Monkey Pod Wooden Fruit in a Bowl

The rich brown color of this bowl of hand carved wooden fruit is truly pleasing to the eyes. It makes a wonderful center piece for a table or stand. The wood is from the tropical Monkey Pod tree. Hawaii is famous for making bowls, trays, fruit and other items from the wood of the Monkey Pod tree. While the tree grows in many other tropical areas, Hawaii is most famous for its use of the wood. The wood is also used to make veneers and guitars.

This bowl has eight pieces of fruit. I especially like the banana and the grapes. They are very nicely done. The bowl itself is not made of Monkey Pod. It is an older wooden bowl. You can find this item for sale in the Sirocco’s Curios Shop. Take a look.

Real Money

 

As you know, the social network, Ecrater Stores Network, picks a new topic each week for its members to blog about and this week the topic is “Labor Day.” Labor Day became a national holiday over 100 years ago in 1894 and it is a day to pay tribute to the labor movement which actually began some years earlier.

I got to thinking about what life might have been like in the 1890s. It must have been hard. Remember, travel was by horse. There wasn’t much in the way of electricity or telephone or even radio. Those were the days when one got up in the morning, went to work then came home and rested. Nowadays, one gets up, goes to work, comes home and then exercises.

I started sifting thorough our ESN member’s ecrater stores to see if I could find something to remind me of the 1890s. I came across this old Indian Head penny from 1895 in the Bargain Express store. The penny looks to be in excellent condition. Those were the years when we had real money. Copper coins were made of copper, silver coins were made of silver and gold coins were made of gold. Bargain Express has a number of real money coins for sale. Go ahead, take a look. Just click on the links.

Model Wooden Sailing Ship

 

I was looking through my ecrater store today and came across this very nicely made handmade model ship. Clearly, someone paid attention to detail and put a lot of time into gluing and rigging all the components to this little model. I would call it a labor of love. It reminded me that the first Monday of September is Labor Day and is celebrated both in the US and Canada. It is a day when we can pay tribute to the men and women who, through their labor, have added to the strength, freedom, and the well being of our nation. Stop in to the Sirocco's Curios store to see what other curiosities are for sale.

Technorati Tags: model,sailing,ship,mast,Labor day,handmade,wooden

Man’s Western Belt Buckle

I haven’t been blogging much during the past couple of weeks. I do from time to time have to get, at least, a little work done around the old homestead and so occasionally have to take a hiatus from the computer.

The ESN blog theme this week is “pants.” Searching around through the eCrater stores of my fellow scavenger hunters, I found lots of items that could be worked into that theme. But, this belt buckle from Bargain Express caught my eye. If you are going to wear pants you will want to have just the right belt and buckle. For me, this would be it. Need I say more?

Technorati Tags: western,belt buckle,silvertone,cowboy,roper

The Perfect Fishing Cap

Northern Minnesota is certainly not known for its hot summers. It might be more known for its bitter cold winters. But this year the weather has been completely up-side-down. This past winter was extraordinarily warm and in addition there was little snow cover. I had thought it could turn out to be a very dry year. Spring came early but, with lots of rain and flooding. A dry year it is not. Now it is summer and the heat is almost unbearable. We are toying with 100 degree heat and that is quite unusual for this part of the country. And, all that rain just pumps up the humidity.
Sifting through the stores of some of my fellow scavenger hunters, I found some items that might make one think of cooler times. "Hot weather" is the ESN blog theme for this week.
One might want to serve up a nice dish of ice cream in this old time sherbet dish from Carolina Blue Lady’s store. Or, you could slip into one of these cool Hawaiian short sleeves from Eccentric Thrifter’s store. I like this silk AVANTI one. 
But my all time favorite is this really cool fishing cap from Embroidery Fashions Boutique. The elongated bill keeps the sun out of your eyes and the long flap in the back keeps the sun off your neck. Perfect for fishing!

Dakota Odowan Hymns in the Dakota Language

ESN has provided the word “Church” for this week’s blogging adventure. The idea is that I am to find a sale item in my shop that goes with that word. That’s easy! We sing hymns in church and I just happen to have such a book of hymns in my curios shop. But, there is something curios about the book that I have. It is written the Dakota American Indian language. This book was reprinted in 1964 from the original, copyrighted in 1879. Just click on the book’s title, Dakota Odowan to find the book. Check out Sirocco’s Curios for more curios items.

 

Technorati Tags: american indian,native american,dakota,hymns,church

Tupperware Salad Set

If you are heading out to the beach for a swim you might want to take along a picnic basket and what better utensil is there for storing and transporting picnic food than Tupperware? One of my ESN Scavenger Hunter associates, Somethig4Myself, has just what you need. It is a Tupperware Salad Set. Take a look!

 

Technorati Tags: tupperware,vintage,salad,swimming,food,picnic