Meet the van Voorhees linchpins:
"Happy Birthday Alien Head" was purchased at Deseret Industries (a sort of Utah Goodwill) in the late 90s for one dollar--we were robbed, I say. Originally meant to hold "Alien Pops" it comes hollow and with
a lid--and even though he is stuffed on a shelf in the walk-in closet among the kids' swim suits and old junk mail, my husband's spirit would die a little if I sent it off into the jumble sale ether. Happy Birthday Alien Head currently holds letters and loose change."The Goodwill Map of Destiny" hangs in the ghetto at the top of the stairs. I bought it for $35 at Goodwill nearly eight years ago (and if you tabulate the Goodwill to Real Money conversion rate, you might argue that I really paid something like $200). It was covered in a thick layer of mud so of course I had to have it. My husband's been trying to off
load it ever since the day I hung it in our last house but I keep telling him that if it goes, I go. Various of my sisters have attempted to carry it off and I even had an impromptu offer for it when a stranger bought my couches off of Craigslist. E
verybody loves The Goodwill Map of Destiny--everybody but Mijneer van Voorhees.But the kitsch stays and we do too. What in your house rises to the level of armed neutrality?
**Thanks to Betty JoDee for sending along a truly hideous Dutch-girl lamp. (There's an untapped market here.) Question: Does knowing it's an oil lamp make you like it more or less? Bettys in the Northeast have had a terrible winter, you know. Oil light might come in handy...
Dr. van der Stevejinck loves his parent's old roll-top desk. It's not even a real antique - it's one of those 1970's reproductions. On the plus side it is real wood (oak) - on the minus side, it's oak. I wouldn't let him have it until he had his own office to put it in...no way was it going in the living room.
ReplyDeleteWe have a blue china pitcher shaped like a rooster. When you pour anything out of it, it looks like a blue rooster is spitting in your cup. However, this was a wedding gift from my MIL's best friend so we must keep it forever.
ReplyDeleteDanvers, my creamic duck flower pot that I keep knitting needles in. also the round table but that isn't kitch but Dr. Moose Steuve van der harr hates it.
ReplyDeleteI have had a *difficult* relationship with my sister (not quite a Veronica; more like Cruella deVille) but she will insist on giving me bizarre presents. These days they're items from antique shops, but she used to MAKE them. An ecru crochet reticule (yup, like from Jane Austen -- where & when did she imagine I'd feel it was appropriate to use?); a crocheted Granny Square poncho in tan, yellow & pumpkin orange. With fringe.
ReplyDeleteThat last one had to go -- hideous colors that wouldn't look good on anyone, but least of all me, and it's a poncho? That's worse than a turban, people! So I donated it to a friend's church rummage sale. And a week later, there was a photo in the local newspaper of the organizer (my friend's mother) holding up the poncho as an exemplar of what they had on offer. I'm pretty sure my sister never saw the photo, and anyway, in B&W, it wasn't obviously recognizable as the Great Pumpkin Poncho.
(I solved all my Cruella deVille problems a couple years ago by not sending them anything. Just stopped sending birthday cards, etc. No one ever asked why, and I've never heard from Cruella since.)
The most infamous piece of furniture in our family belongs to my sister (who promptly grabbed it at my father's death--an action that provided a much needed moment of hilarity in an otherwise heart-breaking time).
ReplyDeleteA few years earlier, my dad had bought at a yard sale, for reasons known only to himself, a homemade, paint-peeling three-foot high ceramic (or Plaster of Paris--who knows?) monkey eating a banana with a yellow book sitting flat on top of his head with the title, "How to Succeed in Business," thus making it a table of sorts.
It sits prominently as an end table in my sister's otherwise pristine and decorated in the most refined of tastes living room. Every time anyone one of us glances at it we smile. My mother still grimaces.
Everything but the "three foot high" makes perfect sense. That's one where you scratch your head and ask yourself why someone put the time and energy into a huge monkey...
ReplyDeleteI love that it makes everybody smile though. That's what Bluebells of Scotland lamps are for.
And "The Great Pumpkin Poncho"--I stand in continual awe at your abilities Magdalen. If you can't wear it--name it!
ReplyDelete