Now that the move is over and the boxes put away it is time to try to make a house a home. I have been feeling better and slowly trying to figure out where everything goes. Some things are finally taking shape and others are still in a stage of ” When we get time”. One of my favorite projects every time we move is how and where to display some of the wonderful things that we have collected over the 27 years that Tom and I have known each other.
Over the first 18 years of my marriage, Tom and I raised horses on his parents farm. We breed, trained, showed American Quarter horses. We raised our older son on farm work and feeding animals. It was a good life, but by the second baby ( 17 years later) it was just more work them I could handle alone. I was the main care taker of the farm and our 9 horses 12 chickens 3 dogs 2 geese and one cat. I just did not enjoy the work any more and Tom just could not be home to help due to his long hours at work and weekend business. So as time passed we sold off all of the horses gave the chickens away and said good-bye to the farm. So as a tribute to my husbands love of horses and his farrier (blacksmith) business I took what most people hide away in tact boxes and Rubber Maid Totes and made him a hall of good memories. The hall grew out of things that we had collected over the 18 years we had the farm and horses. He loves it and so does Cody. Cody has many great memories on the farm and was happy to see that we had not gotten rid of everything when we moved.
I was lucky that I had saved my son Cody’s pony blanket, it worked out as a nice backdrop for our trophies. I also added the spurs that my father made back in the Seventy’s. He was a welder and loved the old west and loved to make things. So the result is a pair of wire edged dragon spurs. I don’t think anyone ever used them on a horse but they sure look nice. The photos are of some of our wonderful babies. Tom and I always loved to work with the young ones and we won a few shows with them.
I also wanted to show off some of his horse shoes and a bandanna that I made him for when he worked in bad weather. I added an old feed sack and a wonderful photo of Tom working on an anvil and farrier school. The bits are ones we have used over the years and make us think of the mares we rode with them. All these things remind me of some of the best times in our married life and I am glad I could make it for him.
Then I moved into the kitchen and tried to find a reasonable way to display my collection. I guess we all have funny things we collect and mine is dishes and /or plates. I started my collection in the 80’s while traveling and it just continues to grow every year. I have plates from all the places I have visited in Europe and the US. Some are fine china and others are pewter or stone ware but all of them have some kind of connection to a time or place that Tom and I have shared over the years. I am sure many of you have collections of souvenirs, my father had stones from many of the places he went and when he passed he had a large “rock collection”. A friend collects shot glasses from her travels and some collect spoons, or decks of cards. Some times the items in our collections help us remember a place better and sometimes a great story to go along with the item.
What do you collect? What kind of memories do they hold for you or are they just for the fun of collecting. How did your collection start. As I said above mine started as a way to remember some of the places I have traveled and grew from that. Let me know that I am not alone in having way to much stuff and not enough room to share it all!
I also want to thank Holly over at Redterrain for the idea of talking about objects we love and why we love them. She has a wonderful Photography blog of her home in Australia and she wanted to know if her readers had some object that we have a deep connection to… and as you can see I just wanted to show her my Plate collection. I love them and they are one of the few things in the this world I would miss if I had to give them up.
Mountain Mama Reads and Writes 
I began collecting things early on. It was encouraged by my Dad, who had a neat coin collection. When I was young, I began with a keychain and mug collection and moved on to collect stamps and then coins. The mug collection was bulky and with every move, from college forward, I would slowly chip away at that collection until now, I only have one original mug, it has all of the GHS class of ’94’s names on it. At a garage sale, 6 years later, I met a little girl who also collected keychains…so I gave her my collection. I lost half of my stamp collection in a move, but it wasn’t much anyways. And after this last move, I can’t for the life of me find what remained of my pillaged through coin collection (my kids and their sticky fingers!)…
But, like your Dad, I find the most enjoyable thing to collect, are rocks. They seem to hold the full memory better, and I have rocks from back in my school days to many various occasions with my boys, including special fossils they gave me as gifts while on swims and hikes at a lake in central Texas. I can hold the rock and be right back in that place and time in my life…besides, there is never a duplicate.
Since moving to the farm, I’ve also taken to collecting dried butterflies and dragonflies. I pin them into arrangements of chicken feathers, and dried flora. You are by far, not alone in your collectivity. My aunt collects everything Elvis, my uncle, everything Beatles…my Mom, everything Coca Cola, my son & father-in-law, knives, my sister collects stuffed animals, that one kind of disturbs me from time to time, being that she’s a full grown woman…and my youngest son has a growing coin collection…wish he’d clue me in on where mine went! He gets kind of shifty when I talk about it! 😉
Thanks for sharing your valuables with us! I hope they bring comfort to you as you continue to settle into your new home.
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I used to have a rock collection as a boy too. Now while hunting and fishing I look for and save stone points and tools from the Indians/Natives who preceded me. I also pick up bits of old English clay pipes and recently even a Roman coin dated 317. I figure it was lost in colonial times along the shore a stonesthrow from where the Pilgrims started out. On a less historical note -we get mugs from places we visit and just use them instead of putting on display
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What a great way to keep memories alive and part of your life. I have a display of some of the tools my father passed along to me, on one wall of my workshop. I walk in there and I think of him.
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Where do I begin. We collect various types of glassware, old kitchen utensils, old tools.. our rock collection includes a rock from each state we visited on vacations—from Ohio to Florida to Alaska, most new England states and California. We used all of them when we built the hearth for our fireplace. We have a constant reminder of the fun times including making space in our luggage for rocks when flying
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Sandy that is the greatest story about rocks I have ever heard.Did you know when you flying home with rock in your suite case you were going to build a fire place or did that idea come later? love it!
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It was part of our plan. Harold made a diagram of where very rock came from and where it was placed, knowing we would forget some of them over time. It’s been nearly 25 years and we are glad he did that. Now all we have to do is remember where the diagram is.
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I love your wall of plates! It’s beautiful… Thanks for sharing your collection with us! 🙂 Also agree Sandy’s flying rocks is a pretty cool idea. Great post Jolynn!
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Hi Jolynn! You have such a wonderful blog! I’m a producer on a show called “Barnwood Builders” and I’d love to chat with you about our show. (I believe another producer sent you a message on Facebook, but it went to your “other” folder.) Looking forward to hearing from you!
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Katie I would love to hear from you and see what it is that I can do for you and the show, if any thing that is.I was just taking some more photos of the next family work shop project… too funny! I will check my Facebook page also. You can reach me at my e-mail address also jolynnpowers@yahoo.com. cant wait to talk with you!
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