We’re so delighted you’ve stopped by The Alley Rose! Here is where you’ll find spectacular antique linens for the home as well as beautiful Antique Clothing and Laces. Whether you’re the serious collector or just looking for a few nice pieces to accent that special place in your home, you couldn’t have found a finer place to search. You’ll find our merchandise to be extremely high quality and meticulously photographed and described. It is our promise that when our antique linens arrive at your door they will be exactly what we said them to be with no disappointing surprises. Be sure to also check out the new Alley Rose Exclusives page where you’ll discover fabulous Victorian reproduction soaps, framed prints and place cards which you won’t find anywhere else but here. As you browse you’ll find many fun old quotes, articles, Proverbs and customs from days gone by. Now, simply sit back, imagine and have fun while you’re taken back to a quieter, simpler time… a time when life centered around the home.
We're excited to announce we've recently run across a treasure trove of beautiful Items for Baby! Many are listed with more to come. To go there Click Here
What a busy spring it was! It’s always a labor of love for my husband and I to get the vegetable garden prepared and the flower beds spruced up for the coming year. It’s a constant regimen of planting, watering, dividing and fertilizing until finally we’re able to see the fruits of our labor burst open all around us with fabulous sights, smells and tastes. One cannot help but know that, with all the bounty around us, there is indeed is a God. We make it a point to stop and enjoy it all and spend hours on the deck marveling at what we’ve accomplished and watching our little dog Mattie romp through the yard chasing squirrels, rabbits, jets or anything else she sees as a potential threat. We eat most of our meals out there (sometimes 3 times a day!) and the barbeque grill barely cools down before we fire it up again to feed the endless stream of family, friends and neighbors who stop by.
And then, in the blink of an eye, summer is upon us. The wild display of flowers has wound down and it’s usually too hot to enjoy a noontime meal on the deck. We close up the house; turn on the air and little Mattie naps by an air vent and waits for cooler weather to reappear. Oh, what did people used to do without air conditioning? Surprisingly, quite a lot!
100 years ago it was actually more pleasant to spend summers outdoors rather than in. They did many of their daily chores such as laundry, mending and food preparation out side in order to catch any cool breeze that might pass by. Even I, a child of the 60’s remember sitting at the picnic table with my mother shelling peas, snapping beans and husking corn for the evening meal. Many homes had a screened in porch and folks slept out there when the nights became unbearable. They took lots of walks (always dressed in their best) visiting friends and neighbors and stopping for a cool glass of lemonade on the porch when invited. Croquet and Ice cream socials in the back yard were a common occurrence. Because cooking often made the house unbearably hot, families took their meals outside and enjoyed them under a shade tree. Even fancy dinner parties were held outdoors with each guest given a chair and a linen “lapkin” to place on their lap which doubled as a tablecloth and a napkin.
As I’ve been introduced to air conditioning, I don’t think I could do it. And little Mattie?? Definitely not. But the old timers couldn’t miss what they didn’t know and without hardly trying they made the unbearable not so bad.
"We should have nothing in our houses which we did not
either know to be useful or believe to be beautiful."
~William Morris~ The beauty of Life lecture, 1880 
