Why I Oughta...

Over the years, I've shared my family's experiences at the Walnut Room at Marshall Field's Macy's on State Street in Chicago .  We go every year and have gone since I was just a little guy.  It is something that my Mom organizes and I come to look forward to each season.  I've also chronicled the unfortunate fate of Uncle Mistletoe and Marshall Field's itself . I've also begun to build a document of the annual mugs that are released by the Walnut Room each year at Christmastime. This post has the full reference list that I've built so far.  But, the photo above includes a new one:  1986 featuring Santabear in red outline form 1 .  Or at least that I thought it was Santabear.  But, look at the band on his hat:  Mistletoe.  And if you look closely at the scrawl on the far right you'll see: "Greetings from Mistletoe Bear." What the what?!? Let's go back and look at the history so far on the blog as documented through the glass

Up at the Lake Geneva Antique Mall (which...is Trump Country, FYI.  MAGA and all that what-have-yous are involved.  Also, I think it means that Nat might not let us go back.  Also, the fact that the guy asked us to leave because the King of the Ball Tossers was touching toys.  Imagine that!  Toys!), I came across this pair of Poinsettia candle stick holders.  They're marked Napco 1957 on the bottom and have what I assume is a "Made in Japan" sticker that has been smudged pretty harshly. You can see the marks in the photo below. One note:  this did NOT come home with us. I didn't particularly love them.  And we have just gone through a Christmas season where most of our vintage Christmas collection was relegated to an upper shelf in our green room up front where nobody - including me - could see them.  They brought me little joy - and were a pain to unwrap/re-wrap after the season had passed.  Not to mention that Nat had purged about half of the pieces - that

Sure, you can go out to Naper Settlement for the Christkindl market and get some searing hot chocolate and pick up a cuckoo clock and ornament from some booths.  And that'd be just fine.  In fact, that's what we did a few weekends ago.  It was a great time.  But, do yourself a favor and ask for the main building where the bathrooms are located.  (skip the porta-potties!) Inside that building, you'll see a setup of a 1950's home all trimmed out for Christmas morning.  Along with some display cases of decorations and toys from the period.  Above and below you can see one of the cases with little vintage Christmas figures (we have the lady on top!  And some "NOEL" angels that are similar but not exactly the same .) and some toys that kids in the 1950's were getting under the tree. In another corner, they have this little vignette set up that shows toys like Tiddly winks and a riding horse that are typical from the period. They also have some

There I was:  sitting in my office one evening doing some work and mindlessly watching one of my favorite shows 'American Pickers' on the TV.  I looked up from my laptop and notice that Frank Fritz has picked up a Santa.  I know I've seen it before.  I pause and rewind and sure enough.....I *know* that Santa that Frank has in his hands! It is one that Nat picked up at an antique sale somewhere over the past few years.  He's now proudly displayed in the front entryway of our #newoldfarmhouse.  Check him out below.  He's awfully cute taking a nap in his big chair: This piece survived and is proudly displayed.  But....with our new house and fresh slate in terms of decorations, we've gone through some growing pains with our vintage Christmas collection.  Nat has, wisely, parsed some of 'finds' and has decided that we can't keep all of them ourselves.  Of all the pieces that she decided weren't a fit, some of them have been re-hous

Here's a vintage Christmas pro-tip:  Head to your local Goodwill about two weeks after Thanksgiving and you'll come across an abundance of Christmas decorations that people have discarded.  It works something like this:  Friday after Thanksgiving, people decorate their houses.  By Saturday or Sunday, the 'remnants' (as I call them) are still sitting in the tubs and people have decided that certain things didn't make the cut.  That can be ornaments.  Or figures.  Or garland.  Or lights.  Or...on occasion, Marshall Field's Walnut Room Christmas mugs.  That's how I came across this Walnut Room Mug from 2000 that features Santa Bear getting married.  Yeah...getting married?!?!?  I don't know the details, but I'm guessing that the folks at Marshall Field's were trying to introduce a female Santa Bear?  So they got Santa Bear married to Mrs. Santa Bear.  Kinda like how Disney introduced Duffy first, then moved on to adding ShellieMay the female

Back at the end of October, I posted a photo of the 'coming soon' screens that Marshall Field's Macy's had put up on their State Street windows as part of their annual reveal of the Holiday window tradition.   Soon after the calendar turned over to November, they opened up the windows for public viewing and while the ones on State Street are traditional ones, they now have set up two different ones on the Randolph Street sides. First...when I say 'traditional ones', I mean...holiday stories of some sort.  This year, it isn't so much a linear story where the you can see kids racing from one window to the next to learn the different storylines, but rather just a set of different windows, each in a feeling/spirit. But, this is the 50th anniversary of doing animated figures in these windows, which is cool and that's why they've organized these two separate windows on Randolph - to kind of celebrate their history. And, much to my delight, look

A few days ago, I posted a photo of some vintage window Christmas candle lights with these sweet orange bulbs that I came across at a church sale in Westmont .  I passed on the candles .  Right next to them (you can actually *see* one of the candles in the photo above) was this sweet flocked Christmas Tree that is adorned with fake poinsettias and this very jolly Santa Claus.  I took this photo and picked up the tree.  Thinking that I really only wanted Santa himself.  Then... I remembered my collecting mantra .  And set it back down on the table.  Hoping another owner came along and put this thing in it's proper place and saving this treasure from the dumpster.

It was just a few days ago that I posted about a vintage plastic Menorah that I came across at an Estate Sale in Elmhurst.  But, today, I'm sharing a photo of another ' one that got away '.  This time, it was at a Church Sale on 55th Street where I found an entire box of these three-candle vintage holiday lights.  With those pretty awesome red/orange flame bulbs.  There must have been ten sets of these in the box and it was a 'name your own price' sale.  But, I leaned on my collecting mantra and passed on them.  Feels like we need to go through a Christmas season before we add more decor for our new place. These things would look awesome perched in the windows of an old house, wouldn't they?  I bet they'd cost a fortune to operate in energy costs, but it would be worth it for a few months, right? Oh, and we have SO.MUCH.STUFF.  We (I) have to stop buying things.  The garage is loaded.  The basement...it is LOADED.  Once we sort things, I think we

In the basement of an Estate Sale in Elmhurst,  I came across this vintage lighted menorah amongst the pile of old Christmas and Halloween stuff.  I picked it up, took this photo, then set it down.  I didn't buy it, so I'm filing this under [ One that got away ], but now that I've gotten around to posting this, I'm kind of regretful for passing on it.  Those of you who know what has happened/been discovered in my Mom's family over the past year probably have a little smile on your face.  I can only imagine whipping it out at the holidays this year to uproarious laughter. Thus, part of me is regretful and part of me is remembering my collecting treasures mantra .  Say it with me: It is enough to enjoy the existence of things without possessing all of them.

I scored another vintage Marshall Field's Christmas mug at a Garage Sale a week or so ago - this time from 1983.   If you recall, I posted a few years ago about the two Walnut Room/Marshall Field's Christmas mugs that I picked up at the Elmhurst Goodwill .  They were 1980 and 1981 years.  There were four total mugs (two from each year) and my sister Vic has a Marshall Field's collection of sorts, so a pair of them were destined for her collection. If you go back and look at the other post showing the 1980 and 1981 mugs , you'll see that the 1980 version is one of these 'hot toddy' mugs while the 1981 one is a normal mug shape.  The '83 version went back to the taller, 'hot toddy' version.  But, the character is just as interesting. 1980:  A teddy bear, Christmas tree and presents under the tree. 1981:  Contortionist Santa. But, in 1983, they used Uncle Mistletoe.   Don't know who he is?  C heck out this piece about Field's from the

At the Elkhart Antique Flea Market there were so many treasures that it was hard to focus.  It was colder than we thought and we weren't dressed for the wind and weather, so we were hustling around.  I posted about the Schlitz glass pitcher yesterday , but today comes a treasure that is closer to my sweetspot:  vintage Christmas stuff. Above you see Santa and Mrs. Claus on a little bench giving each other a smooch - and it is pretty cute.  They're salt and pepper shakers and this is what I *think* is the first matching pair of vintage Christmas ones we have.  I posted about this "Merry" (without Christmas) one  back in 2014.  And this spaghetti trim Salt shaker (no pepper) in 2015 . This new pair was in a booth that was close to the entrance and I picked them up and liked them right away.  But, it was like the 2nd booth we had visited, so I passed and moved on.  Just like the Schlitz pitcher, since it was on the way out, I stopped by and the vendor was packing

Earlier this week, I posted a photo of a felt Christmas mouse ornament from an Estate Sale, but it wasn't the only Christmas item that I came home with that day: I also got this Santa.  He's all gangly and has wire 'pose-able' limbs with a cute wooden face.  And those eyelashes, right?  There's a pretty strong legacy in the vintage Christmas world it seems to have a strong eyelash game.   Here's an angel ornament with some serious eyelashes .   Then there is this deer with major eyelashes .  And this pair of ornaments with strong lashes, too . This Santa has a weird belt that you can see up higher than his waist.  It isn't connected anywhere and is bigger - around - than the white band at his waist.  In our new place, I'm sure we'll find a place for him come November.

A few days ago, I posted a photo of a little brass letter rack that I picked up at an Estate Sale recently.  I also stopped at a garage sale or two on the same trip including the one where I bought a few vintage Christmas items  - one of which is this flat Santa Mouse felt ornament.  He has a cute little bow that has a couple of bedazzles on him and he reminds me of both the vintage felt ornament that I made when I was a kid and this flat Mrs. Claus felt ornament that I picked up last year at an estate sale. This year, we'll be back to decorating our *own* place and having a tree (or two?!?) and we're always looking for 'low-hanging' ornaments that the Big Beef/King of the Ball Tossers can reach and not shatter/break.  So, I'm sure this one will find a home somewhere low this season.  Should be a nice addition to our holiday.

Earlier this fall, I stopped at a yard sale up in Twin Lakes and saw this Santa on the table with an asking price of $0.25.  Couldn't pass him up.  Mostly because I liked him, but also because I thought - at the time - that he looked just like a Santa that sits on my inlaws counter in their kitchen at Christmastime.  There's a story involved, but I believe that the Santa in question (the one on the counter in Naperville) is from Nat's Dad's childhood.  So, it is loved. This one, looked just like it.  But had better paint.  I brought it back and figured there was no better home than with Nat's parents.  I mean...it was just a quarter, so if it got thrown out, that's not the end of the world.  But, they loved it!  And confirmed that it *is* the exact same one they have at home from Granddad's childhood. I've looked around and you can see on eBay that the mug that he's holding in his hand holds a bulb in some cases.  Not sure, exactly, how that w

Found this awfully cute Santa planter up at the antique store and if we had a place to call our own?  It would have been mine!  But, because we haven't had Christmas at our own place for two years, I have no idea how much space we have and how much vintage Christmas stuff like this we have! If he's still there this fall?  I'll buy him.  I'm pretty sure he's a Holt Howard based on the face and eyes. But...what is Santa painting anyway?

I've been chronicling something I've been calling the "Vintage Christmas Motherlode" at the Great Lakes Antique Mall up in Coloma since back in 2013.   I posted about it as recently as this past June when we were getting ready to say 'see you later' to Coloma. But, now that we're spending time up in Twin Lakes, Wisconsin, one of the first orders of business was to discover the local antique mall.  Either Nat's parents or her sister found one just a ten minutes away in Lake Geneva .  So on a trip up there earlier this year, we went.  A bit smaller than the one in Coloma but a lot more furniture.  Turns out the guy at the counter is a wingnut and was getting all excited about the prospect of the incoming President-Elect, so it has that going for it... But, in we went to wander around. And lo and behold...what did I discover:  a new vintage Christmas Motherlode!  Look at that case.  Some pretty great stuff.  Ornaments, lights, little figures, Pu

Over the weekend, we packed the kids into the minivan and drove around Hinsdale looking at some houses/house features as we work to finalize our own house.  We saw some pretty beautiful places, but we also came across an Estate Sale.  Which.....I couldn't *not* go in, right?  It was a nice, old house on the outside, so my hunch was that there'd be some gems inside. After waiting for my number to be called (yeah...it was one of those Estate Sales.  Where they had you pull a ticket like you do when you're waiting at the deli counter.), I got in and poked around.  Nothing.  At least for us.  So, I went outside to the garage and discovered something!  They had a few cases of vintage 3 1/4" glass ornaments in their original boxes.  That's the side of the box above and the top of the box below.  They say "American Made" from Coby Glass Products.  If you poke around on the web , it turns out that Coby likely didn't make these, they were using Corning bl

We spent a few days up in Twin Lakes Wisconsin and besides the beautiful views and lovely screened in porch, I was glad to see that just like in Coloma, there's a pretty active garage sale circuit that one can run on the weekends.  Maybe it is a 'lake house town' thing? I found time to stop at one and picked up a few items including this angel above.  She's old, but not *that* old because her head is squeeze-y rubber.  But she's in impeccable shape.  Super bright white.  No dirt or marks on her.  I also bought a plastic blowmold Santa that takes a light in his back.  It is the same one that Nat's parents have on their counter during Christmastime and I *think* it dates back to her Dad's childhood.  Which...means it is from the 1950's - 60's?  But this one that I bought, just like the angel above, was in just about perfect shape, too! We left the Santa up in Twin Lakes for Grammy and Granddad and who knows?  Maybe he'll get a shot at the bi

I posted some photos of the batch of vintage glass ornaments I bought at an Estate Sale earlier this week and mentioned in that post that there was one more ornament that came with the set.  And here she is!  She's some sort of felt version of Mrs. Claus who has a bunch of bedazzling on her with her Christmas best on and she's carrying a pie with both hands.  She's maybe five or six inches tall and a mirror image on the other side of her.  And awfully cute. We have a few ornaments that look/feel like this and they all came from Anthropologie.  I could totally see something like her hanging in their store and selling for $12.99. As for us, she was a no-brainer.  We are always open to 'unbreakable' ornaments that we can hang low on the tree for the kids to see, touch, and yank on.  She'll go great down there amongst her brethren.

A few weeks back, I picked up this ornament case and these 14 vintage Christmas ornaments at an Estate Sale in Elmhurst.  It was the same sale where I picked up this hobnail milkglass pitcher and this vintage White Sox book .  Quite the haul... The ornament case was found where most Christmas stuff ends up - buried either on the floor under a table or in the basement.  When I opened the case, it was totally full, but I pulled out the ornaments that I didn't want that were newer and the seller at the sale was glad to keep them to try to sell to someone else.  We see these type of ornaments all the time at sales and most of the time they want anywhere between $2 and $4 a piece for each of them. Sometimes they're not even really that old, but just look old.  And each time, I usually pass. Both, because glass ornaments like these aren't destined to last super long on our tree with the three savages roaming around and shaking the tree, but also because we have a tree ful