What's in the box?

If you came across this wooden box what would you think of it?

Before my dad moved into assisted living this summer we had a talk about what needed to be saved from his house before we cleared it out.  He told me about this wooden box that has been sitting on the shelves in the storage room for the last 33 years.  Actually, this box has been around since before I was born.

I hope I get this story right--I'm not quite sure of the years. 

My parents were up in South Dakota in the 1950s.  The egg market was in a slump at the time and eggs were only 15 cents per dozen.  Mom and Dad wanted to take some eggs back home to Coyote, New Mexico.  How to transport them?

This is an old egg crate that belonged to my dad's grandparents--my great grandparents.  They filled it with eggs and drove them all the way home to New Mexico without any breakage.

It was fun digging through the layers in the bottom of the box.  They don't make things like this anymore.  It may look like an old wooden box, but my parents held onto it for 60+ years.  It's an antique and a family heirloom.

So the question was what to do with it. I didn't just want to sit it out and not have some type of decorative element to it and I also didn't want to do anything to it that might ruin it for future family decorators.

 Off to Hobby Lobby I went for inspiration.  I found this really cute modern day hen.  A hen goes with eggs, right?  Now to fill it full of native grasses and put her in the nest.  I think I love it.  I even found some wooden eggs to go with it, but I haven't had a chance to paint them yet.

Dad, if you read this please let me know if I'm mistaken about any of this box's history.

What surprises have you ever found that had a great story behind them?