Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Magnets are drawn to my fridge

Good morning. Gold Country Girl Tina here. Today you will be viewing my refrigerator magnets. My son is always making fun of the many magnets covering our icebox. I just seem to have gathered a lot of them together, plus I have made some out of old and newer family photos. I enjoy them, so I put up with his snide remarks. I need something to do while I am waiting for water to boil, etc. I am always rearranging, and sometimes adding to it. I have bought them on vacations, at garage sales, I have gotten them free with items I ordered on ebay.
I enjoy old family photos and one Christmas made magnets for the family as stocking stuffers. I did not know what I was doing, however, and trimmed them to close to the edge, so that they came apart from their magnetic backing. I want to try again one of these days. I just use other magnets to hold down the edges of mine.
There is something here for everyone. Celestial items, a toucan from Mexico, the caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland, a Dutch girl, a vintage milk bottle cap.
I like to purchase magnets at the historical sites near my home, so I have them from Coloma, Gold Bug Mine, and also ones from small towns that sell them. And of course Mary Engelbreit and Disney items make an appearance. At the top in this photo is Hungry, the Weight Watchers magnet from last fall. He was recalled since someone said they found a pin inside him. I checked mine, he is fine, and he stayed here with me. Under Hungry is a TV dinner with fried chicken, my favorite, maybe Hungry's too.
The three flowers in the picture above glow in the dark, so that we can find our way to the ice-maker in the dark. At top left is a Tom Kincade drawing of the church in Coloma where we were married. My nephew in his letterman jacket. A polar bear from Alaska. All these keep me busy when I am waiting for my toast to pop up.
Heidi has a wonderful display of magnets on her fridge, which I peruse every time I am there visiting. Each time I am there there is another new one. I need to go back and check it out soon.
Lori has some nice ones too, with darling pictures of her grandchildren.
In this the Gold Country Girls are in the top center photo. Below is a Chessie Systems magnet, which was a gift from Heidi, since my cat Cheshire Cat is nicknamed Chessie.
The trailer in the middle says "home sweet home". I lived for a summer in a small travel trailer that had belonged to our grandpa, so I thought it was fitting. Most of my magnets have a very personal meaning to me, or they don't get the chance to be on my refrigerator.
The fiesta cup in the center was once joined by a teapot and a creamer, but since they are ceramic they were breakable and they did. This door has a way of falling completely open with a big thump and sometimes the magnets fall to the floor in a suicidal leap.
The side of the fridge is the magnet junkyard. They make it there after they have been broken, or perhaps they weren't my favorites, or there just wasn't room to begin with. They are a motley collection, which I also find fascinating at times.
Towards the top are ticket stubs from concerts, photos of friends cut from the newspaper, postcards, notes from the granddaughters. It is a catch-all, but a meaningful catch-all.
I am not sure what I will do if we ever have to buy a new refrigerator. What if it isn't magnetic? What if there is no room for magnets? What if we move it and I can't use the sides for my discarded magnets? (The other side of the fridge holds those thin plastic advertising magnets - from real estate agents, pest removal services, pizza joints, candidates for county supervisor... you name it. They are all collectibles now.) But thanks to my son's teasing remarks, no matter what happens later, my magnets will go down in history now. They have their own post on our blog...

2 comments:

Heidi Ann said...

I really enjoyed this in-depth look at your refrigerator display.
Neat post, Tina!

yosemite faith said...

when we moved from copperopolis ca to mich - i had to remove all my magnets - at that time hubby john asked me to really pare down and i did. i never could have done it except that we were moving and they had to be taken down no matter what. loved seeing your fridge display!