Books Bygone

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Button Box

Contents of Aunt Margaret's button box
ALTERNATE POST TITLE: How to Tempt Poor Little Rocky

I am beginning a project which I will post a bit about from time to time. I won't be able to be particularly specific-- Christmas is coming, the geese are getting fat, and all-- but I will share parts of it with my reader(s). 

The project-- actually there are three projects, no, technically six, no, three sets of two-- requires buttons and ribbons and other fun things. So last evening I got out Aunt Margaret's button box. The button box is full of crappy old buttons and other stuff. The vast majority of the buttons are mother of pearl. They are quite lovely.

What's even lovelier to me is that I have Aunt Margaret's button box. How many of us even have crappy old button boxes these days? How many of us take the time to remove old buttons from a worn out garment before we toss it in the rag bag? (Who has a rag bag?) And how many of us have a big mother of pearl belt buckle in our button box?

I really like that mother of pearl belt buckle. It will be hard to let it go. But it's destined to be part of the project. I'm sure Miss M. will take good care of it. She doesn't mind crappy old stuff.

~~
Introduction to crappy old stuff.

4 comments:

  1. Uhmmm...

    That should be "B_U_tton Box", I assume??

    I have my Mom's old sewing box. It's lost a hinge. Well, not exactly "lost"...the hinge is still there, but the screw that should hold it in place have pulled free - which means that either the wood is rotted, or maybe just too much stress so that it just needs wood putty. That would be the easy solution.

    She didn't have a button box, per se, but a button bottle. I've never dumped it, but it doesn't appear that it has such mother of pearl treasures as you've seem to have found!

    And yes - I do still cut buttons off stuff intended to be rags. Can't have those rags scratching furniture now...! And I have a rag bag as well. Don't apply the rags nearly as often as I should, but the bag is there! Besides, cutting off the buttons is _definitive_. That item will never be mistaken for something intended to be worn...if by chance it finds itself in the wrong pile after washing or something.

    If the buttons are all cut off...it's a rag!

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  2. You assume correctly! (Geeze.)

    It does not surprise me that you cut buttons off. Don't you have a set of those Mary Pickens Something old books on needlecraft etc., too?

    Rags come in handy. I've never understood why people buy rags under the guise of "cloths". Seriously.

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  3. Erma Bombeck (rest her soul) once had an article (and only she could make it an entire article!) about the fact that it was not necessary to actually have a baby in order to buy diapers to use for dust rags - or other raggy uses. One is not asked for motherhood credentials in order to buy diapers.

    That said, my daughter is about to have her first (and possibly last) child, and at the moment is opting to use "real" diapers instead of disposables. Being a good Grandma, I've started looking for "real" diapers. It ain't what it used to be! No more Curity diapers. (although I found one - that would be 1 !) that was on Ebay - bidding was at $36. Thirty six dollars. For one. I double checked.

    Curity diapers as such exist no more. Now you have to get prefold birdseye - no more gauze fold it how you want type. They're also hard to find - stores like "Babies R Us" don't carry them - it's obvious why...shelves and shelves of disposables. Every possible size and weight.

    And to think - I remember when the disposable thing started! To start with, they were a combination of plastic pants with a fold down front and back on the inside, into which you slipped a large Kotex like pad - only bigger. They were good for traveling, but I'd hate to have had to use them all the time. The selection available now...whew! But they're pricey when you figure the cost of day in day out changing. I think she's smart to go with cloth diapers - but I wonder if it will last...

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  4. Are you serious?

    [Insert huge amount of silent space as I think about this.]

    There are no more Curity diapers?

    Man, suek, I don't know what to say. I sat down to write a thought or two about the movie Shane-- and I see this.

    Good luck to your daughter (and you)! Bringing a baby into a world without Curity diapers... what has become of civilization?

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