When in doubt...

This is one of my favorite vintage pieces that now, happily lives in my kitchen. This originally belonged to my sweet grandma Armetta. She was truly what you would expect a grandmother to be and I just adored her. I have so many fond memories of wonderful days spent together with she and my grandpa Armetta and our entire family together at their little Craftsman bungalow on Brooks Ave. in charming Willow Glen, California in the 1950's and 60's.

They lived such a simple life where each day was about doing the tasks' needed to help them put food on the table. This included grinding their own meats from "Lucky's" the local neighborhood market, canning the plums from the tree in their backyard to rolling out fresh, homemade dough for grandma's chocolate cream pie we'd have after grandpa's dinner; Sherry baked chicken, mashed "spuds" and salad from the garden every Sunday afternoon.

And if you were part of the Armetta family; you'd better have a pretty darn good excuse as to why you weren't at that little bungalow on Brooks Ave. every Sunday for dinner! Short of being hit by a bus or a meteor, you were there! 

It is, to this day one of my fondest memories of life as a baby boomer during such an innocent time...Sunday dinner at grandma and grandpa's. That and hearing the train whistle blow from the open sash window on warm summer evenings when I spent the night under grandma's pink Chenille bed spread so many years ago...

One of the items I was lucky enough to have received was "the old meat grinder" when my grandma was called to make her journey to heaven. Though Mr. La Bella Vie and I are not big meat eaters and we are definitely NOT into grinding it, I was blessed to have become its new caretaker, patina and all!

So as my motto states in my intro..."When in doubt, make a lamp out of it"

Or when in doubt, remember your past and remember who you are in the world...

Not the best photo of my grandma's kitchen on Brooks Ave, but I have this framed in a huge shadow box and it is impossible to disassemble, I am blessed to have many of the things you see in this kitchen including the big, oval enamel basin...

Linking up with Kaitlin at
 CSI Project.
for their Linky party...go on over and sneak a peak at their darling blog!