hOnEySuCkLe tHyMe

Showing my age again, and my roots way back when blogging was new! It was common on "prim and rustic" blogs to use the mixed capitalization. For some reason, it reminds me of when "knee warmers" and "cummerbunds" were popular, but that was in the 1970s.

Anyone remember that, the knee warmers? Ringing any bells among the belles who read my little bloggie? I had a little pair of red acrylic knee warmers, of knitted fine-guage acrylic, but still; scritchy-scratchy acrylic yarn of the day. And I had a red cummerbund that matched, but of a fine-guage material. Oh, I was so thin. But the advantage was I could wear anything. I was so thin that people felt I had an eating disorder, as I did. Eating disorders were just getting known then, in the 1970s. But I looked well in clothes and I bought the "display" clothing from fine stores in size 3, and took them up. The display clothes were sold for a song at the end of the season, as were the shoes. I had tiny feet, size 5 narrow, the usual display size.

My mind is off and running now! White sales! The White Sales -- we would wait for them and then get our linens. And the department stores had whole floors of china and stoneware and flatware, and so many pretty silver things. The peasant in me chose a Mikasa stoneware design for my first wedding: Strawberry Festival. Funny, I don't have a single piece left and I loved that pattern so much. Strawberries have always made me smile. And my flatware pattern was Oneida American Colonial. Gosh, haven't thought of that in years. 

In New Orleans, we had a beloved department store, D.H. Holmes. Its colors were a light cream and dark chocolate brown. The bags, the boxes, the giftwrap, the name tags were all that color combination. I loved those stores, especially the big store on Canal Street. At the very top floor, there were hats and wigs and the offices. We would take the escalators up and up and up. It always made my heart race a little bit to step on the escalator and start rising. One of my aunts was a "window dresser" for a local department store in a smaller city. She had such style, and store windows in those days were glorious things. 

If I have been slow to comment on your blog, I apologize. I have been very tired and I am also racing back and forth from work taking care of my husband, who has had some procedures done. He's pretty independent in general, but anything out of the ordinary hits him hard, making him more oppositional and not do the things he needs to do to heal and stay healthy. And yesterday I drove a teacher from school to the ER and stayed with her for hours, as I could tell with one look that she had cellulitis starting on her leg, and indeed it was so. She is deeply hypochondriac, but sometimes she does get sick for real. But it all makes for long days and I have little energy, sometimes just falling asleep with my head on the desk where the computer is. 

But I did go see if I could get a cutting from a wild Queen's Wreath vine and a Silver Lace vine. [Success! And I saw a pretty old-fashioned fence it was growing up!] And then I stopped by the church to light some candles.

If you have read this far, you are probably saying, "Cough up the honeysuckle! Where is it?" This honeysuckle vine surprised me! It is growing all mixed in with the wisteria vines at church! Right now it is smothered in blossoms and I did allow myself to stand there and pull off about a dozen blossoms, pinching the end off and pulling the stamen through, carrying that tiny drop of nectar that we dab on our tongues. 

Then of course, just as if I were ten again, I have to suck the open end and get the rest of the nectar out. I can think of so many "wild foods" we ate as children! Gosh, the list is just forever. Pepper plant, honeysuckle, wild onions, wild garlic, grapes, figs, plums, loquats, maypops, rabbit grass, elderberries, blackberries, huckleberries (which I disliked), digging sassafrass roots, climbing to get at pawpaws and persimmons. I know I'm forgetting a lot. 

May the rest of your week be "just as you like it." See you around the blogs!

Kind regards,

Olde Dame Holly