THIRD TIMES A CHARM........An Easter Story.

Remember these cool charm bracelets from the 1950's.......Little state charms that you always got as a treat when the folks took you on vacation....shiny enamel charms on sterling silver............they sold for a couple of bucks in gift shops all across the country.....friends and neighbors would pick one up for you in their travels.....if you were lucky.....

I had one of these coveted bracelets back in the 50's and can't remember what ever happened to it....I was the kind of kid that lost everything......

But this is how it all started......

It was 1958 and we used to go food shopping at an old A&P in Linden New Jersey......

Every time I would go with my mother I would oogle at an end cap display that had the coolest plastic charms in a big bag......probably just a couple of dollars back then.....but I just had to have them..... I think there must have been a miniature Statute Of Liberty in the bag that caught my eye......

They looked something like these........
I asked and asked and asked and my mother would never give in....So Easter was coming up and I thought if ever there was a time I could score these cute little charms now was the time....So I asked for the "Charms" in my Easter basket......and then I waited...........
It seems my mother sent my older brother...... who was 20 at the time and you think he would know better.....to the A&P to buy me the charms.....
On Easter morning this is what I found in my Easter basket.......



Not this whole box........no..... one small package of "Charms"......the candy.
Years later when I was a teen I guess the fam felt bad that they had stiffed me and I started getting the little state charms..........but as I said.....it became lost....or misplaced
Walking home from high school one day I saw something glistening in the grass near the sidewalk and there unclaimed was a beautiful gold charm bracelet....just sitting on the ground....Yes....it came home with me....It had a "Sweet 16" charm on it and since I was 16 at the time I knew it was put there just for me......
Never seeing any signs that anyone had lost it I had it up until last year when I finally sold it on E-Bay......awful I know......
But with the money I started buying back the old 1950's state charms that I so loved.....
The picture above is the new bracelet.....charms bought one by one....
Thanks to the wonder of E-Bay..... and their motto.....

If we don't have it.....you don't need it