Thanks, Cebury. I am posting a link that will take anyone to the USDA agricultural university Cooperative Extension Services (CES) office. Simply find your state, find the ag colleges for printed info, or find the county within your state for contact information in your county. Here is a link that might be useful: CES Agents

When I was "oldifying" my previous house, a 1994 Cape, I shopped at Bradbury & Bradbury (bradbury.com) for wallpaper, Rejuvenation for lighting, vintagetub.com (FANTASTIC customer service) for plumbing fixtures, ebay for accessories, Horton Brasses for door pulls. Now we've bought an old house (1900 Eastlake Victorian, albeit stripped naked and modest to begin with) I'll be back to all those companies, and soon I'll be headed down to Architectural Salvage in Exeter NH for parts for our broken mortise locks (I may have to buy the whole lock and scavenge the parts we need; it would probably make more sense to replace the whole thing but I'm sentimental about the parts that have been there for 107 years). He's a little expensive though. In a few months I'll go up to Old House Parts in Kennebunk ME, and check out the rumors of a Habitat ReStore in Portland (Maine, that is). jfpegan.com (who also sells on eBay as jfpegan) sells restored antique and handmade repro lighting at good prices. I picked up two slightly battered pan chandeliers at a yard sale this last week (15 bucks for both!) and when I'm a little more flush I'll send them off there for repair and restoration, which they also do. I'm not sure if I've seen anyone mention Bathroom Machineries (deabath.com). Sort of a mediocre website but they have things no one else does. Sadly, where I live (SE NH) the Arts-and-Crafts-that's-not-Mission ;-) furniture I love most is a rare critter, at least on the lower budget end. I've heard the Skinner "Discovery" auctions in Bolton MA have cheaper, less-fancy things; it's about an hour and a half drive but I'd rather bring something wonderful home from that than something from Ikea, which is the same distance in a slightly different direction.

VCT = vinyl composite tile. AKA "schoolhouse tile". That swirly stuff most of us remember from schools and hospitals. Cheap, surprisingly attractive if you avoid the pea-soup green they always used in the schools ;-) and wicked durable. Tina, one of the few MCM things I've ever liked was the tree-slab tables, but the bases usually spoil them for me. (I keep telling Housevixen that I'll gladly take custody of that "tree table" her DH adores and she dislikes. So what if it's literally on the opposite edge of the continent? LOL) I'm sure you MCM fans would plotz at the handed-down stuff I've put out by the side of the road at the first opportunity I had for replacement. :-) I'll be honest, I just like things a bit fussier, I'm more William Morris than Gustav Stickley. I've actually drifted away from American Arts & Crafts furniture and a LONG way away from most Mission... it's mostly just too spare and angular, a bit too much Asian influence for my tastes (especially the Prairie School and the Greenes), while I've fallen in love with things like barley twists and "carved to death". :-) I've got a couple of nice Mission pieces I would love to get rid of if I weren't going to get completely screwed on the money end, but 10 cents on the dollar is just painful. I can appreciate the craftsmanship on the nicer MCM pieces, like say Nakashima, and I can see why other people like it, it's just not me, that's all. Robinco (BTW, is it Robin Co or Rob In Co? I can't remember) thank you so much for the compliments! I don't think I deserve them at all but I'll slurp them up anyway. :-) I've really only "publicized" the two good rooms, the bathroom (and for what we got screwed into spending, it dang well better be good) and the living room which is pretty good but still has two chairs I hate, and cheesy pine trim and mantel that I dream of replacing with oak like in the bath. Folks are wearing me down on those floral drapes that everyone hates but me, too, tired of hearing people b*tch about them just about every time I post a picture of the room! The color of the library was a mondo mistake and I can't get past the heinous melamine bookcases... but, they hold up the books, and even if we could do Ikea (which would be tricky) it would be close to $1500 for the ones I actually like or $700 for the bare minimum. DH gives me the hairy eyeball if I even mention repainting. Let's not even talk about the upstairs or the siding, either! :-)

Thanks for the ideas. Well I had JC Penney out here on Friday and we really went through the fabrics. I found fabrics that I like, but I don't know if they are going to give me the look I want. I like a very traditional, simple, warm look. We live in the country and I think I want dummy panels that won't block any of the view out the window. And I don't know that I want a busy pattern that will compete with the view. But I don't know what I would want to block out the sun from the east and west. Maybe I'll post some pics on another thread to get some ideas from the folks here.