It’s a fluffy cat that sits asleep in a basket and for some reason it freaks out my 14 year old nephew just as one like it used to freak me out at my Grandmother’s house. Why, I don’t know. It is not a real cat. It is even asleep, or seems to be. It is too small to be a real cat. It never moves, not one eye ever slits open as cats will usually do (when real).

My Grandmother had a cat like this. It was also curled up in a basket, had real fur but her cat was awake. I was always spooked out by that. Yet now I wish I knew where it was. I could have the two cats together. One awake the other asleep. Guardians of the house. No mice or teenagers would dare to mess with us then!

Does anyone know if this is a type of toy or knickknack? Do they go by some kind of name which I could search for and find others of their kind? Or maybe, as my nephew says, they are in fact aliens from another planet just disguised as toy cats to keep us all from getting suspicious.

Typically, you grab the knob, turn it to open the door and step inside. How many doorknobs have you had in your hand and not really noticed them at all?  I like the unique, decadent doorknobs made of crystal, glass and metals. I've seen especially nice brass doorknobs in Creemore, Ontario.

If you look for antique or vintage doorknobs online you will find yourself pulling up a lot of salvage sites. As an explorer of old and abandoned homes I'm not quite happy about salvage companies/ people who basically find old houses so they can rob them and then sell their stolen good for a lot of money. While I may cross the line and fall into trespassing on property to get photos, I don't harvest, remove or take away anything from inside the house. I usually don't even go inside of them at all. "Take only photos; leave only footsteps" is the basic rule for urban and rural explorers.

There are a lot of places that sell salvaged hardware from old houses. I don't think you can ever know if they come by the hardware legitimately or not. It's a shame because the old doorknobs are so glamorous and decadent, very hard to resist. Some modern hardware is designed to replicate the old. This seems a better option to me. Or, there are artists who work with glass, brass and other materials. I'm sure you could commission a truly unique, glamorous and decadent doorknob. It may not be old but it could be even better, designed to your own style.

Flickr: Glass Doorknobs

Flickr: Doorknobs and Doorhandles

Flickr: Knobs and Handles

The rocking horse I remember from when we were kids was not the typical vintage, wooden horse. Ours was plastic, set on a frame with four big springs holding it to the frame and giving it all the bounce it needed. I can remember the sound the springs made as it bounced and rocked back and forth and side to side, once you really got going.

I didn't find anyone collecting that plastic rocking horse. Maybe there is a line between what is vintage and what is antique and some things (like rocking horses) don't become valued until they are old enough to be antiques. Kind of a shame. Now that I've got thinking about the rocking horse I miss the sound of those squeaking springs as they stretched back and forth. Then the hollow sound the plastic horse made when the littler kids were on it, their legs flopping around while we kept them from flying off.

Flickr: Rock a Bye Baby -- Rocking Horses

Rockimals: History of the Rocking Horse

Rocking Horse and Art Design Holland -- Includes pages with vintage and antique rocking and carousel horses. (Note: Spams with pop up windows).

Rocking Horse Maker (UK): Makes and restores rocking horses.

Jane Hooker Rocking Horses: Restores vintage rocking horses, based in the UK.

Lexi's Rocking Horses: Personal blog from a restorer and collector. No recent updates.

The Guild of Rocking Horse Makers

A very modern rocking horse from the Boing Boing site.

I remember luggage from the old movies. Big trunks, body size standing up and deep enough for a couple of bodies. Inside were drawers and a full closet with a mirror.

When I started planning for my first big trip as a kid I wanted one of those. My Mother and I went shopping for my first luggage (of my own!)  I was looking for one of those big trunks. Even though I had no idea how I would cart that trunk around on my own, I was already having the adventure of  planning everything I would pack into it!

I didn't find a big trunk. But I wasn't disappointed. I got a new suitcase, vintage 1970's, blue, with tiny wheels. Mine was pretty plain and practical, none of those handles that extend out, no extra pockets on the outside to stash secret treasures or books to read. It's long gone now. On some kind of trip of it's own I guess.

Later, I wanted a suitcase like my Grandmother's. It was plain brown with a broken handle. It's only real charm were stickers from all kinds of places. I don't know if she had been to all of them herself or if some came from other family and she kept adding to them that way. I do know that she came from Ireland as a young woman and went out to BC as a married women with her husband and children. After that she moved back to Ontario again, when I was already born or at least heading that way.

We went on family trips, sometimes my Grandmother took trips with us. I never noticed her getting stickers for that suitcase then, but I was just a kid. There was a lot I didn't notice and a lot I did notice. We were in dozens of US states up and down starting from Ontario and ending up back there eventually. We took drives out to BC in a big, huge camper which we delivered to Red Deer, Alberta and then took the train the rest of the way. She may have added more stickers to that suitcase all along the way.

She's been gone awhile now. I don't know where the suitcase is. I never would have dared to go looking through her things, it just wasn't something I would have felt right to do and I know she liked to have her things left alone. I don't have any truly firm beliefs about what happens after we die. But, if we get to choose I think my Grandma would be keeping up with what we are doing and yet, I hope, she takes a few road trips too. Pack up her suitcase with the essentials and enjoy her sense of adventure forever.

Flickr: Vintage Luggage

Go Nomad: Travel Chic: How to Refurbish Vintage Luggage

The Queen of Re: Vintage Luggage as a sculpture.

If you ask yourself why you actually like coffee do you have a reason? Sometimes I think it isn't the coffee that I really like so much as the social side of coffee drinking and coffee making. Starting with the beans and how you grind them, then to the type of coffee maker or the process you use to make coffee and then ending with the classic: cream, milk, sugar, sweetener...?  Even the way you serve the coffee, do you prefer a mug or do you use something fancier like a teacup?

Where do you drink your coffee? Typically, I drink my coffee alone in a crowd of people who don't know me. I like it that way. Sometimes I make coffee at home when I work in front of the computer. I also feel alone and yet in a crowd of people there too. Coffee is a part of going out. How many times are you out somewhere and end up going out for a coffee? You could just come home and make it yourself. But, there is something kind of special about being out for coffee. Something kind of grown up, cosmopolitan, elegant and sophisticated about sitting with a coffee in a cafe or even over lunch.

I have a small collection of coffee makers. The process of making coffee is as interesting and sometimes elegant too. My favourite is the Bodum French Press, for practical reasons. With the press I don't need coffee filters, just the beans themselves, to make a cup of coffee. I can take the press with me and make coffee any where that I can boil water. It is very handy when I go babysitting for the weekend at my sister's house.  My French Press pot is a bit small though. Fine for a regular sized mug. But, when I'm at home working on the computer I like a big, deep mug of coffee. A mug so huge as to appear bottomless, as close to it as any mug could ever be. So, for making coffee at those times, I use a portable cone filter which I hold over the mug, pouring the boiling water over the beans. I doubt this makes full use of the beans. They have less brewing time. So it seems a bit of a shame to make coffee this way. But, it does work.

I have an old percolator (Corning) which I picked up at the thrift store. It must have been used very seldom as it looks pristine. I have only used it a few times in th years I have had the pot. It is fun to hear the coffee brew in the percolator. You get more coffee smell this way too I have noticed. My other pot is a cone filter too but it comes with it's own pot, lid and scoop. The pot itself is glass but the rest of it is all my favourite shade of red. A Melitta pot which I bought when I was 16 and had my first apartment, living away from my family.

Flickr: Coffee Maker Museum

Flickr: The Coffee Machine Collector

Ning: The Vintage Coffee Maker

Jitterbuzz: Coffee Paraphernalia

Vintage Coffee Grinders

Talk About Coffee

A to Z Coffee Makers -- Reviews.

Coffee Sage -- Blog about coffee, beans and news.

Transcend Coffee -- Committed to fresh roasted beans.

Jim Seven -- James Hoffman's coffee blog.

Brewed Coffee -- For caffeine addicts only.

On Coffee Makers

Royal Coffee Maker -- When you want something really deluxe!