Rare Finds: Or Jenny's excuse to carry anything that strikes her fancy . . .

Dear Reader -  I had a guest stop in yesterday who proclaimed "rare finds!" upon his entry. I laughed and said, "that's my excuse to carry anything that strikes my fancy!" To which he replied, "It's actually a great umbrella," supplying the necessary hand gestures to encompass the assemblage of biblion's contents.

What he didn't know was that our newest addition was sitting in the yet-to-be-opened cartons at his feet. And in the words of Sesame Street, it was a "one of these things is not like the others" kinda item.

You see, dear Reader, at the request of many of our friends, Miss C and I are now the Lewes source for Colonial Candles' Classic Dinner Candles:

It all came about at a Taste the Fruit of the Vine meeting a month or so back. Libby and Sue and Sue all told me how they were at a loss for these awesome dripless, smokeless candles that Wildflowers (who closed their doors in January) used to carry. They joked, saying "You can carry those, Jen!" Which, of course, seemed a little goofy for a bookstore; but, of course, we're not your usual bookstore, a la that "rare finds" gig.

So I looked around the shop in my little mind and realized that we had the perfect spot to tuck them in: high up on some bookshelves that're inaccessible for anything else. Then I told the ladies that I'd be happy to carry them, so that they wouldn't have to drive down to The Wooden Indian in Reho (which still has the best selection for various colors, etc. in the area) or to hit the Internet.

I ordered a few different neutral and Spring-ish colors in the 10" variety, thinkin' they'd be sorta fun for Easter, etc. But the lion's share of what I got were 10" and 12" white and off-white, 'cause we kinda dig the classic here at biblion.

And speaking of classic, I was a little thrown when I was perusing the Colonial Candles website to see a "sock monkey" link; but, yes, the same Midwestern folks who make these awesome candles also sell hand-knit sock monkeys. Go figure.

Rare find? Prob'ly not really, but I don't care, they're just too darn cute:

I mean, look at him: he's already sporting his biblion colors! I'll double-check my friends down at Kids' Ketch (our stellar local toy store, which deserves a blog post of its own), just to make sure that it's not an item they already carry. If not, we're gettin' a couple the next time we order up some candles.

Hurry up Libby, Sue, and Sue! Come get some of these candles so we can get us some monkeys!

And to tide us over 'till the monkeys arrive, let's enjoy Miss C's favorite track from the awesome anthological Los Lobos 2-disc set, Just a Band from East L.A., I Wanna Be Just Like You:

Blissfully burnin' those pretty candles at both ends!  - Jenny