It's Christmas!

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas & a Happy and Peaceful New Year

Milly and Dottie x

Festive Finds

A selection of recently added vintage goodies on the Grotto shelves. http://www.millyanddottie.com/userimages/procart2.htm

Keep warm!

Bah Humbug ....

Perfect for Christmas - 1940s recipe for humbugs. Let us know if you make them.

Of course you might be too busy stirring up the Christmas puds to be rolling out the humbugs like tiny roly-polys but they sound like fun.

If you are stuck for gift ideas for the festivities, the Emporium shelves are full with treasure and the Grotto is groaning under the  weight of vintage festive goodies.  Bah humbug indeed!

Milly & Dottie's Bumper Book Bonanza

Hello!

There's nothing better than cosying up beside the fire with a jolly good book to read and we are very pleased to announce that there is a veritable feast of favourite reads in our Library at the moment.

Julian, Dick, George, Anne and Timmy, aka The Famous Five, are solving mysteries galore.  It's a case of jolly hockey sticks at our favourite boarding schools, St Clare's and Malory Towers, the perfect opportunity to grab a slice of fruit cake and the odd ginger beer or two from your tuck box whilst catching up on all the antics.  Hop, Skip and Jump are in Toadstool Town too.  We really do think Enid Blyton would be proud of our vintage bookshelves!

We have also been lucky enough to add some wonderful gardening books, King Penguins and a beautiful Ernest Nister "The Language of Flowers" book.   These all sit alongside our old favourites, Milly Molly Mandy, Margaret Tarrant, Dr Dolittle and Peter Pan.   There really is something for everyone.  The perfect gift.

We would also like to say a big 'thank you' to all our customers who have visited our Christmas Grotto recently,  Santa's helpers have certainly been very busy with the brown paper and string.  We are always adding new items to the Grotto so do pop along and see what's new.  There are some lovely books in here too and all sorts of interesting and unusual vintage gift ideas.

If you are thinking of getting ahead of things, then you will find lots of lovely gifts throughout the Emporium from tins to prints, posters to cuddly toys, sewing notions to kitchenalia.

We do look forward to seeing you soon.

Milly and Dottie


http://www.millyanddottie.com/

Teatime Treats

 The Scullery

Sunday afternoon, is the perfect excuse to indulge in a spot of afternoon tea.

Nothing beats a cup of tea in a vintage cup and saucer - 1940s Utility ware if possible...

 Whilst our love of custard creams is well known, on cold, wet Autumnal afternoons there's nothing better than a warm pud of two...

And maybe some help from The Ministry of Food...

http://www.britishpathe.com/video/thought-for-food-ministry-of-food/query/ministry+food

Rambles, brambles, posies and roses

Hello

Fancy a jolly?  There's nothing better than a ramble through the brambles, a hike through the hedgerows and a meander through the meadows.  Summer frocks, sunhats and a pair of plimsolls and we're off.  A bottle or two of ginger beer, a slice or three of homemade cake to keep us going and some sunshine to keep us smiling...

If buttercups and butterflies, birds and bees and strolls along the riverbanks or Devon countryside take your fancy, just pop along to the Emporium where we have a wonderful assortment of goodies to tempt you.  Gorgeous books in the Library, vintage framed prints in the Attic, posies waiting in the Box Room, deligthful posters in the Dovecote and Attic , pitchers and jugs in the Scullery and, if you need a bit of a spruce up after all that walking, a lovely washing set in the Nursery.

See you soon

Milly and Dottie

Milly & Dottie's Summer Selction

New items added to the shelves. 

Now we are 3 !!

 Today Milly and Dottie will be cracking open a bottle of their finest Elderflower Fizz, dishing out lashings of vanilla ice cream and strawberries and maybe the odd custard cream or two.. to celebrate their 3 rd Birthday. 

We would love you to join us in our celebrations .. so please put on your prettiest floral frocks and straw bonnets for the occasion.

Say "Hello" to Summer

Picnics In The Park

Time to find the red watering can

Make dandelion chains and tell the time with the seed heads

Feed the birds in your matching summer frock and hat

 Pick some homegrown vegetables for supper

The sun shining enough to tell the time

Enjoy the return of the Swallows

Summer has arrived! 

(posters from a variety in The Dovecote

1940s Rainy Day Treats

 Bakelite Beehives

Gloves From Dusters

Treacle Toffee Carrots & Camiknickers

101 Things for Girls to Do on a rainy day or two...

Like Cats & Dogs

Meet Rags, Tatters, Bill and Mittens.

Two Fox Terriers, an Airedale and a tabby kitten, all on our Library shelves now!

Rainy Day Sunshine

Well, with the weather gauge permanently stuck on "Wind & Rain" at the moment we could be forgiven for indulging in a spot of weekend whimsy.  After a week of soggy bunting, broken brollies and windswept gardens, you could forgive Dicky for being a trifle cross about not being able to go out and play.  

To cheer ourselves up in the Emporium we have been adding a few bits and bobs to the shelves, Gladys and Eric have taken up residence in the Nursery.  These two beautiful vintage teddies are just the right sort of distraction on a rainy day. 

New items have been added to the Boudoir and tins to the Boxroom, prints and embroidery to the Attic and in the Library a wonderful 1950s book of hobbies if your ideas are running low as well as a delightful 1940s children's book, "Our Friends in The Country."  There is also a delightful 1920s Alphabet of Winter Soirts which is both charming and humorous and very much of its time.

If you fancy making and mending, our Sewing Room is full to the brim with 1940s sewing projects and tips.  Thrifty gift ideas from kettle holders to pin cushions, rattles to calendars, tablecloths to dress jackets, pinafores to drawstring bags, all of which are typically 1940s in style and design and very economical to make too.

In The Scullery there is a wonderful 1950s pegbag, cheerful china and a wobble of jelly moulds to brighten your day.

With best wishes for a sunny, dry and enjoyable weekend

Milly and Dottie

Fit For A Queen

Enjoy the weekend!

Mend & Make Do To Save Buying New

We have added oodles of 1940s sewing ephemera to the Sewing Room Shelves.  Post War and Wartime rations and scarcity of materials, brought out the resourcefulness and necessity was certainly the mother of invention.
With Make Do & Mend tips for turning trousers into skirts, patching worn items, sewing hankies into cushions, scraps for bags, how to crochet jewellery and many many thrifty gift ideas, the projects and advice seem as useful today as they were then.
Whilst many of the projects , eg embroidering covers for ration books, are thankfully no longer relevant, they are still fascinating and collectiable, offering a rare insight into the Make Do & Mend ethos of the time.
There's still no denying that there is nothing more satisfying than delving into your bag of scraps and transforming that nothing into something.

(We also have lots more magazines in the Stockroom which have not yet been added, please contact us if there is a particular edition you are seeking.)

May Blossom

Our May bouquet - a selection of new goodies on our shelves.

Maytime

We can but dream and keep our fingers crossed that the view from the window will change from one of grey skies and rainclouds to sunshine, barefeet, blue skies and fun. (Poster is one of a selection we have over in The Emporium)

Happy Easter

Days like these

A picking daisies, red shoes & riboons kind of day. Hope you've had one too.

What's Mummy Doing?

75 years ago today, would we be reading this?



Sewing this?



Loving or hating this?



Buying this?




Winter-proofing with this?



And find time to look as lovely as this?