Filling up the wall behind our mid-century bar

Well, I didn't find any other good mid-century things in New Orleans after my last post from the city, but I did have a great time there. (At least from what I remember).

Now that I'm back home, I'm catching up on stuff like laundry, etc.  After a run to the dry cleaners and gas station today, I hit my local thrift/consignment store and picked up this paint by numbers Parrot.

It's in nice shape and came at a reasonable price.

I also visited a nearby antique store that's usually pretty sadly stocked, but in one shop I spotted my holy grail.  Playing it cool, I asked the price and that required a phone call to the owner, who said it's "Not for Sale!"

I know that drives us all nuts, doesn't it?  Why display something in an antique store if it's not for sale?

So what was it?


A HUGE honking shadowbox - curio shelf like this one (The pictured shadowbox belongs to froggyboggler, on Flickr, and can be found in my Mid Century Shadow Box group).  The one I saw also has two lamps behind the planters.  It's the first gaudy one like this that I've seen in our area.

I left my business card and an offer for it, so maybe I'll get a call back.


In the meantime, I've put up some black iron shelves and this metal shadowbox near the bar.  The Elvis bust, Shriner nodder, and Fezmingo (thanks Amber!) seem more at home by the bar, and she who must be obeyed is a lot happier that these guys are no longer in the living room.

I've also added some records to the wall,

and my Infinity Mirror.

It's straight out of the 1970s and not what I usually collect, but it's just too cool not to display.  I posted a pic of this on the Uncle Atom Facebook page recently, and there you can also see the original box this came in.

So, the search continues for a shadowbox to hang behind our bar in the basement.

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If you haven't entered my giveaway yet, time's a wastin' - The contest closes on Feb. 3.  You can find details at the giveaway link.

A few recent finds; a road trip to Hershey, and more

Man am I behind with my blog posts!  Yes, the Uncle has been busy, but that's a lame excuse, so let me try to catch you up a little.

I enjoyed my work-related trip to LA last month, but I had no rental car and very little free time during the day.  I did manage to visit one cool architectural salvage store - Olde Good Things - within walking distance of the LA Convention Center.  Some great old big heavy stuff there, from sculptures to furniture to weird stuff, and sadly I didn't have my good camera with me.  All I bought were a consonant and a vowel which I used to finish spelling out my daughter's name on her bedroom wall.  But, I learned they have a 100,000 square foot salvage warehouse near Wilkes Barre, PA, so I may be road-tripping up there for a visit some day.

Our group did get out our last night there - I persuaded the guys to attend the Lebowski Fest at the Cal Bowl bowling center.  Lots of great people there in costumes relating to one of my favorite movies, the Big Lebowski.  Unfortunately, I forgot my camera and my iPhone battery charger, so all I got was this one crappy photo.  If you're interested in the Lebowski costumes, just search for Lebowski Fest and you'll find tons.

Uncle Atom is in the back wearing an atomic bowling shirt and holding a bowling pin mug full o' white russian.  Mmm, mmm!  We had a blast but had to cut things short after bowling just two games because we all had early flights home the next day.

In my last post on the two new metal lawn chairs I'm restoring, I mentioned I would be posting about a road trip to pick up an oven.  Sorry I still don't have the pics to do that post, so please be patient.

However, I did make my annual pilgrimage to Hershey, PA, for the annual Antique Automobile Club of America Fall swap meet and show.

 I shot - photos of lots of great cars for sale and some really beautiful cars in the Saturday-only show field.  A couple of my favorites were a pair of Chrysler-produced station wagons, including this sweet 1961 with a rear-facing third seat in the back and lots of goodies inside.  Here are a few shots of other car interiors - hang with me, these are cool!

It's a shame that car companies don't give us beautiful interiors any more, but thankfully there are some old beauties that have been preserved for us to ooooh and ahhhh at!

No one would ever use this infant's car seat/launch pad today, but isn't it cool that someone preserved this?  It even matches the interior!

 Here's a link to the rest of my Hershey pics.

I thought I should also do an update on some recent finds, so here we go:

Tiki mug - my collection is doing well, I'm up to 7 different tiki mugs now.

Pair of starburst juice glasses - these are etched, I wish I had found more than two!

A set of eight "old fashioned" glasses @ 50 cents each!

They fit perfectly in our rolling bar - now I need to find three matching shot glasses to fill in the open spaces in the bar.  Yup, I know I haven't shown you all that bar yet.  I'll make that a future post.

Finally, here's a sampling of some great LPs I've found recently - love the cover art on old LPs.  You can pick these up for a song - haha - and they look great hanging on the wall.

I"ve been looking for this Green Hornet / Al Hirt album cover forever, and I scored this cheap even though there were a handful of big LP buyers hovering all over the flea market that day.

Well, that's all for now, have a good week!

Bar stools? Yea, we've got bar stools

I'm off work today and Friday.  Today I was a good boy - I built a small footbridge out back to go over the small dry stream that more often than not this spring has been a wet stream. (Yes, that's a yard full of clover instead of grass.  I still have to mow it.  As I've said before, the big backyard is a long term work in progress. At least now we have this fine footbridge!)

I still need to dig down and level it on top of the cement blocks in the photo, and then stain the treated wood. I used some pretty weathered 2x4s for the top so they need some stain.

Anyway, I was planning to make my annual pilgrimage to the Spring Carlisle (Pa.) old car flea market and car corral.  I usually go with one or more of my car club friends, but this year the weather and various family obligations made it impossible for any of us to get there on the same day.  My plan was to go Friday by myself, but here's what happened:

First, I filled up the car with gas - $65 !  When you add up the round trip miles, and consider the entrance fee ($10) and the fact that I would not be hanging with my buds, I started to have second thoughts.

Next I went to the ATM to get cash for the trip.  No problem there, and it's right next door to a Thrift Shop I sometimes go to but almost never find anything. So I dropped in.

And found this stuff!

Turquoise iron - $6. Sold.  Now SWMBO will be able to iron while we're camping.

Not something I would ever do, but she would. And that's OK.  Really.

Our Shasta, a 1962 model, was originally equipped with this pull out accessory in the kitchen, which can double as a light cutting board and a small ironing board.

Next item - another small electric fan.

Did I need another fan?  No.  This is number five or six in the collection.  But it was only $5, and it runs very quietly - how could I pass it up?

And lastly my best score.  These three bar stools - $36 for the set!

I really like the red, white, and black vinyl combination.  No nicks, cuts, or significant wear.  They swivel, and they have backs.  The red, black, and white scheme goes pretty well with the bar, don't you think?  Now I'm thinking I may come up with some kind of playing card theme for the bar area.  I may end up relocating the lunchbox shelf.  I'll have to think about that.

So scoring this stuff for about $50 made me decide to skip Carlisle on Friday.  I'm not looking for any car parts for the cars I have.

However, there is this big shindig at one of my favorite antique malls in Pennsylvania on Saturday.  The Old Sled Works is celebrating their 20th anniversary in business as an antique mall.  For year it was a factory making the old metal runner wooden sleds, and there is still some memorabilia on display, but there's a lot more too, including a great collection of pinball machines and old arcade games, and an old fashioned soda fountain.

So I thinking I'll  use that tank of gas to drive up to Duncannon, Pa.  At least I won't have to pay a $10 entry fee.  And I usually score at least a couple of good deals at the Sled Factory.  We'll see what happens.  Stay tuned.

My stools now have a bar to hang out with!

I picked up these two wrought iron legged bar stools off craigslist about 3 years ago, and I've been searching for a bar to match them up with.  This afternoon I was doing a casual craigslist search while I was waiting for the NFL playoff game to start, and I stumbled across a 1960s bar with hairpin legs only a few miles from me.  Within an hour I had it safely in here the Uncle Atom crib.

Here's the bar and stools together, like long lost cousins.

I'm going to finally get motivated to clean and paint the worn legs on these stools and clean the vinyl seats.

The white formica top with gold specks is in nice shape.

Heck, the whole bar is nice.  The ends of the brass footrest look like they should have caps which aren't there, but other than that, and reeking of stale tobacco, the bar is great!

There are a couple of hinged brass finger pulls on the doors.

The seller said he was settling his brother's estate and that's why he was selling.  He said his brother bought the bar new in the late sixties.

 I'm going to shine it up a little and leave it alone for now, but I am tempted to give the front of the bar this kind of treatment and recover the stools to match.

The only thing is, the front wood on the bar is paneling, with grooves, and I'm not so sure it would look right to add the vinyl padded cutouts.  I don't know - what do you all think?