRANNIES

SweetiePie is always wondering why it takes me 4 hours in a thrift store. Well, you have to check everything and in every area. You never know what you will find or where you will find it. For example, I found a Brother monogram attachment for any zig zag sewing machine in the game section at my favorite thrift. See, it is in the box with all of the discs for the alphabet and instructions!!


As I was standing there, counting all the discs and looking at the price on the front of the box $24.30, and figuring if I could make a profit. Let's see $24.30 less 50%, and should sell in the $30-40 range, yes that could be triple my investment. Put this baby in the cart. When I got to the check out the man running the register (who just happened to be the store manager) asked what it was. I said a sewing machine attachment for monogramming . He said, "wow, it still has the original price on it". What?? $24.30 is the original price?  What was the thrift store price, you ask?
Plus, I used my 50% off coupon!! Now for a cost of 63cents, I think I may be able to "squeeze" a profit out of this item.

So, the moral of my story is: Leave no item unturned in the store. Look at everything.

Now, if I could just get the darn price off the box I would be one happy thrifter.

**When I got home I checked the completeds and found that this is not a big seller. Maybe $25, but still I'll make a good profit. I would have loved one of these when my girls were little. I'm hoping that some Mom or Grandma will feel the same way. I'm still glad I bought the complete set. It won't sell fast but it should sell for a good profit.

GETTING THE JOB DONE

Well, well it sure has been busy hear at the ol' homestead.
Ah fixin' stuff, ah buyin' stuff, ah sellin' stuff and ah makin' stuff.

My daughter, SmartA**, has settled into her new house pretty well now. And she has unpacked almost all of the boxes that are there. She still has some stuff, not much, that she needs to get from our house. In the meantime we have been working on her kitchen cabinets. I've gotten the frame up and the shelves are in.

Just ignore that bowl of ice cream on the ladder. My reward for
getting that far.

And next week we hope to get the vintage windows mounted on the frame. She is going to try and prime the inside this week, if she has time. Not bad for my first set of built in cabinets. You can's see the scuffs on the left wall where we had to "persuade" the frame to fit. If I could correct a few things I would have made the shelves inset in the framework, but at this point we would have to rip out everything to do that. Not gonna happen!!

On the thrifting front I have had some great finds lately. I had a 50% off coupon for my favorite thrift and I have used two of the four I had. I think I will save the others for September when the coupon of the month is any coupon that you have left over from previous months. I will be making an out of town thrift trip in September, but who can resist 50% off!!

I found something I have never seen before and at first thought it had been embellished by the previous owner. But after research I found out it is original. Look what I found!

It's a Vintage Vera Charm Scarf. Early 50's. I had never seen one before. According to research they were made from surplus WWII parachute silk. This one has no holes, but does have some color variations, which is normal for the age. But over 60 years old!! I priced high and can always reduce the price, but for the age I think it's fair. Link
Also on the same trip I found a Lilly Pulitzer shift, some JJill linen and silk tops and dresses, several things NWT. The Lilly Pulitzer sold in an hour and half after it listed this morning!!! Lilly
I have been trying to research everything before I list. On the Lilly there is one exactly like the one I sold and it is listed for $54, different size and almost no description. I just checked and it isn't there, must have run out, but in checking completeds it has been relisted at auction twice with no sale.

Also on the same trip I checked an area that I usually just overlook, belts.Usually the belts are pretty beat up and so out of date that I never find anything. There is one time SweetiePie found a Brighton belt, with tags, at GW for $2. I found an Allan Edmonds belt, a per se belt, and this belt that sold last night. You can bet I will check belts from now on.

Happy thrifting and selling.....let the games begin!!!

TREATS FOR ME

I have been selling on ebay for almost two years now and I keep taking crappy pictures. I know, sometimes it is the picture that sells an item. I should do my best to take the best possible pictures. The trouble is that I have had to do it in stages.

At first I was taking pictures in front of my pantry door. It's dark brown wood. But the light was pretty good. Lots of natural light. But I didn't like the door knob in all the pictures!

Then I moved to another room and the light was not as good. So I rigged up a system using reflector lights on some display stands that I had from my craft days. Not too pretty, but they worked fairly well. I always had trouble with reds coming out pink, blacks coming out brown and sometimes all of the colors were yellow. I was using natural light bulbs. A constant struggle and lots of retakes.

I needed a light box for a long time for smalls. I made one from a cardboard box and tissue paper. It was fine for a while. But one of my daughters cats thought it made a pretty good napping box. That didn't last long. So I upgraded to a nylon light box. Wow, what a big difference that made. If you decide to upgrade to a nylon light box, go big. They fold up like those folding laundry bags at the $ store. I got a 24" and sometimes that is not big enough. If you have something large, like cookware, it is hard to get a good shot without getting the sides of the box.

Now I've upgraded to better lighting. At first I was just going to get white nylon umbrellas to diffuse the light. Then I started looking at the stands. They were nice!! You could get the stands, umbrellas and light bulbs for the cost of 4 just plain umbrellas. I ordered the set. The stands adjust up and down and are smaller than the old ones I was using and if I ever need to they fold up for storage.

Do yourself a favor, and your pictures, and get a set up with the umbrellas. It diffuses the light really well, the bulbs are florescent, and they are much cooler and more energy efficient. And the colors are much better. Trust me on this one.

One more treat for myself.

I had been using an IKEA tape measure. You know the paper ones you get free when you go to IKEA? I had taped it back together dozens several times and it was still barely holding on.  I got this really nice one, 60 inches long, in a vintage sewing box I purchased several weeks ago.And I went straight to the trash and threw the IKEA on right in. But it's on top, in case I change my mind ;)

Don't call me selfish. I did it for the good of my ebay store, and ultimately my customers. Plus it makes getting things ready for ebay much easier, and helps me get my listings done faster.

Thank me, thank me very much!!