This toaster is up for auction on eBay’s seller ID findgreatstuff.

Here is a beautiful one of a kind art glass paperweight made by Robert Eickholt. It is engraved with his signature and the date: Eickholt 1981. Name and date are marked very lightly but they are legible in a good light. I think this paperweight is a fantasy landscape… a frozen ice planet in shades of cobalt and cream… with an overlay of dichroic rainbow dust… the Northern Lights… Aurora Borealis. They shimmer and change, appear and disappear as you turn it around. It is fantastic! 2-1/2″ high x 2-1/2″ wide. Excellent condition… no chips, flakes, cracks or repairs. This paperweight is one of a small collection we purchased from an estate sale. See our other listings for more from this collection.
Info: Robert Eickholt founded Eickholt Glass in 1978. For 30 years he created a full line of unique and wonderful art glass… paperweights, perfume bottles, vases and sculpture. All of his pieces were made by hand so no two are ever alike. In 2008 he retired and closed his studio.

This Eickholt item is offered  for sale on our  findgreatstuff.com website.

This printer really impressed me. After only a few prints I had to spring for one of Epsons R1800 large format printers. With a year of printing under my belt, I found that my large Epson would also print on the 4×6 Dash paper with as good an image. This Epson PictureMate only has 26 prints on its life. The condition is as close to mint as a used printer can be. The original print package came with ink and paper for 20 prints. I just put in a 150 glossy sheet photo ink cartridge in the Dash and I’m including 25 photo glossy paper sheets. More glossy paper can be purchased without having to buy an ink cartridge. All original software, manuals, power supply, and box with packaging are included. I’m also including a USB cable if you would like to connect this printer to your computer, but this printer works just great all on its own with its built in software and button navigation. Something my large print can’t do. The sale page can be found HERE on our findgreatstuff.com website.

Here’s a magical Christmas item… a miniature white grand player piano that plays a succession of 12 Christmas carols… an electronic music box of sorts. It comes with 2 different sized snowmen that glide/skate/dance/pirouette on top of the piano or you can choose to display the piano with the top raised in grand piano style. There is a prop for the lid. The music rack moves. Lift the cover over the keys to start and stop the music. The keys move independently, up and down, as if it were being played by an invisible pianist in true played piano style. Top is decorated with silver and gold snowflakes, holly leaves

Notes for audio cast Harman/Kardon  Harmony remote TC 30 work around.

1. Mac users don’t upgrade to Harman/Kardon remote version 5.3.2
2. Mac users need older vision 5.1.4 running on a power PC processor not an intel processor
3. With the remote connected to your power PC running version 5.1.4 you can update your TC 30 remote.
4. Harman/Kardon remote control setup site

Bill’s words

Build Your Sales Pages Part 3 of 4 from Bill Lair on Vimeo.

HowTO part 3 of 4: Beginning instructions for using WebMerge software to publish your item sales on an internet antique store. Go to HowTO part 1 of 4. Go to HowTO part 2 of 4

Heron Fish Dive from Bill Lair on Vimeo.

This video is an excerpt from my Heron fishing video, shot at the dam in Lake Cotoxen, Medford, NJ.

Bill’s words

Great Blue Heron Fishing Lake Cotoxen from Bill Lair on Vimeo.

In early spring a heron or two feed daily at Lake Cotoxen. We even get to see a couple together either flirting or fighting. The other times of the year we’ll only see one at a time every few days. This video was filmed during one day of fishing.

Bill’s post

Organize Your Data for Collectible Online Sales Part 2 of 4 from Bill Lair on Vimeo.

HowTO part 2 of 4: Beginning instructions for using FileMakerPro to orginize your data for publishing sales on your internet antique  store. Go to HowTo part 1 of 4.

Bill’s words

The following is a eulogy for Four Beavers (Castor Canadensis) whose lives ended tragically on the shores of Lake Cotoxen, on the Southwest Branch of the Rancocas Creek, in environmentally concerned Medford, NJ. All four were victims of death by auto, all killed, in the very same spot at the edge of Church Road. The first one was killed last fall in October or November; then two more were killed together one night a few weeks later; and now a fourth has been killed just last week, March 2009. All four bodies were removed fairly quickly by persons unknown before we had a chance to bury them. (We have buried a majority of the poor creatures who have met an untimely end here.)

We’ve lived on Lake Cotoxen for almost thirty-eight years but had never seen a beaver here until about three years ago when we spotted a young one circling the rain swollen lake. The area was partially flooded, normal with Spring rains. All the tree trunks on the bank were about three to five feet under water and must have looked very tasty to this newcomer. For a couple of days, while the water was up, he nibbled and gnawed on the bark, but he disappeared again once the water had receded to normal levels. We added some chicken wire surrounds to the trees he deemed worth eating just in case he returned. We saw him swimming around a few times but we never saw him again after that summer. We never saw another beaver until the first of the deceased creatures turned up out front one morning last fall.

Recently, Medford proudly announced that the efforts made to clear log jams and debris along the Rancocas, from the center of town to historic Kirby’s Mill located at Lake Cotoxen, had been completed. Two and a half miles of creek is now open to recreational activities and easily accessed by boat owners. Community Canoe Days with canoe and kayak rentals are open to all and efforts by Burlington County to implement plans for clearing the waterway from Kirby’s Mill to Lumberton is underway. And the beavers? Were their lodges and dams a part of the log jams and debris? Only those who helped to clear the stream might know… or maybe they wouldn’t. I didn’t know much about beavers until they began to show up dead at my doorstep.

So I must thank a great website BWW, Beavers: Wetlands & Wildlife www.beaversww.org/index.html for enlightening me. They offer a lot of great information. You can see some excellent photos on their website as well. The best picture I have of a beaver exists only in my memory. I was minus camera on the day I saw one swimming under the railroad bridge on the Southern Branch of the Rancocas at Marne Highway and Creek Road. He was heading towards Rancocas Woods with a bouquet of flowers in his mouth! What a sight! We just assumed he must be going to visit his girlfriend… although, being vegetarians, he may have been taking the roots home for dinner.

Beavers are good for the environment and what’s good for the environment is good for mankind. They create a wetlands with the dams they build. Such wetlands can help to absorb flooding, control erosion, and purify the water. They are intelligent gentle creatures who rarely bite (humans or each other). They mate for life. They can live for 20 years in captivity but in the wild usually only survive for about 10 years, succumbing mainly to traps and traffic accidents. I have learned that they are nocturnal, rarely are they seen during the day except at dusk, an hour before sunset, and at dawn. I will start looking for others now and truly hope that the deceased were not the last of their kind here.

Kathy’s words

For the last two years we’ve also been losing our dialtone on our landline. The upside of that was the joy of not hearing the phone ring all day long. We called in for service to repair the connection, and they said a technician would be out within a week. Before a week was up the line became operational again. This happened several times. The last time we didn’t cancel our appointment. When the technician showed up the line was working. He said that in our location the lines were old and this behavior just happens because of weather changes. So much for a reliable 911 landline. This pushed us over the edge. We cut the line and we are going for it. No more Verizon. No more Verizon bills. We pay for a $30 yearly Skype unlimited plan to call land lines within the United States and Canada. With this Skype plan we also get voicemail. For another $30 a year we get a local landline phone number  so folks can contact us using their landlines. We don’t have our computers online all the time, so we purchased a Belkin desktop phone that connects to Skype through our high-speed internet connection, no computer needed. The Belkin phone has received some mixed reviews, but so far for us it’s doing a great job. This phone still dials out to order pizza and dials long-distance to save those long-distance charges. Voicemail is still set up to answer incoming calls if those telemarketers zone in on our new phone number. When we quit Verizon the agent said they needed our new phone number to cancel the account. Anyway I didn’t have a new number to give her yet, so she said she could still close our account and would mail us our final bill. We are only three weeks into our new phone system with no negatives yet and lovvvving the silence.

Bill’s words

One morning during rush hour the honking of many car horns alerted us to the fact that vultures had been landing in the middle of the street trying to feed on a possum that was killed right in front of our house. Our once-upon-a-time country road has turned into a major thoroughfare in the last few years with cars tearing through here at a much faster than posted speed so we thought for sure that the vultures would be run over too. At the very least, they would miss out on a good meal, so with a little trepidation, we brought the dead creature into our side yard where the vultures would be safe if they decided to land here. We didn’t know what would happen but it turned out to be a great meal for them and an incredible photo opportunity for us.

The bravest vulture landed right next to the possum and after some cautious investigating tugged and dragged the carcas until he got it to the back corner of the yard. He may have felt safer under the protection of the surrounding bamboo and may also have wanted to avoid being spotted by his competitors. Soon others landed and he began defending his rights of ownership. Three others shoved and jostled but allowed him to eat first. Four vultures in total fed from that carcas, returning for three days to pick it clean. They spent a lot of time eating, just standing around in the yard and observing from vantage spots in the trees just outside our living room windows. I’m not sure we’d do that again but it was a great adventure.

Kathy’s words

Kathy’s words and photo