d.Sharp Journal

Paper Snowflakes

Good music, funky knitwear.

Elvis Perkins, {son of Anthony}All The Night Without Love.

Christmas things I covet

I am a nut for old Christmas stuff. It is fascinating.When I was an antique dealer I bought and sold {and yes, kept} quite a bit, but the truly great stuff, like antique Dresden ornaments, were too hard to come by at that point. If I had ever been so lucky as to score a cache of these ornaments at an estate sale, you would have found me jumping up on the wobbly folding table cluttered with ceramic figurines and carnival glass and bursting into a spontaneous yet deftly choreographed dance of victory. These pictures are from two great older books I got on Ebay -  Holidays - Toys and Decorations and Christmas Ornaments - A  Festive Study, both by Margaret Schiffer, now being republished.

Spun cotton ornaments are so charming to me. It is not unusual to find vintage spun cotton fruit or icicles, but  figural pieces and animals are harder to find. I especially love the 'Puss in Boots'  in the picture directly below, the spun cotton birdhouse is so unusual and the herd of sheep and goats are pretty cute, too.

Even more rare and exquisite are Dresden ornaments. Most authentic Dresden ornaments were handcrafted between 1880 and 1910 in the German town of Dresden - these meticulously detailed pieces, crafted from embossed cardboard, were created in an awe inspiring variety of forms. Many served as candy containers, such as the animal heads with silk sacks { middle picture} or as whole containers. These ornaments just do me in, I especially love the tarnished silver leaf of many of the pieces. {The dog on top of the elephant! How neat is that?}

Christmas. With arsenic sauce.

Before I had kids, one of my worries was whether I would be able to refrain from swearing in front of them. Not that I use obscenities a lot, I  just have very little filter between my brain and my mouth and changing habits is not my strong suit. Surprisingly, it has been almost effortless - like I have a V chip installed somewhere in there, so when little ears are listening I get more creative. Now Christmas may not seem like the best time to discuss this, what with that whole JOY thing, but the old classic You're a Mean One Mr. Grinch by Dr. Seuss is a veritable bounty of creative phrases. I can't take myself too seriously if I am calling the guy who cut me off in holiday traffic a "crooked jerky jockey". {And just between you and me, I can't help but think of Dick Cheney when I read the words 'garlic in your soul'.} Just take a gander:

You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch.
You really are a heel.
You're as cuddly as a cactus,
You're as charming as an eel.
Mr. Grinch.

You're a bad banana
With a greasy black peel.

You're a monster, Mr. Grinch.
Your heart's an empty hole.
Your brain is full of spiders,
You've got garlic in your soul.
Mr. Grinch.

I wouldn't touch you, with a
thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole.

You're a vile one, Mr. Grinch.
You have termites in your smile.
You have all the tender sweetness
Of a seasick crocodile.
Mr. Grinch.

Given the choice between the two of you
I'd take the seasick crocodile.

You're a foul one, Mr. Grinch.
You're a nasty, wasty skunk.
Your heart is full of unwashed socks
Your soul is full of gunk.
Mr. Grinch.

The three words that best describe you,
are, and I quote: "Stink.  Stank.  Stunk."

You're a rotter, Mr. Grinch.
You're the king of sinful sots.
Your heart's a dead tomato splot
With moldy purple spots,
Mr. Grinch.

Your soul is an appalling dump heap overflowing
with the most disgraceful assortment of deplorable
rubbish imaginable,
Mangled up in tangled up knots.

You nauseate me, Mr. Grinch.
With a nauseous super-naus.
You're a crooked jerky jockey
And you drive a crooked horse.
Mr. Grinch.

You're a three decker sauerkraut and toadstool
sandwich
With arsenic sauce.

Copyright © 1957, Dr. Seuss.

The Velveteen Rabbit

If you have a kid on your Christmas list, consider this classic. There are a lot of different printings, make sure you get the original printing with illustrations by William Nicholson. Information here. This is a vintage copy I found  and I am as enamored with the illustrations{ the endpapers! at right}- the restrained color palette and technique - as I am the story.

The Velveteen Rabbit was one of my favorite books as a kid. I am a real sap - I can cry at just about anything. Including the end of this movie, back in the day. {I was young, okay!} Even though I have read this book so many times,  I still have a little catch in my throat when the Skin Horse explains what it means to be real.

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse.  "It's a thing that happens to you.  When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse.  "You become.  It takes a long time.  That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby.  But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

Now I'm all verklempt.
Talk amongst yourselves, I'll give you a topic: the Thighmaster is neither a thigh nor a master - discuss.

Typography - a wish

What is your holiday wish?

{Peace, Balance, Health.}

Behold - Nine lives times one hundred

We spot it and know instantly, it is the perfect Christmas tree. We cut it down and when we take it up to pay for it with the other Noble Fir -  they laugh at us. They thank us and give it to us for free. The tree is a Noble Fir,  it is about 6 feet, and it is a perfect conical shape topiary. A Seussian tree with a slender triangle top and a trunk that is bikini wax bare for the first 5 feet. It is perfect.This is about 12 years ago, in our first house. At that time G. and I had two dogs, a wonderful white mutt, Wiley and an older but exuberant chocolate lab, Solo. Solo would often wag his tail so hard that it would bleed, leaving a spray pattern on the kitchen wainscoting. If he was happy to see you it could be like a policeman's billy club. His tail was dangerous, to him and to others. So when we saw this tree in the clearing we knew it was perfect for the dogs. Yes, we got the dogs their own tree. We put this one in the nook off the kitchen, Solo's tail couldn't clear off any ornaments as it was only hitting the trunk. We went back to that same tree farm for many years, each year looking for a 'dog' tree. That first year we decided to decorate it only with paper and that became part of the tradition as well. The original dog tree had a litter of cats among its branches -  over 100 vintage feline photographs hung by round paper clips.

The stack of black and white photographs at the estate sale were a good two and a half inches thick, well over one hundred photos. $2.00. All of  this dear old couple's cats. Now, I am not much of a cat person, but I couldn't let these photos be tossed. {It was the last day of the sale}I adopted them. I learned that the couple had no children, they had both lived into their eighties. These cats they photographed over the years were everything. A large number of the photos chronicled two decades of Christmases - cats perched in front of holiday cards. My favorite- a series of a cross-eyed Siamese celebrating the New Year with a bottle of old cat nip. We had so many of these holiday cat photos that the following year we mounted them with photo corners and sent them out as Christmas cards to our friends. Many other photographs had product shots - like Still Life of Kittens With Canned Beef. What is interesting is how few of them are candid. More of my favorites here.

As for the dogs? Well, they heeded the season's call for 'goodwill to all' and didn't even brag that they had effortlessly treed so many cats.

Taste.

" I don't want that spoon Grandma, I want to use the other one. It's more baroque." -M.

Color Dance

If it is grey where you are, do the color dance. Fair Weather Friends from Daedelus.

Green is the New Black

If you haven't seen the new issue of Domino, there is a great piece by window dresser extraordinaire  Simon Doonan on the green theme for Barney's Christmas windows. With past themes like last year's Andy Warholiday or Margaret Thatcher as a dominatrix, it is no surprise that this year was tackled with equal wit. Rudolph the Recycling Reindeer is constructed out of  pop cans and the Twelve Days of Christmas go green as well. Barneys has paired the window's theme to their holiday promotion of environmentally friendly products - sustainable and organic clothing and accessories - encouraging everyone to give good green this holiday.
 {A few pictures from flickr.} 

On the twelfth day of Christmas my pro-Green true love gave to me …
Twelve tons of tofu,
Eleven solar panels,
Ten New Age gurus,
Nine organic carob bars,
Eight tickets to Burning Man,
Seven sustainable ostrich farms,
Six compost toilets,
Five rolls of recycled gift wrap,
Four fair-trade futons,
Three free-range sustainable-farmed organic hens,
Two vegan chefs,
and a Prius in a pear tree.

{sounds a bit like Portland}