A Warm Blogger Welcome! (And new items, Just Listed!)

We are having such a beautiful fall day here on the East Coast! What's not to love about fall when the leaves are just sparkling a lovely golden color in the sunshine.

It was a great day for fleamarketing as well on Tuesday. I found a few things, not all at the flea, but they are all part of my latest listing:

Antique Limoges, France egg cup by T&V. Awesome!

Pearl wrap around bracelet. So chic! So feminine! So reasonably priced!

While these may be vintage bone dishes from Germany, I think they'd make

great pin dishes to catch your jewelry on the nightstand or dresser.

Old playbook from the 1920's ... the ads and graphics are fabulous!

The ivory fringe on this old Easter card makes this one so charming. Two sided Victorian children carting their egg. Sweet!

Victorian amethyst stone hatpin. A real stunner!

Alice in Wonderland... illustrations by John Tenniel.


Another collection of baubles and beads for my crafters

in a Reed & Barton silverplated bowl.

Talk about sweet... this 3D greeting card will give you three layers to craft with.


The rest of my finds are found in the shop, Bella Rosa Antiques. Don't forget to check out the newly moved items in the Flea Bella Category!

Now to switch gears I'd like to give a warm welcome to my Dear friend, Joyce, of Quilted Nest.
A big congratulations for her new blog! She has an etsy shop and is an ebay seller.

Won't you stop by and say hello? She has a heart for the Lord and a great eye for antiques. I met Joyce ten years ago when we both had an antique booth next to each other. We're still dealers at the same antique mall and good friends. (She is my fleamarket partner, too.)

Have a BELLA day!

A Bella Makeover?

Change is never easy. I have been contemplating a new look for my Bella Rosa website. My regular blog pals will notice I just changed my blog look. I like the three column layout but I couldn't figure out how to add a new designer template to my blog! If anyone can help, I'm willing.

So what I'm contemplating is: Does it matter if I purchase a new website design which will alter everything? I've had this logo and Italian architecture design for more than two years. The main benefit of changing looks would be to allow people who use the browser, Firefox to view my website. The last graphic designer did not include this code for some reason and no one who uses Firefox can see my site normally. Some have suggested I have lost business because of it. Ewww. Not good. So either way I guess I need to head down this road. Any helpful suggestions? Anyone else go through something similar? Who do you recommend? I have a few selections in mind I have found but I'm waiting until I'm positive. Excited yes, but carefully trodding, that's me!

I am positive I found some great stuff at our local antique fleamarket this morning. I'm almost done taking pics and editing them. Look for fresh stuff to appear in the JUST LISTED category soon!

Second Chance Tuesday #5

Welcome to Second Chance Tuesday. This is where I show items from my shop that haven't been highlighted on the blog in awhile and well frankly, deserve a second chance!

If you also have a shop or a favorite blog post (or something else that may need a second chance) feel free to contact me and I'll get a Mr. Linky type thing going. For now, it is just me.

Here is what I've selected for this week:

Vintage style phone. I think this one is from the late 70's or early 80's.

Great look and lots of fun!

Unique Limoges, France teapot.
I like the garden style "vines" or "branches."
The gold is stunning ... as most Limoges pieces are.

Have you noticed a theme yet? (Everything is in the same color scheme.) I'm watching DWTS while I'm typing this so it may be necessary for me to have a theme! LOL

Anyway, there are 9 yards....NINE yards of gorgeous champagne colored rose fabric
here.

What could you make with 9 yards???? I see a beautiful vanity chair or bench or maybe pillows!

All Lenox pieces are ivory but with a splash of color

this rooster is a real beauty!

I really can't believe it hasn't sold.

These illustrations
from an old book are amazing! Framed, they'd be even more so.

And there's one more theme tying all of these pieces together. They are all on sale in the FLEA BELLA category!

Thanks for giving them a "Second Chance!"

Falling for My Crockpot

Every year around this time I fall in love with my crockpot all over again. It sits at the bottom
of my storage cabinet all spring and summer until I go in search of it...usually about now.

It is always faithful, just sitting there waiting for me to open the door and exclaim "there you are!"

Today I'm cooking pork loin and just tossed barbecue sauce and another ingredient... salsa. I'm going to see how it turns out Figured it was easier than chopping peppers and onions!

Like I said, my crockpot is amazing! Because of this cool gadget I'm even going to make MASHED potatoes tonight! I never make mashed potatoes! Whoo hoo....

The leaves are falling off of the trees in a blustery fall-like wind today.

This is how our maple tree is going to look by the end of this week. It is still green and yellow.

Most of the leaves have been hanging on and I've really enjoyed the warm weather we had lately too. Yesterday was the perfect day to go with the family to the park, which we did, but I am kicking myself for not bringing along our nice camera. The photo ops were everywhere!

(A snippet of our driveway going up the hill)

This morning I went to our local craft store in search of clearance pumpkins. My friend showed me a Martha Stewart clip of how she painted pumpkins with glue and covered them with this beautiful glitter.

I'm really getting into autumn this year!

What have you been doing to celebrate the season change? Go ahead, tell me about it.

Just Listed! Pink Feathery Hat, Violets Gift Book, Vintage CORO Bracelet & Pin, Victorian Autograph Book, Holy Bible

Last night instead of working on a costume for a party (it was cancelled due to a lack of interest!), I worked on getting these vintage goodies loaded onto my website, Bella Rosa Antiques.

All kinds of fun things this week:


Dear Hubs thought it was weird that I paired these two together but to me it says "Night Out on the Town!"


These gift books are harder to find than you think!

Retro pink bracelet

Larger size pink shabby roses plate... I think it is almost 12 inches.

This was of course my favorite piece this week. A vintage pink Berkshire wool hat with a gorgeous feather plume!

Vintage CORO pin...

Holy Bible from 1890

A vintage CORO bracelet...

Antique autograph book from 1878!!! It is neat to read the little poems ...they were such wordsmiths in the day...now we use Facebook and Twitter! And blogs!

Lovely aqua demitasse cup and saucer.


There are a few others but I'll let you check them out, here.

Making Applesauce Into My Comfort Zone

Recently I wrote about going out one night to make applesauce with my M.O.P.S group. (Mothers of Preschoolers)

It was not something I would normally jump at the chance to do.

Go ahead and call me whatever you want (how about snooty suburbanite?) but basically I grew up in the burbs and we bought our applesauce from a jar, at the grocery store. My Mother never canned or froze food so this was something foreign to me. Really! And I was completely uncomfortable with the thought of having to go hang out and can ....of all things! I mean, why can stuff when we can use our precious child-free time and meet out at a fun restaurant or see a movie?

I decided I needed to have a conversation with my Mother when I learned my MOPS group was going to be canning as our fun, girls night out. Here is how it went:

Me: Why didn't we ever can at home?

Mother: I don't know, I guess it's just something we didn't do.

Me: Well, it is your fault I don't know how to can.

Mother: Of course it is, everything is always my fault.

Me: Why didn't you can? Seriously.

Mother: Well, BOTH of my Grandmother's canned. One was Scotch Irish and canned all kinds of things like Peaches, applesauce, etc while the other was Italian and always had tomato sauce and things like peppers on her basement shelves.

Me: Well, I LOVE tomato sauce and peppers!

Mother: And it was actually MY MOTHER who hated canning! So, we didn't do it in my house. I worked full time so this is probably why we didn't do it in our house either.

Me: Oh.

Mother: So, now you can go learn how to do it for the both of us.

While my conversation with Mother did not make me feel any more excited about spending my evening canning, I decided to go with an open mind and get into the experience.

It ended up being a lot of fun. We all sat around the kitchen table and told our fun stories of how we met our husbands, the stories behind our children, the pregnancies, and really bonded over applesauce.

And I learned that what I'm not comfortable doing is the first thing I should try.

Second Chance Tuesday #4

Welcome to Second Chance Tuesday! This is where we feature items we feel deserve a "SECOND CHANCE" to be highlighted on the blog. Feel free to join us if you have a shop or even a favorite post you'd like to give another day up on your blog.

Here is what I selected this week, from my online shop, Bella Rosa Antiques ... all with the upcoming Christmas holiday in mind:

A Josef's Original Santa puppy. He's bringing you a stocking. . . have you been good this year?

(Thank you, these have sold!)
Why is Mrs. Claus winking at Santa? Cute kitcshy / retro set!

Ice blue Christmas tree pin. Show your holiday spirit... for your coat lapel or sweater!



Vintage glass teal beads... why these are still in the shop surprises me! How pretty they would bewith shabby pink ornaments.

(Thank you, this has sold! )

Little figurines like this remind me of my Mother's cute decor from days gone by. She always put out her collection a few weeks before Christmas. This one is by Lefton.

Pumpkin Pickin', Chuckin', & Plain 'ol Junkin'

Saturday we went on our second annual pumpkin hunt. Last year the weather was a little bit warmer... but we had fun anyway!

We tried a new farm and they had all kinds of fun things to do...

Dear Bebe found her pumpkin and we were off to enjoy other festivities...

The pretty horses...

And the great pumpkin chucker, Charlie Brown! How did I do with my expert photography?

That smoke is pretty good, eh?????

On the way home Mommy stopped at a cute little antique shop and found a little vintage for her Bella Rosa Antique store. Plus we were invited to a pre-house sale which almost never happens.

Fall is looking pretty good around here.

THe lady that sold this sweet sweet feathered hat to me said her Mother wore it when she got married! Can't even imagine what the rest of the outfit must have looked like. This hat is awesome! And it is pink!

(I'm attracted to vintage bracelets like moths to a light bulb....)

Antique German house signs... one dates back to the 1880's!

Antique box from Siena, Italy???? I am about to do more research on this piece.


I'll be back with more on my latest finds... I'm sooooooo excited!