davidd's A DOLL A DAY 2023

[davidd]

Looks like a flashback from Hawaii.
Another lucky "trash" find, or a purchase?

The pic has a "Hawaii vibe," yes; and left me feeling nostalgic.

This tiki figure is solid concrete, and was a hybrid find-purchase. Neighbors up the street are getting ready to sell their house, so they've been putting things out by the curbside with a "free or $5 donation" sign. I spotted two carved wooden tiki figures on their discard pile, about 10 inches tall, the exact kind that the carvers sell at the Aloha Stadium Swap Meet or at the International Marketplace in Waikiki. The carvings were very weathered and grey, obviously having been left outside for a number of years, but there was no decay, and I was quite excited. Those carvings sold for forty to fifty dollars apiece back when I first went to Hawaii. The woman who lives in the house came out when she saw me looking at the tikis. I asked her if they were five dollars apiece. She said no, five dollars for one item or as many as I wanted. Then she said, "if you like those, I have another one over here," and she led me to the 24-inch tall one sitting beside the garage. I was well familiar with this concrete tiki. I looked at it every time I passed the house all last winter, and again this season. So I scored three  tikis for five bucks.

I oiled up the dry grey wood carvings. They slurped up several coats of wood stain and look much happier now, although I must admit, they looked kind of cool when they were dry and weathered. I wasn't eggspecting them to become so dark, but they absorbed so much medium tint oil stain that they are now almost black.

The moral of the story: covet thy neighbor's tikis and they shall become thine!  

You can see one of the wooden tiki carvings in today's Pic o' th' Day:

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25 February - A Doll A Day 2023:

Precursor to Unboxing: Pirate Costume Barbie & Ken in a Nautical Setting