Thrift Store - Look At What I Found!!!!!

Last post I told you we had been to a thrift store and that I'd tell you more about it later - then I sat down to look at the wondrous things I had gotten - and I got some wondrous things - a tiny teacup with butterflies on it - and a butterfly handle, lots of crafting things for 49 cents and 99 cents - a pretty milk glass plate - some red candles and glass candle holders.  Even though those are nice things - that is not my prize purchase.

I've been looking for a certain craft magazine for over 5 years now.  In 1969, just before our youngest daughter was born, I was busy making felt christmas decorations.  I had bought a magazine for 1.00 and figured if I was going to pay that much for a magazine I'd better use a lot of the patterns - and so I did.  Over the years the items wore out and were discarded - or they were damaged in a move and had to be tossed.  So I have been looking for that magazine for a long time now - hoping to discover those patterns.

Yesterday in the thrift store I was browsing in the craft section - found a couple craft magazines about plastic canvas - wandered down to the craft book section and just went lightly through them - ran my fingers along the edges of the magazines and pulled this one out.  I didn't even look inside - it was marked 99 cents and I liked the look of the wreath on the front - it seemed familiar.  Later when I got home I settled in with a cup of tea and the magazine - WOW - was I ever surprised.

This is the Twelve Days of Christmas Tree that I had made - way back in 1969.  And it was the main reason I had been searching for this magazine for years, but with no luck.  The tree is 43" tall - and the figures are tiny.

These are the patterns in the magazine - I put the end of the fine point sharpie in there for scale - those pieces are TINY!

And then on through the magazine - I had also made these felt cottages, the top two gingerbread people ornaments and the felt tree.  I would go to a big department store in Wisconsin with two kids in the shopping cart, and buy felt by the yard - for 45 cents a yard.  I bought a lot of felt that year.

This page is in Black and White.  I made several of these mice ornaments - the two top ones and the one in the bottom left.  We still have these and use them on our tree every year - they are 44 years old.  The bottom left mouse is missing one eye - I need to cut another teeny felt on for him - poor Elf Mouse.

I made many of these felt Della Robia Swags 

And I made this felt wreath - I still have the Della Robia Swags - but not the wreath.  The swags looked more like the wreath than like the drawing of the swags in the magazine.

And then there were christmas stocking in felt.  I made these for our family - the Victorian boot for me, the angel for our oldest daughter who had just turned 4.

(I made two versions of the Victorian stocking - red like in the photo, and green)

The train for our year and a half old son and the baby stocking for our youngest daughter, who was born on Dec. 11, 1969.

A friend saw the stockings and wanted to take some to work with her to sell them to her friends.  Ok - I'll make a few extra stockings and a few dollars for spending money - maybe cover the cost of the felt.

She came back day after day - with new orders - these things were really selling.  I made 400.00 that year, selling the stockings for 4.00 each (a higher price than store bought stockings were selling for in 1969).  I had started making the stockings in October and had made and sold all of them before our daughter was born.

This is the patterns for the stockings in the magazine - so not only did I have to cut out all those tiny felt pieces, I first had to enlarge the patterns by drawing them on 1 inch squares.  There were no copy place like Kinkos to make photocopy enlargements and I didn't have graph paper - I drew the squares and on taped together pieces of typing paper to make the patterns.  It was a wonderful year - ending with our youngest daughter being born.

And then today I happened upon this BLOG - about the same magazine - isn't that strange?

Do you think I will re-make that Twelve Days of Christmas?  I'd really like to have one.