treasure...

(please click the picture to truly see the beauty and detail of this machine)

Found some years ago at an estate sale, after living for years in a chicken house...truly a chicken house with live chickens! What kind of life did this poor antique sewing machine have? But I am ahead of the story of finding this "treasure" ~ may I explain?

There was a time that I attended several estate sales each summer, I *love* attending these sales, the excitement of looking at the goodies offered for sale, hearing the auctioneer with his/her chant and the final word of "SOLD" and watching the delight of the winning bidder receive their items. I now use the term *love to attend* knowing that it has been a few years since I have attended an estate sale! Also attending with my son is so much fun...he enjoys it, I like that he enjoys it ;-)...you know the round robin of our being proud of our children and the joy we feel being with them (love you Mike)!

I found the antique treadle sewing machine at an estate sale, saw the potential of a *beauty* beyond seeing the layers of chicken dirt, chicken feathers and just plain old disgusting chicken droppings caked to this machine and cabinet. It didn't matter to me if it could be used to sew...but I knew it would be a treasure and I felt sadness that it led the life as a chicken roost obviously ignored and unloved, except by the chickens.

In all honesty I could not see any of the beautiful gold lettering or decos on the machine...it was soooooooo disgusting with the chicken crud that it was in the back row of the auction items...looking lonely and neglected. I waited and waited and finally the auctioner said "we have a sewing machine in a cabinet that can be removed and the wood used for something"...so I started the bidding at $5.00...thinking NO WAY WOULD I HAVE A CHANCE...someone else decided it would be nice, maybe a wooden cabinet for something, maybe even a different machine...because that machine was disgusting and should be tossed they bid $10.00 and again the bidding stalled off! Surely they knew that I was thinking they were WRONG ~ WRONG ~ WRONG, I purchased it for $15.00 dollars and PRAYED that my hubby would not flip when he saw the mess, and with confidence I trusted he would be able to do SOMETHING with it! He did do something with it...cleaned it beautifully, discovered all of the gold print and labeling intact...and attachments still in the drawers!! I only have it displayed at this point, but yes it does sew...the problem being needles are not able to be found for it...and personally I love my Janome (electric sewing machine) for pushing out fast projects! I do believe that at one time the pictured antique sewing machine was someone's very special machine, I am so proud of having it and the beautiful job my hubby did cleaning and restoring it ~ even if it is only for display in our home.