High Button Shoe

Good morning and Happy Valentines Day! NOT the best of days here. We are covered in ice. We knew it was supposed to come, so I don't know why I was surprised when I got up to find it. Wishful thinking, I suppose. Oddly, while nearly every school in counties clear north and clear south, over to the Lake and way east are closed, ours apparently is open. Or at least was not on the long list of closings. So much for all the little kiddies and their valentines to exchange today. Our country road looks like a skating rink. We have barely any snow on the ground, which always makes me smile. Of course, now it is covered in ice. Saturday, after another day of fairly warm temperatures (mid 40's, which is highly unusual for this part of northern Michigan), I took advantage of the sunshine and warm and sat on the back deck in just jeans, t-shirt and my bare feet and had my coffee. This has definitely been a different winter. Usually by this time, we are snow clear past our knees. NOT complaining though!

Yesterday, I found myself chained to the dining room table with the annual dreaded income tax. Being a self employed shop owner means a pile of paperwork for expenses, income, sales tax etc.

Each year, I promise myself I will be better organized. We all know of my poor organizational skills. That goes hand in hand with my discipline skills. Not great. But each year, I have gotten somewhat better. That "better" is prompted by the frustration of actually going thru each piece of paperwork as I am organizing the tax paperwork for the accountant. I swear, I have it already DONE before I take it to them. The outline is filled out with all the pertinent information. He takes my figures and puts them down, admittedly with tax law skill I don't possess, charges me a weeks pay, BUT I don't have to worry that I did something wrong in putting it down in the way that the IRS wants. My harvest table is full of piles of papers. My plan for post-filing, is to actually take all these piles of papers and file them. Ronnie put another file cabinet in for me, and I suppose that meant maybe he thought the cardboard box I have on top of the file cabinet is not filing.

I had occasion last week to have a "thing" taken off my face and have it biopsied. Haven't gotten the pathology report back yet. But for the past week, I have had 3 stitches in my face. We took my brother out to supper Wednesday for his birthday. I thought perhaps they might prefer to sit at another table, rather than sit with me with a face that looked like I had been in battle! Along with the stitches, I was not supposed to have makeup on the stitches. So I avoided that part of my face with makeup. Looked real good. I had the option of going back to have them taken out, or Ron taking them out. Yes, I know! I thought about that too. But he did just great. As we don't have a dermatologist in this immediate area, but do have a plastic surgeon I went to the plastic surgeon.

I suppose the post office in town wonders what uplifting procedure I had done, and will be scrutinizing me when I come in next time, as the paperwork they sent me clearly had facial plastic surgeon, stamped on their envelope. Ronnie had suggestions of all the procedures he thought I might benefit from, as long as I was there. He, by the way, is locked out in the ice!!

Ronnie and me have been taking pictures of items. We are definitely getting better with this digital camera. We, meaning he. You know I haven't touched it yet. No sense in muttling up my brain cells with that, when he can do it. We have been photographing vintage clothing and antique smalls, which will be showing up on the website soon. I, especially love the vintage clothing. We have several more pieces to photograph. We have not yet mastered the lighting however, so we need to do some retakes.

Always frustrated with my large bathroom mirror, which generally shows signs of SOME body in this house, actually using the sink, and the resulting mess on the mirror...we have a difference of opinion on who that is... I have tried every cleaning product, every paper towel, and every method to no avail. It always was a streaky mess. AHA! Martha Stewart ( I would be her worst nightmare!) sent me a advertisement thing wanting me of course to subscribe to the magazine. Yah, like MY table would look like that when I set it... anyway, to show you the terrific reasons why you should subscribe, they offered some enticements. One of them was on mirror cleaning. She apparently has heard of my streaky mirror. Did you KNOW that proper mirror cleaning is to spray your cleaner ON the soft clean cloth instead of on the mirror, wipe the mirror, and then use another clean soft cloth to finish it. It works! Well, until one of us (still up for debate) washes hands or brushes teeth the next time.

We are advertising in a new primitive magazine that has its second issue just come out. Called Mercantile Gatherings, it is focused right at us primitive people. The graphic are wonderful, as is the actual feel of the magazine. Very high quality. You can check it out at www.mercantilegatherings.com I am very impressed with these gals. It is based out of Ohio.

Beulah put up our new offerings for www.crowsoup.com that will be coming out tomorrow on our website yesterday. You can see them now at http://www.highbuttonshoe.net/itemson.htm (We also have some new things on the new items icon. We have changed that somewhat. More to come later, but it has a different look to it.) 3 are old things, 3 are new. 2 new dolls. Mrs OrvillaMae Chupp is decidedly different from my usual dolls. Lost brain cells on her, I can tell you. She has 10 separate fingers. She almost only had 9 fingers. So two fingers somewhat resemble that she has arthritis. Anyway, a lot of work went into her. She wears the most disreputable pair of underpanties you ever saw. I didn't go into great detail about them for crow soup. Just you get to hear it. Aren't you special?? They are a odd color blue silk, handmade very crudely, that I must have found on a doll somewhere. It appears I cut them off. In hindsight I wonder why? But they were perfect for OrvillaMae. And they have been properly (or not) mended back up. So between her arthritis and her disreputable undies, she is perhaps one of a kind. We have another doll, rag stuf'd, and her face kind of falling off her head...

and a piece of "rebirthed" architectural, we are doing. You will be seeing more of this, as we get the pictures up.

Oh, and we have the new calendar of events up. We will be adding to it as things progress, but it gives you some things to ponder on. Our big show at the farm is scheduled for July 9 & 10. And I listed BrunieMae's shows we will be doing. ( www.saltboxfarm.com) Check it out periodically.

I believe I told you I would share why we all have these goofy names some time soon. Rather than go back into detail again about this, go to the newsletters section on the website and read the August one. I think it is still there. That was for August 2003. It tells of Beulah and me and our trip to Kentucky and Tennessee. That is where the names started. Note: I just checked that out before sending this and Beulah has changed the newsletters. SO..I will have to tell you later when I haven't rambled on so long about other stuff.

Ok, the harvest table and the tax paperwork awaits me. I want to finish this today. Hopefully our hill out here will melt off the ice soon and I will be able to get this to the accountant, in a day or so.

Thanks for asking to be a part of our farm.

In fond regard,

Miss Clotilda