Last Native American Jewelry Lot For A While

This week's entry will be pretty brief as there is not a lot of news to report. On Tuesday, I went with Kuochun to see a local cardiologist for the first time as a follow-up to his ER visit and hospital stay. Unfortunately the EKG taken in the office showed an abnormality so Kuochun needs to have a stress test next Monday and a follow-up on June 1. As a result, we will be staying even longer than anticipated but weather-wise we are doing fine.

We have not had a day top 100 degrees for a high yet and because the humidity is low weather in the 90s is totally doable. Kuochun has been walking the girls at 6:00 AM while it is still cool and I have been helping him with the early evening walks before their dinner because this is the time when other folks (and usually their dogs) are out and about. It is challenging for him to control them both when they lunge and bark at others on their double leash. Their outings during the day are brief when temps are on their way up. I bought some little booties from Amazon to test them out but poor Margot just did not know what to do with her leg when I put one on her. The rubber part was way too large for her little paws so as cute as they were I had to return them. I think I will need to get some socks with rubber pads and replace them when needed. The girls are due for grooming next Wednesday and I believe last time we were there I saw some for sale at the groomer. It is extremely important to protect dogs' paws from streets and sidewalks when temps go over 100 degrees. Dogs are not even allowed on the local hiking trails when temps are that high.

Upon returning from Kuochun's appointment, I needed to take Mother right to the ER. Her left leg was horribly swollen, red, shiny, lumpy and weeping. She ended up staying in the hospital for three days, diagnosed with cellulitis. It was also found that she is severly anemic and needed to go on iron supplements right away. She is also on a couple of antibiotics to clear up her infected leg. If anything good can come out of it, this seems to have been a wake-up call and ever since, she has made a conscious effort to lower her salt intake. We have quite a few appointments coming up in preparation for her follow-up with the pulmonologist on the 24th. It definitely has not been a fun time as we are in our busy time for estate sales now as well. Between the two of them, we have five appointments coming up and I am spending the rest of my waking hours on estate sale work.

We experienced a bit of a cool spell for a couple of days last week and I was hoping to get to the botanical garden during that time but it was not meant to be. Next Wednesday the high is only supposed to be 80 degrees but I do not think there will be time to go. It may have to wait until we return in the fall. Instead, when driving to go anywhere I have been admiring all of the colorful flowers which have been blooming. I have seen white, yellow, orange, purple and fuschia color flowers to name a few. They are everywhere - on cacti to trees.

I was able to post the above grouping of vintage Native American jewelry on Sunday evening. This will be the last of its kind for a while, unless some new pieces come in. My main Chicago-area contact has been hoarding jewelry for my return. I offered to choose pieces remotely but they would prefer I select everything in person when I come back. From this group, only the Sleeping Beauty turquoise cuff bracelet has sold, although the watch at the upper left corner is pending sale. The other pieces are all available. It is probably just as well that lot posting is slowing down as folks in the Facebook groups are not purchasing as much as usual.

I am planning to turn back to my Federico collection next Sunday evening - I still have at least two groupings to present. Then if there is time, I will go to the Buffalo Dancer pieces I have not yet shipped home. This will likely take us to the end of our time here this spring.

The garage is filled with items to sell and I need to make posting items I can sell locally on Facebook Marketplace a priority. I am still dealing with items the previous owner left behind but thankfully it is getting down to the end. I have a black metal shelf, Mexican pottery planter, Frigidaire microwave we no longer need because I now have a drawer microwave, the wine fridge and some IKEA metal shelving. I also need to post the headboard Mother does not want anymore and decide whether to repair the very cool MCM bar chairs or sell them more cheaply as a project. Once those items are gone it will clear up a good amount of space. Most likely the rest of the household items such as vintage home decor, linens and Christmas decorations will need to wait until fall to deal with. Too bad I could not send the dining chairs home with the rest of the set as they are taking up a lot of space in the garage as well.

We sold a lot of clothing, shoes and purses at our downsizing sale in December and garage sale in February but there is still so much to sell. Eventually it will all go online. There is really not much need to have long sleeve shirts here unless I go out at night in the winter. Elbow length sleeves are ideal but they are harder to find. I have SO many long sleeve shirts that I bought from Macoma Boutique these past couple of years. I have never worn many of them and would like to downsize. I have had ten pieces of their clothing on eBay since last year but there has been no interest. Next fall, I will get to crossposting the clothing and accessories to the marketplaces that make sense. One of the brands went out of business at the end of 2022 so maybe their pieces will have slight collectible value.

For now, I will pack everything up in bins and store them in the laundry room. This area is in the garage but closest to the house so it will be kept cool enough, even in the heat of the summer. The garage is below ground level so I am sure this helps keep things cooler as well. I was really surprised that with it being 100 degrees outside, I felt fine working in the garage. There is a ceiling fan which helps a lot. Some day I would like to get a mini split system like I have at home but in the meantime I feel encouraged that the garage is not nearly as hot as the outdoors. Most importantly, the car is now in the garage. What a huge difference it makes to not have the car outside in warm weather. The temperature in the car is a good 20 degrees cooler and the steering wheel is not hot.

There is still a lot of jewelry to polish, price and send home for the caravan. The original hope was to get through all the sterling but it does not look promising. I plan to work on costume jewelry this summer in my spare time so I am not going to ship any unfinished jewelry home. I will just do my best to accomplish what I can and leave the rest for the fall.

Hopefully there will be more encouraging news to report next time!