Stocking the shelves with maple syrup...

Real, pure maple syrup, from a sugaring house, is often packaged eclectically. After all, it's going to cost more to buy the real stuff, and to buy from an independent, so why not make the syrup seem like a very special treat?

(Yes, my northern friends, it's often sold in inexpensive plastic jugs as well, but those are no fun all lined up in this tiny setting!)

So the Aucoins' shop sells their various grades of syrup in ceramic jugs, in precious bottles of many shapes and sizes... all sorts of things ready for keeping in your kitchen or giving as a gift.

Doodads employed in the making of these bottles include: Beads, picture-hanging nails, upholsterers' tacks, jewelry findings. And probably other things... if it looked like a lid, a bottle, or a base in mini, I held on to it all year until the big bottle-assembly day!