It all started when I cleaned my cupboard....

As a newlywed of two years my husband and I moved into an old farmhouse on our first farm in 1968. The house was an old 1905 one bedroom down and two up (in the eves of the roof with slanted ceiling). It had been moved there from down the road in the '30's by rolling it on big cedar logs. The logs remained under the house as part of the "foundation". The attached bathroom and back porch had been added sometime later...so there was indoor plumbing too! This was the ultimate starter house and we loved it!

The kitchen had floor to ceiling cabinets with beadboard doors, a scrubbed wood counter and huge cast iron sink. I needed a tall utility stool to reach the top shelf of the cabinets. Moving into the house I tackled the cupboards, scrubbing and relining all the shelves. In the far back corner of the top shelf (where I could barely reach) had been left behind two jars of homemade pickles and a glass bowl. Those pickles and bowl started me on two new journeys.....canning and collecting.

The canning came easily to me. My Mom had canned for years during my childhood, filling up shelf after shelf with jars of fruits and vegetables from our garden. I just dialed Mom and got all the help I needed, but it took years to finally duplicate the awesome dill pickles I found in that kitchen. They had a hint of licorice in them and I tried many recipes before I discovered it was anise that created that unique taste.

Now...the collecting took a bit longer. The bowl (which I learned many years later was Iris and Herringbone pattern depression glass) to me was just a really pretty bowl that always held my fruit salad for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners. One day I was shopping with friends and saw the same bowl in an antique shop. Once I knew there was more of the same pattern out there the hunt was on! This is what started my antique hunting passion.......and the rest is history. I owe it all to the day I cleaned out my cupboard.