The Country Lady Antiques : Tour
OUR HOUSE IS FOR SALE
We have never put photos up of the upstairs because we are still working on it. In the future, we will debut our efforts here on our TOUR page~
Adam made the wattle fence for me one Saturday morning as a suprise. It is around our herb garden in the back. Our next DIY project for outside the kitchen door in the back are raised bed gardens with heirloom herbs and perennials!
The little footbridge in our yard, over our stream.
We two hand-built our diamond-scribed, nail studded batten doors.
Scarlett runner beans climb the birch arbor we created. Now, in August, it is covered with flowers and we have been harvesting the beans! I have strung them on wire and they are drying from a beam in the keeping room!
Our 'babbling brook' flowing down the hill.
The firepit and stone table we built in the back yard.
Off to the left of the firepit is where stone paths and raised bed gardens will be!
We have raspberry bushes along our stream. We pick them and make our own HOMEMADE RASPBERRY SHRUB, which we served at our DINNER WITH THE PILGRIMS!
The hand hewn granite bench in the herb garden.
Our 18th century cape is locally known as the " the mill house". This is a photo of the mill just a few doors down from our house. It was built in 1784. This mill is owned by a friend, and houses the 1920's lathe that Adam is using to handmake our lovely 17thc. style treen candlesticks! He is working on them in this idyllic setting, just a few doors down from our house!
We built a PERIOD CAGE BAR in the room in the 'ell'. This is now our '17th century taproom', and is the best place for entertaining! We have had several parties and our friends just love this room! In the 17thc. a 'taproom' was known as an 'ordinary'....
WELCOME TO SPENCER'S ORDINARY~
My husband is my best friend, soulmate, and dearest love. He hand painted this sign for me, for our taproom, or 'ordinary'. He painted an exact replica of our signed Westerwald jug on it!
THE MERRY LADS~ Raising an elbow to the strains of the 17thc. music, 'Johnny Cock Thy Beaver' with mugs of Mary and Adam's homemade Rum Shrub.
Dear friends, and fellow reenactors Ken and Jeremy~honored guests at 'Spencer's Ordinary'!
Adam put a long wooden piece the length of one taproom wall, with rosehead nails for 'hanging hooks'. We keep some of our 17thc. reenacting clothing and gear here!
All throughout the house, we have slowly collected and electrified all ANTIQUE lanterns for our lighting.
Below are photos of the butt'ry, which is off the taproom. I bought this house over 10 years ago, as a widow from the midwest. The house was a disaster, and I worked for 7 years alone, restoring it, teaching myself to do as much of the work myself as I could. I built this tiny 'butt'ry' years ago with NO money, using ALL garbage-picked PERIOD materials!
Some photographs of my butt'ry show the late 17th or early 18th century hand hewn wood sink. Even it's little drain is a hollowed out piece of branch! It is all original, and very rare. Hanging in the leaded diamond paned window is a glass witch ball with dried sage on it---a blessing on the house.
Mary, in 17thc. clothing ready to take school children on a tour of our home.....She volunteers, and taught fireplace cooking to grammar school children after school. Adam shows them how to light a fire with a flint and steel, and how he loads his doglock musket.
My darling husband hand made me this wooden bake oven door as a Valentine's day present, using wood and rosehead nails we had laying around!
I have a pair of these pewter hollowcast candlesticks. Mine date to 1550-1600.
This 17thc. American hanging cupboard has it's original 1600's butterfly hinges and lock and was found in Massachusettes.
A hand made and scribed spill holder....
Our best piece is this completely untouched AMERICAN, 17th century blanket box. It has initials, and the date 1678 on the front! It was made in Rowley, Massachusettes in 1678 for a Nelson, and decended in an unbroken line in the Nelson family---my husband's aunt. The design, initials, and date on the chest are punched in, as if with an awl. It went from Rowley, to Lincoln, Mass., in about 1700, and stayed there in an 18thc. house for 300 years.
Here is Mary at the Battle of Lexington-Concord reenactment, April 2008. She is sitting on a rock marking the site of the Josiah Nelson house in Lincoln Mass., and Adam stands at the spot as well. This is the Nelson family in which our wonderful 1678 blanket box decended. Josiah built his home around 1750, along what is now the 'battle road' . A cellar hole and commemorative plaque are all that remain now. It was amazing for us to sit at the spot where our chest was for a good portion of the 18th century!
Our pumpkin pine floorboards are 20 to 26 inches wide EACH!
The horn mug is from Plimoth Plantation. We were married in an authentic 18thc. wedding with all guests in period dress. We purchased several of the horn mugs, and Adam HAND CARVED AND BLACKENED OUR INTIALS AND THE WEDDING DATE on each one. These were our gifts to our wedding party!
Although it seems short in this photo, this late 17thc. stretcher base table is 6 feet long and about 45 inches wide. It has chamfered legs with lamb's tongue stops, and old dry paint on its base, legs, and almost-worn-through stretchers. It is great for preparing food and eating at as it is right in front of the cooking fireplace. We have a collection of 4 period joint stools around the table and a pair of leather Cromwellian leather covered arm chairs at either end.
My home was featured in Early American Life magazine years ago, and MY ORIGINAL wall-aging was featured in Early Homes magazine as well. My home is COMPLETELY different now and looks nothing like it did in the magazine years ago. I got a lot of jobs from both features, hired to do the 'wall aging' process that I 'invented'. Some have tried to imitate it, but never could. I still travel here and there doing wall aging for people, and it looks quite a bit more spectacular in 'real life', than it does in a photo! I have seen some imitations where mustard paint has been used, and mine must have looked yellow in some photos----there is no mustard in mine at all. As true aging would look, mine is soft and flat----NO sheen, and I have seen many a poor imitation with garish mustard paint and glazes, which I never use.
We do not believe in carrying autenticity so far that we do not have a sofa for us, and our friends to sit on and relax. Besides, the pilgrim separatists were not 'backwater rubes'. They had lived in cosmopolitan Holland for over a decade before sailing on the Mayflower, were used to the finer things, and did bring some of these things over to the new world as soon as they could. The children of the pilgrims of 1620 were into conspicuous consumption, and their generation had as fine homes and furnishings as they could afford.
The 2 of us just cut the ugly legs off our sofa and we put these 4 Jacobean legs on it instead! We have an antique oriental rug on the back, and several antique oriental rug pillows on it now!
This 18thc. dated, 'band' style sampler hides an ugly thermostat!
We both made this shelf in the kitchen out of a 250 yr. old board---a gift from friends.
We put in soapstone counters which we love.
Looking from the kitchen into the taproom.
We love the 'aged' soapstone sink we put in.
The 2 of us also laid the oak board flooring in the kitchen.
The fold down shoe foot work table is early, from New Hampshire, and has traces of it's original mustard paint with grey 'squiggle' decoration.
A peek at part of the bathroom....
Diminutive court cupboard in the 'little sitting room'.
In the 'little sitting room', a close up of the grouping on top of the court cupboard~Mary's Georgian ladies 18thc. style wig from England, a hand embroidered stomacher, and quills and old documents. The leather document box was completely hand made as a wedding gift to us from a reenactor friend...
The settee in the 'little sitting room' is a hand done Jacobean all-over wool crewel.
Adam's chair in the 'little sitting room'. We have NO lamps in the house---only antique lanterns that we have collected and electrified. Most are on dimmers and can be adjusted for reading or mood lighting!
On this wall in the 'small sitting room' we have a number of our reenactment clothing hanging from a wooden bar rack. No one would ever know that underneath these clothes is a flat screen TV ! Under it is an early quilling wheel and baskets of ANTIQUE wool and flax.
Here you can see when we move our reenactment clothing, we have a flat screen TV and DVD player on the wall!
TV is covered, absolutely invisible.....
We just move a few items to the neighboring hooks, and can see the TV from all sitting areas in the room!
Adam built the shelf in the 'little sitting room' out of 250 yr. old wood.
NOW THAT'S LOVE~I came into the room one day to see Adam wiring our phone and answering machine into this basket on the floor in the little sitting room to hide it as a suprise for me! We have it covered with a piece of old linen.
Our 'babbling brook' can be heard out of these windows.
Our c. 1650 chairtable came to us from Yorkshire England, and was probably in the cottage of a Dutch-born weaver there in the 17thc. The set of 4 untouched English 17thc. chairs is rare. 2 are armchairs and 2 are side chairs.
The brass chandelier is a c. 1950 Flemish copy of one of 17thc. style. We saw one almost identical in a Vermeer painting, and it had the same 'Hapsburg double eagles'.
This early chest has it's original dry grain painted finish---not a later one.
The cornice boards over the windows in this room are early---covered with a hand done wool-on-linen crewel embroidered fabric, and were found in a home in Maine years ago.
The fantastic hand turned candlesticks that Adam makes.
American chest in untouched, original condition decended in an unbroken line in the Adam's aunt's family, the Nelsons. Made in Rowley, Mass. in 1678, the front board has that date and the first name initials, J and B.
A mid-1600's spice cabinet.
This extremely rare c. 1635 livery cupboard is the actual one pictured in John Fiske's book on English 17thc. furniture.
Here is our 17thc. chairtable shown in the upright position. It is in wonderful original condition.
Another original fireplace, this one with it's chimney cupboard. 17thc. spoonrack with dry reddish paint, and an English 17thc. wainscot armchair.
The early and pristine lighting device was a wonderful auction find.
Another original fireplace, this one is in our bedroom. The cradle is late 17thc. Inside the original wall cupboard are a pair of metallic brocade 17thc. style ladies' shoes, and a gorgeous hand embroidered coif. The coif was done by someone at Plimoth Plantation and was on display in a glass case there for years. They sold it to us after hearing all about the 17thc. reenacting we do.
Hanging above the 17thc. backpanel backstool next to the fireplace in the bedroom is a small very early mirror surrounded by original stumpwork metallic embroidery.
The bible box on top of this carved chest has it's handwritten provenance written on an ancient piece of paper inside the lid. It was made in 1672 and was a gift to the bishop of Durham in England.
The thimble and wrap head pins are 17thc. and were excavated in Rhode Island.
This charming old child's coif is of brown velvet, lined with linen.
The find of a lifetime several years ago, our phenomenal English 17thc. bed is all panelled and carved. It bears the initials 'TMA' and the date 1686 at the top of the headboard. My husband said it was 'meant to be'---that that meant 'to Mary and Adam'! The bed has a wonderful provenance. We have dressed it in accurate 17thc. style---most of the time beds of that period had curtains only at the head, and then a cloth valence. Ours are of green linsey-woolsey, with pillow covers of white linen.
Both the top and underside of the bed's canopy are paneled wood with the most amazing original surface. It is so neat to look up at when lying in bed.
The painting of the pilgrim lady is an oil portrait.
The bed has it's original candle shelf.
One of my reenacting petticoats, this is made from the TRUE linsey woolsey that only we sold exclusively, and was embroidered by hand in wool. The motif is taken from a period petticoat featured in a book about early clothing.
Here is a photo showing one of the walls in our entry hall. I have a quote from Proverbs written on the wall which means a lot to us. The picture below shows a close up of the quote. We continue to do things to the house and slowly collect treasures for our home. OUR BOOK WILL FEATURE MANY NEW PHOTOGRAPHS OF OUR HOME, INSIDE AND OUT, NOT SEEN HERE. THERE WILL BE PICTURES OF US AT REENACTMENTS, AS WELL AS PICTURES TAKEN WITHIN ONLY A FEW MILES OF OUR HOME, GIVING THE READER A LITTLE TASTE OF WHERE WE LIVE...
----IT IS A NEW HAMPSHIRE OF OLD GRAVEYARDS AND STONE WALLS, AND GREEN TREE BRANCHES ARCHING OVER MEANDERING ROADS. OUR BOOK WILL ALSO FEATURE SOME OF OUR FAVORITE RECIPES, AND THE INCREDIBLE STORY OF HOW WE MET, AND OUR "COURTSHIP IN 18TH CENTURY STYLE", AND MORE~
The old granite bench in the herb garden....end of the day in our yard.
©Copyright 2007, 2009, 2010