A day at the auction.

Just arrived back from the auction, I'm afraid there was nothing special I bought on the Rag Rescue front, although I bought some antique sewing tools and a lovely, well once lovely, Victorian quilt which due to its damage I should be able to get some pieces of lovely Victorian fabric from.
I just love this particular auction because the drive to it is so spectacular even though today the mountains were shrouded with low cloud. However it does mean a very early start and combining that with my late night last night celebrating my husbands birthday it has resulted in me being incapable of listing any items today ready for tomorrow. So my apologies.
I have been asked whether or not I have already listed all of the lace I bought on Wednesday especially the pink lace (see above). the answer to the question is a definite no, I still have loads to list and I will photograph and measure some more tomorrow with the aim of listing on Monday morning, I promise. I will put a preview of the lace on this blog tomorrow afternoon for you all to get a taster.
I'm going to sign off now and sit and relax by embroidering my felt picture I'm working on. Hubby is preparing the evening meal so I can have some 'me time'.

Lots and lots of vintage fabrics, haberdashery and embellishments on the website.
Click HERE to be whisked away to a cavern of recycled heaven.

Antique lace, haberdashery and embellishments

See all new listing for today HERE

Sorry this a little late. After working long hours yesterday to get these items listed, in the evening I had to prepare for my husbands birthday which is today. The big 60. We actually celebrate next weekend at a party being thrown for him by some wonderful dealer friends of ours, but I had to complete my felted card and get all of the presents wrapped and prepared for when he woke up. The poor darling has to go to the dentist today to have his stitches out, not something I would enjoy on my birthday, still he doesn't seem to mind.

Anyway take a look around at the site, you might find something that will inspire you to be creative.

42 items being listed tomorrow including Antique lace

My apologises for not doing a preview of all 42 items being listed tomorrow morning. I am shattered as I've been photographing and listing since 7am and I think 12 hours around and on the computer is enough for me today.
Anyway, there is a good mix of antique lace, English and French large sized fabrics, haberdashery and embellishments for you to browse through.

Good Luck.

New items listed for today - next listings on Friday.

Today new items are now on the website.


After a sleepless night I struggled out of bed at 5am this morning to go to the auction. However it was really worth it. I have returned with a lot of goodies, both sewing items, antique lace and fabrics.
There was the most amazing amount of antique lace in one lot. It was so beautiful that you had to go and view it in the office in case it got damaged. There were two telephone bids. I managed to out bid one telephone bidder but couldn't pay any more than the second bidder. My husband was going red in the face as I kept bidding and breathed a sigh of relief when I stopped. I haven't seen this quality of lace in such quantity, for a long time. It was unfortunate that I wasn't able to buy it but I did managed to out bid the two telephone bidders on a smaller box, presumably from the same house clearance.

As I have a great deal of items to sort out, log into my records and price up before I pop them on the website, I have decided that I will not list tomorrow but list on Friday and Sunday. That way I can incorporate some of the lovely items I have just bought. I will try and take a photograph of some of the items for you and publish here tomorrow.

NEW ITEMS FOR WEDNESDAY 25TH FEBRUARY

Click HERE to go straight to the page tomorrow
I've listed this preview of tomorrows new items early today as I am very busy catching up with business. I will not be able to list these items until late tomorrow afternoon as I will be out at an auction, hopefully buying all day.

Vintage buckles, buttons, Victorian and 1930's trims. sewing thread fans, numerous 'strippin fabric spiders' and French fabric will be listed.

CHOICE OF THE DAY

Beautiful French fabric with a design of bouquets of roses.

More lovely items tomorrow

Click on THIS LINK tomorrow amorning and it will take you straight to the new listings page on the website. There you will be able to see larger photographs of each item. As you can see there is a lovely mix of vintage buckles, beads, buttons embroidery silks, vintage French fabrics and ribbon. A hat trim, lovely bunch of vintage flowers and an unusual Lux beadcraft envelope containing instructions on bead work motifs and it comes complete with the beads.

I hope tomorrow is a better day than today. First the dentist, then the hand brake on the van seized and now the washing machine has broken with the clothes still in it. Oh well hopefully that's the three.

SPECIAL ITEM

Lovely old English ribbon with a design of roses.

Back from the dentist.

Just to let you know that I'm back from the dentist and have just listed today's NEW ITEMS. I will now start the write ups for tomorrows listing and show a preview later on this afternoon.

Tomorrow - 1920's silvered metallic lace with a design of roses.

NEW LISTINGS FOR MONDAY 23RD FEBRUARY

Please note that I will not be listing tomorrow until the afternoon as I have to go to the dentist. Yuk!

SPECIAL ITEM

1920's SILVERED METALLIC LACE WITH A DESIGN OF ROSES.

Vintage buckles,beads,buttons and bows coming up at Rag Rescue

I've now finished preparing 175 items to be listed in the next few weeks. the majority of them are from that wonderful 'ATTIC FIND'

Tomorrow morning is the first of the new listings. 20 items will be listed as soon as I arise from my slumbers.

Love buckles? - research them on Wikipedia

I have always loved buckles, from Victorian shoe buckles to 1940's plastic buckles. So you can imagine my joy when I found a tin of buckles in that 'Attic find'. The picture shows one of the buckles that will be listed next week. A lovely brass buckle with a design of pillars and roses.
If you would like to do some research on the origins of buckles and how they were used through the ages see:-
Wikipedia

Vintage Anchor Flox pink embroidery thread

In the 'Attic find' there are loads of vintage embroidery threads. Many of them are large bundles of the above in numerous colours - 'Anchor Flox embroidery'. I spent at least an hour this afternoon trying to find out about this embroidery thread but came up with nothing. I visited a site by Alex Askaroff called 'A history of sewing threads' which is a very interesting site telling you all about the history of machine sewing threads and well worth a visit, but unfortunately it didn't mention the 'Anchor' embroidery threads.
If anyone has any information I would be very grateful to hear it, as I am very intrigued as to the word 'Flox' .I'm beginning to think that perhaps it isn't English and the 'flox' stands for floss.
I will be listing some of these wonderful embroidery threads on the 'Rag Rescue' site next week.

Taking photographs all day

I found these lovely Victorian shoe buckles in the 'Attic find' They are so sweet and in such good condition. Ideal for giving your party shoes a new look.

I've spent all day photographing and jpging some of the items I bought last Friday, 84 in total today and that's only about a third of the stash on my dining room table.

Phew I think I'll go and veg out in front of the television this evening.

Don't forget that the 'new listings' will start on Sunday but there are lots of lovely items still on the site that are up for grabs.

A lovely day of sorting out the attic finds.

Six inch square

I'm really looking forward to today's work. I'm sorting through all of those wonderful attic finds. I love coming home with a large box of items because it is just like Christmas, you never know what you will find. Hopefully I'll get some photographs taken ready for the start of my next 'Listing week' which will begin on Sunday.

I think I need a happy day today, yesterday was boring on the office front. I have however managed to update all customer orders so that you can now print them out if you need to. You will however notice that the order dates are dated yesterday due to a programming error which doesn't allow me to alter the date. If you need to get the original date you ordered please email me. this problem is on my 'to do list' for my website manager on his return.
I even got my own records of buys and sales on to my computer ready for the huge job at the beginning of April when I have to send my paperwork to my accountant. A good job done me thinks.
It was also a sad day yesterday as it was my next door neighbours funeral. If you ever read my other blog 'Feltissimo' you would have seen that I made a felted wedding card for them in May 2007. On there honeymoon she took ill and was diagnosed with cancer. She has been fighting bravely since, but she died a week last Thursday. They only had 20months of married life, life can be so unfair sometimes.

On a brighter note I think when I have photgraphed the attic treasures I'll put a photo up here on the blog as a taster to keep you waiting in anticipation.

I'm bigger than you.

My son Daniel in Guildford last week. He couldn't get to the hospital to treat his patients as the snow came over his knees. Soooo!! he build a very tall snowman instead. Looks as if he had a wonderful time. I don't think it he has ever seen as much snow in England in the whole of his 30 years.

Apart from taking orders for Rag Rescue I have had a day off today. I decided to do some felting on my embellisher. I was just getting in to it and a needle broke. I bought the embellisher in August and this is the first needle I've broken. I was so cross with myself especially as I can't get the needle out. I'm going to have to ring the company up tomorrow to try and sort it out. So I ended up ringing my friends and family which is always good to do and was a distraction from my felting disappointment.

Tomorrow is book keeping day, I'm hoping to get all of my buyers invoices on the site up to date. I can't wait until my ex-husband returns from Libya to get the site sorted, then everything will be automatic and it will save me so much time.

Loft treasures

First of all I'd like to show you the four lovely 1930's lingerie fabrics I've listed today. They are Soo! silky. The Liberty fabric is original with a label and still has it's dressing in it but when washed will become very soft. Unfortunately the light was very bad when I did the photography yesterday and that combined with the inevitable difficulty of photographing silk shows them rather in a darker shade but they are beautifully pale pink.

NOW TO THE LOFT TREASURES.

I got called out yesterday to a neighbour who is helping an old man clear out his loft before he moves. His wife had been an ardent dressmaker and embroiderer. She had kept everything over the years including her own mothers sewing bits and her aunts.
The lady produce a huge bag and box full of the most wonderful old items, many Victorian. It took me back ten years when I used to visit an auction where the auctioneer used to get clearances from large houses in London. He used to get the contents of the lofts, cellars and drawers and I used to get fabulous Victorian sewing treasures. Nowadays they are hard to find as many of them have been thrown away as rubbish.

You can imagine my joy when I saw these old treasures. Luxuriant sewing silks, beads in original advertising packets, loads of buckles, buttons waxed mending yarns, and many more, too numerous to mention. I paid a very good price for these because they are so rare now. The lady was over the moon and so pleased to be able to tell the gentleman that his wife's items would be treasured once more by people who would appreciate them.

I had a wonderful evening sorting through them all, which is why I forgot to put up today's new listings. This morning I'm going to a charity sale so I won't be listing anything tomorrow. It will be a few days before I list anything else as I've been inundated with orders this week and I need to keep my paperwork up to date and get all of my customers online orders typed up,. plus preparing for my next loading on the site. I'll keep the Rag Rescue News going on this blog every day and will inform you all when my next 'new listings' are.

I've placed Blogger's new toy at the top of the right hand side of this blog for 'FOLLOWERS'. If you follow this blog please make comments and join the followers that do.

Friday 13th is a GOOD day - Rag Rescue is listing again

RAG RESCUE

I like it when Friday 13th comes along. It always makes me think of my dear father. He was born on Friday 13th and he was such a good, kind caring man. Sadly he is no longer with us but tomorrow I will think of him all day.

I thought I would add some old patchwork hexagon pieces to the site as I know I have customers who like to re-use them in their own work. There are some lovely old fabric patterns.
Some more 6" squares are being added and a few of my own creations as I've been asked for them to be shown. I hope you like them all.

FABRICS AND SCRAPBAGS

I'm afraid today was a very dull day so the photographs have turned out rather dull looking.

Be an early bird and catch your fabric early. I list as soon as I get up. At the moment it could be anywhere between 5am and 7am. This is not normal, I might add, but after getting up every day for a week at 5am at the fairs, my body hasn't yet realised I'm back home and want some sleep.

New listings, earlier than mentioned.

As I am ahead of myself today I decided to add more items to the RAG RESCUE WEBSITE earlier than I mentioned. So have a good look at the 'NEW LISTINGS' page. There are lots of lovely items.

Embellish with beads competition.

The competition I have been running 'Embellish with beads' has been a real flop I'm afraid. The closing date was yesterday and I didn't have any entries. I think everybody has been so busy doing other things, which I can understand. Perhaps I'll run another competition later in the year!!

Still on the bright side, business is booming here at Rag Rescue and I'm just about to start preparing my next batch of items for listing tomorrow. I have so much stuff that I don't really know where to start, but tomorrow is planned, it is BUTTONS, BUCKLES AND TRIMS. I'll pop a picture on here later today.

Rescued vintage hats amongst other items.

ODDITIES ANTIQUES WEBSITE

I thought I would give everybody a chance to see the type of items I sell on my other website. These are a few of the items I rescued at the fairs. I just love the 1940's felt hats with their bunches of original felt flowers. The other two hats are 1870's straw and silk hats. I just had to buy them.
I am listing these and a few more items on the 'Oddities Antiques' website tomorrow morning (Wednesday 11th February)

I'll be back listing on 'Rag Rescue' website on Thursday with lots of buttons, buckles and other haberdashery and trims.

VINTAGE RIBBONS AND BRAIDS

Listing mid-morning.

More scrapbags being listed today.

When we are at the fairs we have to get up at 5am every morning. Unfortunately on our return my internal clock takes quite a while to get back to normality, so here I am at 5.38am listing on my blog. Mad I know, but at least it gives me time to do all the correspondence that I never seem to have time to do under normal circumstances.

Today's listings are of beautiful French fabrics with delicate designs of roses in pinks and blues. It makes you think of Summer even if there is still snow around. We are lucky here in Morecambe as there isn't any snow at all except on the Cumbrian mountains which can be seen across the bay. Still it is very cold.

I thought I'd tell you about how the scrap bags are made up. I have a session where I wash and iron suitable fabrics. Having got these in a pile, I test every one for strength and durability by pulling them and holding them up to the light to find out where holes are. I then set about drawing around a template which is 18cms x 12 cms. To fit the four fabrics in a bag I then fold each piece in half, iron and lay them out in piles according to colour. This way it is easier to see how colours and patterns will coordinate. After choosing four fabrics they are laid down and the pile gets bigger and bigger. Each set of four is then carefully laid out on a previously cut card, ironed and carefully turned over so that the fabrics wrap around. This is then photographed and slipped into a cello bag, sealed with my own label and priced.

This is a lot of work but I am sure you will agree worth the effort.

ARCTIC CONDITIONS HIT THE FAIRS, BUT WE ARE BACK HOME AND OPEN AGAIN FOR BUSINESS.

Freezing blizzards, snow covered marquees and hazardous roads made these February fairs the worst conditions we had seen in the 16 years of trading. However like most hardened dealers we managed to get there and tried not to moan as there wasn't any point in doing so. Our poor UK buyers found it very difficult to attend because even if they had managed to dig themselves out of their drives the main roads were blocked by lorries and overturned vehicles. Our overseas buyers managed a little better, not sure how they got there but they came in great numbers. Japanese, Americans and Italians braved the arctic like conditions to snap up the bargains. the UK pound being so low, obviously encouraged them to spend, spend, spend.

So now I'm back home in the warm, weary and streaming with a nasty cold but eager to start listing all of the wonderful new items I have rescued. I've put some lovely French fabrics into soak this morning and will spend this afternoon sorting out the lovely embellishments I bought.

I opened the RAG RESCUE WEBSITE last night and already have had orders from new customers. I will clear out all of the sold items hopefully today and start listing new items tomorrow starting with some lovely French and German scrapbags. I am aiming to work on a two week cycle for the next two months. I will list every day for a week followed by a listing rest week so I can get orders sorted and paperwork completed. As usual I will email all account customers at the beginning of the listing week with a sample photo of some of the new items for sale. If you wish to be added to my email list please let me know.

My new web manager is working away in Libya for a couple of weeks but on his return we hope to get all aspects of the site fully functional again. This means that at the moment I am still working manually so please bear with me if you see that your account invoices are not up to date.

If you are working towards entering the
EMBELLISHING WITH BEADS COMPETITION
don't forget that the closing date for entries is the
Tuesday the 10th February

Keep warm and enjoy the snow you may not see it in such quantities for another 18 years.