You Can't Take It With You

It's Shameless Commerce Tuesday, and today, instead of featuring an item from my primary Etsy shop, Pasque Flower Creations, I've decided to promote my newly-opened (but far from fully-stocked) vintage Etsy shop, Aunt Pheba's Vintage.

Turning 60 has made me come to grips with my own mortality --- but in a good way.

Over the past year, I've watched my brother and sister-in-law struggle under the weighty responsibility of being executors of estates which included eight decades of accumulated STUFF.  While my uncle and my brother's father-in-law might not have been candidates for the TV show, Hoarders, they had (like so many of that generation who grew up during the Great Depression) found it difficult to throw anything away -- or give it away for that matter!  With all of my kids in different time zones now, I do not want any of them to have to use their entire accumulated vacation leave to clean out a house full of STUFF when I'm gone.

So, I've resolved that during the decade of my 60s, I'm going to DOWNSIZE and SIMPLIFY. (Except for my fabric stash.  I'm not ready to part with that yet -- except for my scraps.   I can sew in assisted living or a nursing home when I'm WAY old.  Although goodness knows I have amassed a FABLE: Fabric Accumulation Beyond Life Expectancy.)

My youngest kids are apartment dwellers, and the older ones are small house dwellers with modern, not vintage, tastes.  The sad fact is, none of them really wants my grandma's china, or my crystal, or my mother's linens. So these things need to find new homes.

With that in mind, I opened my second Etsy shop on June 1, 2013.  Although I call it Aunt Pheba's Vintage, it is actually named after my paternal grandmother, Pheba Lois (Canfield) Larson, pictured in the photo above on the far, far right.  Her husband, my Grandpa Larson, is holding their son Llewellyn, in the center of the photo. Llewellyn died of heart disease the summer after he finished third grade.  This photo was taken in 1921.  My dad was born in 1924.

Although Pheba (pronounced FEE-bee, just like Phoebe) was known to me as Grandma Larson, she was known to most of the rest of the family as Aunt Pheba. She loved pretty things, and, as the only granddaughter, I have had many of her things stored in boxes for too many years.  We've also accumulated some rather kitschy interesting vintage items along the way that need to find new homes.  So, over the next few weeks, I hope to fill the virtual shelves of my new shop with some of those buried treasures -- with a little kitsch thrown in.

TTFN
LeAnn