Buying and Soaking and Washing and Drying...

I've loved reading your comments about the collection of match box covers I found - thanks so much for all your suggestions and memories! I've now finished the washing, drying and ironing of my Vide Greniers linens, and have scheduled this post for my travelling day tomorrow (or today, or Wednesday, anyway...). So, what did I find? Two of those French stencilled rose plates you ladies were suggesting I collect... OK, I've started! A lovely enamel bowl (Chinese again) to balance the other one - same link as before...

This charming, although destoyed box, dating from 1876.

And a tangled heap of linens, including grubby collars sold 'as seen' by the descendant of their wearer.

Some are for adults and others for children.

It all came up very well after a 12-hour soak in Vanish!

But oh, still a tangled, cleaner mess once they came off the line...

But the iron did the trick!

This is a square cloth.

This is a long, oval-ended one.

I took the opportunity of soaking the doilies I'd condemned as no more than 'curious' the other day, and they came up brilliantly, too! Well done those who spotted their potential.

This Irish crochet came up sparkling white. It irons like cotton, but I'm not sure it is... could it be viscose, perhaps?

This one is marked and damaged (white paint, somehow!) but it's only chemical lace anyway, even though it's so pretty. So less valuable, in that it wasn't hand made like the rest.

And to cap it all, the last piece of ironing (one of my lovely big tablecloths) was straight back into the Vanish when the cut on my finger from a broken bowl re-opened. Is this how I'm repaid for being so very, very good about the laundry? Well, so it seems!
j

So, ash cloud allowing (and I think it will), I am leaving Ben and the boys behind in advance of a Bank Holiday weekend, and flying off to Edinburgh. My mum is not at all well, but we are very much looking forward to having some family time together. I don't know how much I'll post whilst there, but I hope to point my camera in the direction of her vintage sewing boxes at some point...