Thanks, holiday-ers, for your kind comments (& funny ones, too!) LOL! ...yup, I guess "it" is a "boy" bunny...that pocket watch gave it away! LOL! I worked at "polishing" today...I like your fav solution, kathleen,... "that a friend would use to clean it for me! ...so wonderful that your Mom did that & that you inherited the silver. Well, I was afraid to do it...but I tried the "boiled water" theory on a couple pcs ... with the purchase the other day, I also got an old "tarnish remover plate" in a cardboard folder (probably from the 50's..."the fastest, easiest & most effective way to clean silver!" it says! HA! I boiled 3 big kettles of water, added the measured amts of Baking Soda & covered the pcs completely.... Sorry to say, all it did was SET OFF 3 OF THE SMOKE ALARMS here upstairs! So, back to the rag & polish...worked on 'em for 2 more hrs & said, ENOUGH! Here's pic: So, quite an improvement but will need more work! And, Jane, yes, it was fun to see more details...I'm glad you have this set, too. Some little pit marks on tray yet...will try to work on those later....much later! Yup, kathleen, "Frumps" is carrying what you think she is...LOL...that's why I thought it was a good gift for my sis turnin' 60! (& being such a GOOD nurse!) Thanks, everyone! 'appreciated! Jeanne S.

Reorganization mission: accomplished. Before I forget though I want to comment to ideefixe: I don't want to limit her reading by any means however, a lot of the junk is old old old and baby/toddler books. We jumped that hurdle first though by donating the baby books to friends and handing down the toddler books to her little brother/my son. She still has four shelves full of age appropriate books and she kept the books that were special to her like nursery rhyme books that are signed by grandparents etc. I did most of the reorganizing without her. She started helping and became overwhelmed and asked me to just do it for her. She has three decorative buckets that were full of 'stuff' I asked her to go to another room to sort through them and she can back with two empty buckets and one 1/2 full of what she wanted to keep. We went through her jewelry and threw away what didn't have a match or what was really old. We made a necklace hanger and hung up all of her necklaces and a bow hanger for all of her hair bows and moved ALL of her other hair accessories to a 'handmade' box As suggested by jlt above and put clippies and bands Into baggies so their easier to find. Took pictures of her most recent 'box' collection and she threw them away herself. I let her keep a box she had used to make a 'puppet' show stage but we found a place in her closet. I cleaned out he clothes of what she can't wear and organized them as I normally do. We didn't get rid of any stuffed animals, she organized them in a large tote in her closet and what appeared to be just a huge stack of junk wa a bunch of hand-me-down purses from grandma. We bought a tote to store all of the purses and she can get them out if she wants but the new rule is, they have to be put away when she is done. Organized her baby doll stuff and ended up with one large basket and one tote with a lid and I'm happy with that. Organized her game/movie collection on a freed up shelf on her book case and that made her tv stand look so much better. Her desk is cleaned off minus her lamp and laptop. Bought her a HUGE pencil box for her pens and pencils to keep on her desk. Got her a three drawer rolling cart for all of her art supplies and crafty stuff and threw away the boxes some of the stuff came in. It looks fabulous!! We hung up several of her art pieces and put all the others in an under the bed tote. Even got one for my son. She is Proud of her 'art collection' box. Thanks for all of the ideas. I was able to vacuum without Moving anything. The floor is cleaned up and everything is where is should be. She said she feels so much better and is so proud of her room. It's only day 1 so we'll see how long it lasts... But I think she is so proud it will stay organized for a while. I am a bit OCD ... And I don't want to push that off on her. As I do respect that she is very much an artist and understand that artists are cluttered and unorganized just not in their own minds. But I think everyone works better when they can see their desk... And surely they sleep better when they can find their bed...

So many people with issues with parents...sad. I was loved, I had toys and gifts,dresses, dolls, books, sport stuff, games,I lacked for nothing . But as I got older, I think I tried to "recapture" my childhood. As an adult, I loved antique shows, flea markets, garage sales. Any time I saw something we had in our house growing up, I had to buy it. I even bought too many rose bushes and planted them in my garden, trying to re-create my Grandma's rose garden. I now have a linen closet stacked with doilies and tablecloths I'll never use, sets of fancy glasses too fragile to use, things like that. Oh, and on the funny side, my daughter cleaned out my bathroom just yesterday. She found eleven bottles of Listerine. I don't know, I hate the stuff, it burns... I remember buying one bottle because it did everything, whitens teeth, freshens breath, makes gums healthy, strengthens the enamel. I'm just always looking for something to make me happy.

Not that many collections per say. Right now I have a lot of various glass items that I use to make my garden totems but they are not a collection they are parts to be used. I do have a small collection of really beautiful glass paper weights that have something in them, one is a square cube of Murano glass that looks like an aquarium with blown glass fish in it. It is my most expensive piece. The others have like bubbles of colored glass inside. Some are round some are tear drop shaped. The tear drop ones are Mouth blown glass handcrafted in Poland and signed by the artists, I have 2 different ones by the same artist and they are just beautiful. It did not start out as a collection but now when I or my husband see a really pretty one we have to take a look to see if it should be part of the collection. We have 4 Harley's I think that may be considered a collection LOL The way I am going my tech toys may be considered a collection too lol. I do love love love to buy purses and have hundreds of them but I never thought of that as a collection more of an obsession!