Panasonic Dynamite 8 Track Player, Etc.

About a year after Louie and I started dating, he surprised me with a gift. No, it wasn’t this 8 track player, it was a set of dishes. I didn’t want them. (I know, I KNOW! BAD MICHELLE!) He took them back, and bought me an 8 track player, just like this one. RED and everything. No, I don’t remember what happened to it, but I suppose when cassettes and cd’s came out, I passed it on. A few years ago, while junkin’, I saw this one, for $3.38  I picked some 8 track tapes to go with it, I tried it out, HAD to have it. I brought it home, played with it for awhile, and put it away. With the recent purchases of vintage items, I needed to get it out and play with it again. 

Here’s a retailer’s flier I found on the internet.

Right now, it is sitting on top of the stove playing ‘The Best of Bread’. Do you remember that one? Louie and I had that cassette after we quit using the 8 tracks, and then got the CD after cassettes went away. Good music!!!

Do you know what’s crazy? Search ebay for Panasonic Dynamite 8 Track players, and especially check out THIS ad. I am SO glad I found mine. I don’t think I ever saw one before this one, or one since I found this one, and for that, I very grateful! I know we are not to love material possessions, but these are not just possessions, these are happy memories.

                            

You all know I love picking up cheese servers with glass domes for displaying my Jelly rolls for quilting. I tried something different with my ‘new to me’ cheese dome. In December, I won the ‘draw’ for fat quarter choice for January. We exchange fat quarters every month for our ‘stash’. I picked black, red and white, or just red and white. I got some beautiful fabrics. When you win the ‘draw’, you get TWO stacks of fat quarters, as we always bring one more fat quarter than there are quilters. That makes an extra stack and we get TWO! That’s what makes it fun. You get to choose, then  you get an TWO stacks! I love how they look!

The sun is shining, and my baby asked me what I wanted to do today. What do you think I will say?

Have a wonderful day, everyone!

Michelle

Vintage Pink SHARP Radio

It seems I’ve been collecting vintage items lately, and that made me think about my Pink SHARP radio.

I got this radio a long, LONG time ago. Like in the early 80’s. If I remember correctly, the style of this radio THEN, was to replicate a vintage radio, so this baby is vintage to the second power!

I remember my mom and I both getting one of these for Christmas one year. (We actually bought them for ourselves from Montgomery Ward, but they ended up being wrapped and under the tree). Mine was pink, and hers was purple. (So who remembers how long MW has been gone? A LONG time!)

Several years ago, I wanted to take a radio to work, so I took this one. It has been exposed to lots of ‘stuff’ floating in the air and oily hands, and only God knows what. It has been played at almost full volume (remember, I work in a factory), and I even wrote my  name on it so no one would take off with it…but then, I can’t think of too many ‘guys’ who would ‘borrow’ my pink radio and admit it, or be seen with it! Nonetheless, I put my name on it, and I also had a tag which said, ‘Do Not Remove This Radio!’ 

After I found the Chord Organ, and I bought the vintage Smith Corona Corsair typewriter, I got to thinking about my special Pink radio. I decided it was time to bring it home and clean it up, and just ‘keep it safe’. Forever.

Here are the Horror pictures. The ‘before I cleaned it up’ pictures. I’m surprised it works at all. I could not, of course, remove whatever oil is inside, (there is!), but I know this baby won’t squeek!

After lots of hot soapy water and toothpicks poked into the holes, it it clean….and YES! The cassette player works!

If you don’t remember cassettes, do you remember 8 track tapes? I have another vintage post coming up soon!

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!!

Michelle

Junkin’ 01*21*2012

I was up til 3am this morning just cleaning, testing, and putting everything away. First off is my Isabel Bloom mouse. Louie saw it in the case and asked if I wanted it. I looked at the price, said, no, I didn’t need it, and he said, ‘It would be pretty cute sitting next to your Isabel Bloom cats.’ ‘Darn it!’ I said. ‘Ok, now I HAVE to have it'!’ See what I mean by enabling me? This cat is a few weeks old (to me). Love Isabel Bloom!

This cutie is not new. He’s kept me company for a few years now next to my computer.

Here’s some more of my goodies. A pink ‘tub’ with handles, a Singer Monogrammer, a glass ‘whatever’ with lid. There are scissors and thread in there. Most interesting though. Electric pinking shears! Louie and I found another shop called New 2 You Furniture and Etc in Davenport. We’ll be going back! (That store was just one of many stores we ‘hit’ today, and in this picture, only the pinker came from there.)

Among the goodies, a white pitcher was cute, and  a Braun Aqua Express Electric Kettle. Check out the price…are people NUTS? Also June Tailer Pressing thing for points, a cheese tray with glass dome…NOT for CHEESE! Oh no, for fabric Jelly Rolls??  A toy Black and Decker iron, a mini travel iron (a quilter’s best friend), a HAEGER pink ashtray for putting pins in (or whatever), scissors, and Louie found a 2 pack + one of a 2 pack (total 3) of Correctible Film Cartridges for my Smith Corona Electric typewriter I found last week. (I donated the first one I found, when I found a better one).

I have never seen electric Pinking shears before.

Can I say, ‘AWESOME’! Louie asked what I was going to do with them. I DON’T KNOW! I’ll figure something out! If I wanted fabric confetti, it would work great!!!

I’ve been on the lookout for a crock pot for a single male coworker. I found  him one. I brought it home and SCRUBBED it (oh my) and got is sparkling like new, inside and out. I poured water in it and turned it to HIGH. I don’t know if I should give this to him or not. The outside of it was HOT. Should it be that hot? I turned it to Low, and it seems ok. I know it is vintage, and maybe not as insulated as the new ones. I’ll just have to tell him, use LOW and DON’T TOUCH THE OUTSIDE!  This baby cooks! Definitely 1970’s.

I found a couple quilts at GW. This one, I am going to wash, and pass on to Quilts For Kids of Iowa. It’s brand new.

This one, I am going to cut apart. This one is not decorative enough for Quilts For Kids.

I only paid $1.38 for it, and I bought it for the backing fabric, which looks to me to be a polka dot batik. Love it!

I mentioned I bought an electric typewriter last week. It was the second electric typewriter I bought, and it was newer than the first one mentioned a few blog posts back. The keyboard was more user friendly and more like a computer keyboard. The Correctible Film cartridges I ordered, and also the ones Louie found yesterday were for that computer. (Picture borrowed from Google images, but same machine.)

I found THIS computer yesterday. It is an even newer one, and uses the same cartridges and correction tapes. This one is a Spell-Right Dictionary Memory Typewriter. SD 750. You can choose 3 different typing modes. Memory, which you can save to file. Line, which is you type the complete line, making corrections and viewing it before you type it, or Type, which means, just to type immediately. I chose Line, so I could save on correction tape! I typed a couple of pages last night, and it works pretty slick. You can choose to have it print at the end of your line without hitting return, you can change the pitch, correct one character at a time, or correct the whole word. It has lots of neat little tricks. It’s more like a word processor…you know, pre-computer, only when I had one of these before, it was smarter than me…..still is. So do you think $6.95 was too much to pay for this? The printed yellow paper is what I got when I pressed Code + Z for a demonstration. It ‘talked’ to me!

Well, I think it’s naptime. All my junkin’, and cleaning of ‘said’ junk items have plumb tuckered me out!

Later Gators!

Michelle

Euro Pro Electronic Steam Press

I stopped in my tracks when I saw this Steam Press at the Salvation Army ‘As Is’ store.

The little wall hanging is one of my treasures I bought yesterday too. I just thought showing you this steam press would be more interesting with something pretty laid on/in it. (Tip: Do not get your fingers between the plates, as when you get close to closing, it ‘snaps’ closed with 100 lbs of pressure and it your fingers are in the way, well…..OUCH!)

It has a little distilled water reservoir in the front, and the foot pedal is what dispenses a shot of steam while you are ironing. I did not try the steam feature on this, but I did plug it in to see if it heated before I bought it. I also plugged it in last night after I cleaned it, and I pressed my damp kitchen towel. It pressed quite nicely, thank you!

I paid $20 for it. I found one on the internet HERE and that price did not include the optional stand. I’m sure they can be found much cheaper than the link quoted, but my price beat them all. I found a link to buy the stand for $50. I felt I got a good deal.

Be Pressed Blessed,

Michelle

Remington Quiet-Riter

MAJOR cuteness….and $3.38.

The keys are just SO CUTE!!!

I know, I know…I don’t want to hear it.  I promised no more typewriters unless I found a pink one. Broken promise number two. My sweetie only smiles, and chuckles, and says, ‘Baby, you know you can have whatever you want. I don’t care.’

We went junkin’ today, and the best treasures we found were our friends Russ and Amy from A Quilting Sheep.  We both were shopping at the Salvation Army ‘As Is’ store! They agreed to go have lunch and spend the day with us. We had a blast thrift store shopping together! They were in the QC’s getting away for some alone time, but they didn’t get much alone time after we found them! Thanks Russ and Amy for spending the day with us!

I bought a LOT of stuff today. There are just days like that. I’ll post again tomorrow and show you all my treasures. It was like Christmas in January!

Hope you had a fun day too!

Be blessed,

Michelle

Copycat

Here’s my version of ‘dolling up’ our plain ‘ole’ thermostat. As soon as I saw the idea, I immediately went digging through drawers to find a frame that would work. Mine took a 5 x 7 frame, and it was a tight fit. In fact, I knocked the cover of the thermostat loose a couple times. There are swirels cut out of the frame, and it flexed, so I put a couple of nails through the swirls to hold it flat against the wall. I love it because it is gold.

I got the idea from Pinterest. Click the photo to go the the original author’s blogpost.

 

Here’s mine, in ‘big picture’ view. Thank you, Lauren!

Little home embellishments make me happy!

It’s still snowing!!!

Michelle

Smith Corona Super Sterling Typewriter

Last Sunday, Louie and I went junkin’. We went to Clinton, but we stopped in Elvira on the way, at an ongoing garage sale first. These people have a new machine shed, with heaters, and they sell items they buy from auctions (I believe). They are very nice, and they have some really nice items priced cheap reasonably. I found a cast iron dutch oven with a glass lid for a coworker who has me looking for cast iron, and that was priced so reasonably, that I made a quick decision on a vintage typewriter that was sitting there waiting for me. (Well, what would YOU have done!?)  

I borrowed this picture off the internet, as I didn’t take a picture of mine in the case, but it looks exactly like this.

I liked the color, and I liked that it was pretty easy to press the keys to make it type. Then I saw that this baby has settings for how hard you have to hit the keys! L for light, M for medium, and H for heavy!  I was going to remove the key and ribbon cover to look inside, and I found out that the cover just ‘slides’ forward. I thought that was SO cool!

I decided to set it on my dad’s old library table/desk (whichever it is) in my living room. I think it looks pretty cute there. In case anyone has noticed that this desk looks ‘short’…well, you are correct. I moved it from the kitchen months ago, but it seemed too tall to ‘play well’ in the living room, so Louie and I cut a few inches off the legs to make it ‘arm heighth’ with the couch and loveseat, so things ‘flowed’ better, if you know what I mean. I LOVE it shorter! The other alternative was to get rid of it, but I just did not want to. It’s a piece of my history and it reminds me of my dad each time I look at it.

Right after I finished buying this typewriter, Louie and I had this discussion about how I would not buy any more typewriters unless it was PINK. That discussion was just a rush of hot air, because that day, we continued on to the Illinois side of the QC’s and I found a ‘newer’ (80’s) Smith Corona electric typewriter that was newer than the one I mentioned in my last blog post. That one did not have the same key setup as a computer keyboard, so it wasn’t really as user friendly, and being an electric, it was a little more difficult to press the keys than I thought it would be. Yesterday, we donated it to our local Goodwill. The Deville’s keys are more like a computer keyboard, and MUCH easier to push. It has some really neat features and it has a correction ribbon and the daisy wheel can be changed to a script wheel. I’ll post about my Smith Corona Deville 450 in another post.

It’s snowing here in Iowa. The flakes are fine, but they are falling quick and steady, and starting to pile up. Our forecast is for 4-6”, with the snow stopping by 9:00 tonight. We’ll see.

In the meantime, I should be doing something productive, but I have this computer addition that keeps pulling me back into my office! I do have a couple loads of laundry done though!

Have a great Friday and a wonderful weekend, whatever you do!

Michelle

Update: Ok, another load of laundry is done, the vacuum cleaner is out to vacuum after lunch, and I have scrubbed the shower and bathroom sink. I plan on shampooing the living room and bathroom carpets too. Wish me luck (or wish me motivation)!!!!

Oh, and the snow is piling up!