Vintage Doll Dishes, and the Weekly Photo Challenge: Dinnertime

I just found my doll dishes. I knew they were here somewhere.

Tea time in the doll world…

I don’t remember how old I was when I played with these, or which dolls were tea-drinkers. Although the dishes don’t take up much space, I certainly don’t need to keep them.

Just to get the scale in perspective, I’ll throw in an apple…

As is appropriate for a future vegetarian, my dolls had salad bowls too.

Judging by the fork on the right, at least one of the dolls liked to chew on the tableware.

I hope there are hungry/thirsty dolls out there somewhere who would love a tea party with my vintage dishes.

What did your toys eat?

P.S.I just checked eBay and I see that my dolls won’t be financing my retirement, but they might buy me a few apples.

More on the Weekly Photo Challenge: Dinnertime

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Selling Used Books, and the Weekly Photo Challenge: Future

In the future I will have fewer books. But meanwhile, isn’t there always time for books?

Time titles, and time enough for books, or werewolves –see volume 4th from the left.  These are not on the give-away list (yet).

I’ve been selling books on Amazon since 2012, but took stock last week and saw I had three bookcases full of books still waiting for their new homes. Now that I’ve unpacked the last box of books from the basement, I took a hard look at what I had listed on Amazon.

In some cases, as time passed, other sellers listed copies of books for much less than I had, so prices had fallen below my minimum. The time had come to downsize my books for sale.

• The project — close the listings and donate books that are least likely to sell.
• The goal — measure my progress by freeing up a bookshelf.

The result ? Here’s the “Fiction” case, after consolidation and two trips to the library with donations…

Empty book case!

Now that I have an empty bookshelf I have to hurry up and get it out of the house, so there’s no temptation to fill it up again. Next project: investigate consignment stores.

I’m still selling books, just with a lower inventory than before. Meanwhile, I’ve been so busy that my post on the category “Future” didn’t get written until it was “Past”…

I could never have imagined a future in which I’d have too many books — what about you?

5 Things I Didn’t Know about Illustrator Eric Carle, 2 Books, and 1 Week Late for the Weekly Photo Challenge: Half-Light

Thanks to the High Museum of Art (Atlanta) for a great tour of I See a Story, an exhibition of illustrations from Eric Carle’s picture books —

The Moon in Half-Light

If you’re not already familiar with him by name, I’ll bet you’ll recognize him as the collage artist and author/illustrator of The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and many more picture books.

There are always lots of things I don’t know, but here are the first five things I learned from the exhibition —

1 – He paints his own tissue paper for the collages (after early experiences with commercial paper that was not archival).

2 – His favorite animal is the cat.

3 – He’s also great with chickens (I love cats too, but I have fun collecting pictures of chickens).

4 – The Grouchy Ladybug started out a bit differently.

Early book dummies are in the exhibition.

5 – His parents moved the family to Germany when he was six years old. He left behind a real-life friend, and based this illustration for Friends on a photograph of the two of them as children.

All that and I haven’t even got to the “2 Books” part of my title yet. Maybe I should save them for another post. I’m still sorting out books so stay tuned, I may find more than 2 of these surprises.

Meanwhile, here’s the intro to the exhibition, with a portrait of that famous caterpillar —

If you’re anywhere near Atlanta, see it at the High Museum, April 2 2016 through January 8 2017. The exhibition won’t be traveling, except to go back home to the Eric Carle Museum in Amherst MA.

More on the Weekly Photo Challenge Half-Light

I See a Story at the High Museum of Art, Atlanta GA