COLLECTION #138: Guitars (and baby guitars!)

It's Music Monday! Today's collection is my fun guitar and guitar-like instruments! My 'real' guitars consist of my main playing guitar, the jumbo Taka guitar (a Gibson knock off, and it's awesome!)  a Harmony Sovereign guitar, currently being played by my daughter Annie, and a fun Silvertone cowboy guitar from the 1950s.

The Taka was purchased for a song in 1979, when I was pregnant with our first child. My husband was working for the Sunset-Gower movie studio at the main desk, and someone came in who wanted to unload it in a hurry. (Suspicious, anyone?) He told Bruce he'd sell it to us for $65, and I hurried right down with cash in hand and asked no questions. It's been a dreamy instrument to play, great sound (if imperfect action) and pretty styling. It looks like a Gibson J-185, but I'm not expert enough to know exactly which jumbo version it was modeled after.

Photo found online, I don't have the box or songbooks.

  The Sovereign (an H1203 model) was given to me by a friend a few years ago, and I've given it to Annie to learn to play. She's teaching herself (via You Tube) and it sounds pretty good. (Could use some new strings!)  I adore the fun cowboy guitar by Silvertone (Sears' own brand) from 1958. It is a 3/4 size guitar, and was packaged in a fun box with fifties graphics.

The other mini guitars are a motley crew: there's a Russian mini guitar (the one with the birds), a Mexican souvenir guitar (the one with the flowers). I also have my original, first instrument ever: a Harmony ukulele, which I bought with Blue Chip Stamps when I was 12. It's in pretty rough shape, but I can't bear to part with it. The last instrument is a toy guitar or ukulele- it's made of tin, painted red, and has a cardboard fretboard. I love it, it's so cute!

That's it, I hope you enjoy my stringed buddies!