ARE YOUR COLLECTIONS GENUINE?

My Mother always had this notion that if anything was 50 or more years old, it was an antique. She therefore thought that anything that she owned that was over 50 years old was valuable. She never had ventured into the world of collectibles and antiques, so she never knew if the piece were valuable or genuine. She died without ever experiencing the wonder of the internet world and the expanse of resources available to anyone. But the resources for checking to see if your collection or your heirloom piece is genuine and valuable are numerous. One of the sites that I just recently visited was Auction Funk. Very interesting and very helpful. They have a blog that I would recommend you visit and see if it can be helpful to you. The address for the blog is: http://auctionfunk.blogspot.com . This site is a way you can discover unexpected treasures and shed light on the collectible value of seemingly common and everyday items. So, before you throw anything away, visit Auction Funk.

Although my Mother never knew much about COLLECTIONS, she knew a lot about COLLECTING. In fairness to her, she did have one great legitimate collection--a large
collection of salt and pepper shakers. She displayed them in a glass sided etagere and would enchant anyone who would listen with the stories about each pair.......where and when she got them, what the occasion was and from whom she got them. But the majority of "stuff" that she had in drawers, shelves, and on counters was the result of her collecting (read... saving) things that she could not throw away. I must have received that gene as well, as I also have "stuff" that I have carried with me from high school, college, first marriage and on and on and on. I even have some of my Mother's "stuff" that is now my "stuff". One of the things that she always saved were all of the cards she received, birthday cards, anniversary cards and Christmas cards. I just found a box that had many of hers and now many of mine.

With Valentines Day fast approaching, I think that I might recycle some of the cards I have from that holiday and share my "stuff" with others. An article that I found about vintage Valentines was written by a writer with About.com, which is also an excellent site for finding information about your interests. Go to www.about.com and click the link for Your Guide to Antiques and find the February 3, 2006 article titled Remembering Romance. Be sure to share valentines with all you love.

Keep saving, stashing and collecting. Keep looking through what you have already and make decisions about what you want to do with them. I will keep looking for websites, articles, and resources about collections and share some of the best with you. I will also be sharing some of my collections of ideas and thoughts. I would love to have you do the same. Let's start collecting posts from each other.

Missy Carol Ann