Sunday, February 20, 2011

Exciting Finds!

I like to window shop; I always have.  There were some times, all through my life, when window shopping was the only kind of shopping we could afford.  Early in our marriage, it was our Sunday entertainment, back when the only things open on Sunday were churches, the grocery store (for a few hours), the police station, the hospital, and the fire station.

Now I'm older, and now I do most of my window shopping online.  Sometimes I find a deal; most of the time I don't.  I did find two just recently, and I'd like to show them to you.  This is a Mary Konior book, one of two I didn't own; now I'm going to be looking for the last one.  I suspect it will be hard to find at a decent price, as the cost of most of her books, even before her death, was pretty steep (now it's mostly astronomical).  It must gall some members of her family to know that someone else is making money off Mary, and they're not getting any of it!

The other find of the month is a tatting shuttle off eBay.  The seller listed it as an "estate find...made of metal with monogram etching on it...no marks like 925...not sure of the metal."  Other bids came in, but finally everyone except me had dropped out, so I won the bid.  It arrived, and David asked what kind of metal it was.  I told him that despite the seller's conviction that it wasn't silver, it felt like silver to me.  It had some old thread wound around the post; I unwound it (Spooky was delighted to paw at it as I pulled it from the shuttle) and found some hard-to-see markings.  I borrowed David's big 'ol honkin' magnifying glass (you think I'm kidding, I have used skillets smaller than this glass) and found the word on the post that I was hoping to find: STERLING.


Baking soda, water, and elbow grease will do a pretty good job of cleaning silver without damaging it.  If you use a glass container, aluminum foil, baking soda, table salt, and boiling water, you can pretty much save the elbow grease for something else.  Here are the "before" and "after" pictures of the monogrammed side:
Quite a difference.  David thinks it looks brand-new!  I'm just tickled that it's clean and shiny again, as it looked when the monogram "L A D" was engraved.  We were also able to identify the hallmark as being that of the Charles Thomae Company, which surprisingly, is still in business.  They opened in 1920 in Attleboro, Massachusetts, and still make "fine gifts, jewelry and appointments for the individual, home, and office made of high quality sterling silver and karat gold."  They included contact info on their homepage, so I will be contacting them to ask what information they can give me about tatting shuttles made by them.

Tomorrow is a bank holiday, so I will have a much-appreciated day off.  I'm looking forward to it!

12 comments:

  1. Great finds! Yo will LOVE the book.

    I found the same one at a great price about a year ago, and am enjoying it immensely.

    Also, I was given a silver shuttle similar to yours. It has been sitting in its black, tarnished state till tonight when I applied your technique - I assume I was to mix all that stuff in a glass container - and leave it? It is getting lighter, but has a ways to go!

    Thanks for the tip!
    Fox : )

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  2. This tip originally came from Crazy Mom Tats - she had it on her blog, but I can't find the post. She actually put a glass saucepan on her stove and boiled the ingredients, together with the sterling she wanted to clean. Her "before" and "after" pictures were amazing! A fellow Palmetto, Joanie, told me yesterday that she just pours boiling water over the other ingredients in the bowl and adds the silver - which is what I did as I don't have a glass saucepan. I dipped mine twice, and finished with a light baking soda polish, a rinse, and a buffing with a soft cloth.

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  3. Wonderful finds! Don't you love it when it happens that way?

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  4. Glad it worked so well!
    here's the post
    http://psychotatter.blogspot.com/2010/04/cleaning-silver-off-topic-tutorial.html

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  5. It worked beautifully! It was amazing to see the tarnish leave the silver and settle on the aluminum foil - kitchen chemistry rocks!

    Thanks for the post url - I knew I read it, just couldn't remember when!

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  6. Oooo ... that is the Mary Konior book that I need to complete my collection *envy*...

    Great job on the silver shuttle. What a lucky find.

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  7. Wow, what a find. I'm SOOOO jealous. Well done.

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  8. This is the first antique sterling shuttle I've bought - I have two other sterling shuttles, but they're the repro ones with the ring on. Not easy to tat with that ring flopping!

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  9. Hey, Sharren,
    It worked really well! Thanks! I had to do the process twice, but the shuttle is all clean and shiny now. This will be the topic of the next tat-ology post! Thank you for the info.
    Fox : )

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  10. It took mine two dips in the pool, but with old, stubborn tarnish, it happens. What really amazed me was - I was stirring the pot with an old silver teaspoon, the only one we have like it - and before I could blink, the bowl of the spoon was clean & shiny! I finished cleaning the spoon as well as the shuttle - the spoon really only needed one dip as I remember polishing it (with Wright's Silver Cream and a toothpick wrapped in gauze to get the tiny little tight spots) several years ago. The Crazy Mom Tats method was faster, easier, and only took one dip!

    Crazy Mom, thanks again for posting that on your blog!

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  11. BTW - I think this is the one Mary Konior book I don't have - I'm quite jealous! Now I'm wondering how much you had to pay for this....

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  12. Considering how much some sellers are asking for any of her books, I think I got off really lucky at $71!

    I just wish someone would reprint them in paperback, as Lacis has done with Tatting With Visual Patterns. Then everyone could have her books affordably!

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