Friday Show and Tell: June 2005 Archives

Today was to be a great day. I was to meet with this lovely lady and this lovely lady and this lovely lady and this lovely lady. However, I had to cancel those plans because the financial institute (of the buyers choice) finally arranged settlement of our real estate sale for the exact same time as our outing. However, 1 hour before the appointment the financial institute dropped the ball. Settlement was changed to tomorrow at 4pm. There was no way I could get the meeting place by the appointed meeting time. :-( How much does that suck? ******* I missed Blackbird's Show and Tell Friday. She wanted to see our handwriting. Here is mine. This is the beginning of the planning list for Steven's Birthday Party on Saturday afternoon. His entire family will be present.

Blackbird's Friday Show and Tell is to show something bad. That's it. Just something bad. So here is my version of bad. These are my bad-ass hollyhocks. Towering today at just over eight feet tall. They have made the path out to the gardens and koi pond a small jungle of stems, giant leaves and flowers.They are scattered in huge clumps and are blooming in shades of pink, red, yellow, purple, and orangey-peach. This is a close up of those same bad-ass hollyhocks starting to bloom. These are my bad-ass wild roses. They are climbing almost 15 feet. There is honey suckle in there too. The scent is very sweet and lightly perfumed in the late evening. This is the bad-ass koi pond beginning to bloom. The lotus plant is nearing 4 foot in diameter. This is my bad-ass 7 year old on her last day of school with her bad-ass long hair flowing in the breeze.

I am posting this today while I have time to work with the photos. Yes, I know I am one day early. Blackbird's show and tell for Friday (tomorrow) was chosen by her son. He wants to see our front door knobs. Since I have old fashioned door knobs that are original to my house I thought I would show several of the different ones. This is my front door knob. It is in the Sears, Roebuck catalog listed as the "Emerald Design Lock and Hardware". It is a colonial pattern that was very popular at the time the house was built, 1909. It came in bronze metal finished in copper, antique copper, bronze, antique bronze or plain black. depending on the choice of color in the lockset it was priced at $9.95 -$10.05. The knobs cost extra and ran between $5.60 - $5.70. This is what most of the door knobs in the upper and lower front halls, linen closets, bedroom closets and bathrooms look like. The locksets sold in the mail order building catalog for $1.78 per dozen or as much as $4.98 per dozen. They are "Ivory Black Steel Cases" and "Japanned Iron Cases". The keys came in nickle plated steel. The door knobs were extra and cost .93 cents per pair for the pocelain knobs. Three doors have these brown porcelain knobs, the two in my bedroom and the upstairs bathroom. This door needs work. You can see it is out of alignment. This is my cellar door lock. The locks are called a "rim door latch". The door knobs cost .10 cents - .18 cents. The set cost $2.11. The enterior of the cellar door is a simple matching knob. If someone came along and slid the latch you would be/can be/will be locked in with no way out. These are the keys, original to the house, that opens these locks. Amazingly all the locks work. This is not a door knob but it is a fun feature and I thought I would share it here. This is the doorbell on the front door. You ring the bell by turning the key. It has a tinny sound, not quite like an old bicycle bell but close and VERY loud. In my house there are a total of 16 doors complete with working lock sets, 1 pocket door with just the porcelain knobs and 2 back doors with modern locks and knobs. We have 2 doors in the attic that were taken down when the 4 closets were converts to bathrooms -2 linen/storage closets made into one room each for upstairs and downstairs bathrooms. There is a doorway between the living room and dining room that needs a door. For some reason it was taken down. We will be reinstalling it but we have to find 2 of the old door knobs to match.