What I didn’t Buy at the Thrift Store

Hey guys! So try as I might I just couldn’t bring myself to buy anything yesterday at the Memorial Day thrift sales. I went to five stores and came away with nothing! There were just too many people and I was really just not in the mood. I mean one savers was giving out numbers for the dressing room, nope no sorry not gonna happen. So instead of a thrift haul I’d thought I’d do another addition of things I didn’t buy at the thrift store.

1.  Wagon Wheel Chairs 

 I’m Mildly obsessed with wagon wheel furniture.  If I had a house with a finished basement I would be tempted to decorate the whole thing in mid century wagon wheel furniture, it’s just so kitschy and cool. These chairs are pretty awesome but I don’t have a finished basement awaiting a sweet wagon wheel collection and if i’m going to go through the hassle of buying thrift store furniture It has to be something I know I can use.  So I left these for a better home.

2. Barber Chair

This chair is pretty cool but it was also pretty beat up. One of the arm rests fell completely off and  I also have no immediate use for it. So it stayed at the thrifts.

3. Mosaic-y Lamps

These are cool and I kind of regret not getting them but I have enough lamps and don’t really need anymore unless they’re something I can’t live without. These I could live without so I  left them.

9. Dirty Wavy Lamp

I liked the pattern on this lamp and thought if cleaned it would have a lot of potential. But again I don’t really need anymore lamps.

10. Mid Century Sliding Door Bookcase

Ok I kind of regret not getting this. It was only around $10/11.00 and I’ve wanted one of these for awhile. The catch? I want one with glass doors and these are solid wood. In hindsight I should have gotten it anyway but I guess I’ll wait for the next one I see.


11-12. Cat Statue and “Marble” top side table

I really liked the egyptian cat statue but it was like $14.00 and that seemed a bit pricey for a decorative cat. The side table was really cute too but one thing I really don’t need is another side table.

13. Emily Anne cross stitch

I have an old friend named Emily Anne who is exactly one day and eight years younger than whoever this cross stitch was made for. I kind of wanted to get it but I decided to just take a picture and maybe send it to her later.

14. Dress Form

I like the idea of a decorative dress form to hang clothes and stuff on, so when I see them at the thrifts I’m always a little interested. This one was a whopping $50.00 so I kept on walking.

15.  Pitcher

I liked the design on this pitcher but didn’t need one.

16. Mid Century Lawn Chairs

These lawn chairs were pretty cool but they were also in need of refinishing and were a bit pricey at about $70.00 for the pair. They’re very cool but were a bit expensive and not really practical for me right now, so I passed.

17. Mikasa Cups

I thought liked these but they were kind of small and into larger mugs at the moment.

18. Mid Century Small Dresser/ Nightstand 

These dressers ( there’s a twin behind it) were nice and would be good storage. I think they’d be cute with different pulls. But  A.) They didn’t have a tag and B.) I realized I liked them 99% because of the mid century style legs, which you can buy anywhere.  I decided to leave them since I really wasn’t in love.

19. Jelly Bean White House

This is a thing. My grandpa loves Jelly beans so I was slightly tempted to get it but … I don’t think anyone really needs a jelly bean white house. Except maybe for Jelly Bean Barack Obama, Obama bean?

One of my three shirts

Shirt / Jacket / Shoes: Thrift  Jeans: Old Navy
      Though I have plenty of spring/summer inspirations (see last post) the weather here has been predictably unpredictable. One day it’s 85 degrees the next it’s 35 with flurries, thus I haven’t broken out the skirts and dresses quite yet. In Fact pretty much all winter and spring when I’m not at work I’ve been rotating the same three shirts pretty heavily, my boyfriend even commented on it which means it’s pretty bad (lol).
   
      Call it laziness, call it normcore, I just can’t be bothered too much with fashion right now. Not really sure why. I do have a lot of clothes but to be honest my shirts, even my work ones, have been pretty sad for awhile. Part of the reason is that I never shop for them. I haven’t been thrifting much lately and when I do I always seem to have a short attention span. Since shirts are generally the largest section it’s hard to force myself to go through them and pick out some good ones. Even when I buy new shirts are the last on my list. But that needs to change. I do actually need shirts now so I guess I’ll suck it up and put them higher on my thrift list.

       Either way I do genuinely like the outfits I put together with my three shirts. I will be documenting them and posting for you to see. But be forewarned until the temps stay consistently warm, or I acquire more tops, you may be seeing a lot of outfits similar to the one above. Apologies. 

Be Mine?

As a single girl I never hated Valentines Day but I never really celebrate it much either. Now that I’m in a relationship I start thinking about what I’m gonna wear on this day pretty soon after the new year, I know it’s silly but that’s just my brain.  Last year I had a vague idea of what I wanted to wear, but this year I had nothing. No ideas, no inspiration, nada. The only thing I knew is that I wanted to pander a little to my boyfriend and wear a skirt and/or a Dress, since he’s fond of them and I tend not to wear them much during the winter months.  So I went thrifting, I looked online, I went to the mall, I scoured pinterest and fashion blogs and … nothing.  I did find a couple dresses I liked but one wasn’t in my size and the other was too expensive. So what’s a girl to do? Look in her closet, duh! I don’t know why but whenever I have an event/ occasion to dress for I rarely look at my wardrobe and pick something from there right off the bat. No, my first instinct is to declare I have nothing appropriate and look anywhere but the most convenient location. So finally last week after coming up empty handed yet again I went through my closet and found no less than 15 pieces that I could possibly wear, 15! silly, silly, silly me. I finally tried them all on in various combinations and decided on this lovely ensemble oh a few hours before dinner on valentines day…

Top: H&M (Thrifted) Skirt: ASOS Tights & Shoes: Target  Earrings: my mom

This outfit wasn’t too exciting and I had plans for a different pair of incredibly valentines day appropriate earrings to add a pop but, of course, I couldn’t find them. So I went with these green ones that I “made” from a broken pair of my mom’s. I decided to wear the skirt since I’ve only really worn it once even though I really like it. I just find it hard to style mini skirts casually, I should probably work on that. It has a lovely mesh band on the bottom that looks really good when you’re not wearing black tights, but it’s Minnesota, it’s February, and it’s cold so those are the breaks. The shirt was a recent thrift find that I’m kind of obsessed with it, it’s stretchy and soft and I love it. Overall I really like it, it doesn’t scream Valentines day date outfit but it’s significantly more dressed up then I get for most of our dates (especially in the winter) so that’s a win.

Anyway the boyfriend and I went to Chino Latino a latin/Asian Fusion restaurant in Minneapolis that I seriously always wanted to try, 80% of which was because of its shiny gold sign (I’m dead serious). We had a kind of early reservation since we didn’t end up making concrete plans until 11 days prior (procrastinators unite!). Dinner was really good and dessert was kind of amazing, we had fried bananas and coconut ice cream, yum . After dinner we just hung out and did our normal date stuff, which was cool.

Didn’t take a picture of my presents but here’s a “in the process of” picture of my Zine. The finished one is on the bottom and my first draft is on the top.

If you were wondering about gifts, this year I got hella crafty and did some serious DIY. I saw a really cool tutorial on Design sponge about making your own mini Valentine’s Day Zine so I got really excited, ran to Michael’s and made one awesome Zine! For the actual gift I made (yes made, as in got all the ingredients and mixed them together) my boyfriend one of his favorite snacks, Trail Mix. Oh yeah I bought an ungodly amount of nuts, dried fruit, M&M’s and chocolate chips and filled two pretty large canisters full of my concoction. Then I gussied them up with some left over craft supplies.  I have to admit I had the most fun making these gifts this year and think I may have to incorporate some DIY every year, if I can. I also gave him the lovely cold I’d been fighting that week, ooops.

My boyfriend isn’t big on the whole flowers and chocolate thing on valentines day, I’m pretty sure he’s convinced it’s some sort of trap and I wouldn’t like them if he got them for me. I keep telling him I would be down but I don’t think he believes me. Anyway that means I always end up getting the sweetest homemade gifts. Which are better than flowers in that it means he actually puts in some time and effort into thinking up a sweet and thoughtful gift.  Last year he gave me a jump drive with all the texts messages we had sent back and forth for the entire first year of our relationship, which is oh 99% of our phone conversations as I’d rather text than talk on the phone most days. It was incredibly sweet and unexpected but a totally appreciated gift since I only just got an iPhone last year and all those texts etc. had to be regularly deleted from my old phone. This year he ended up giving me his version of “Cooper Coupons” from The Big Bang theory, though he called them Cooley coupons (because last names n’ such). Basically they’re coupons I can redeem to make him do things he may otherwise not want to do or at least would bitch about a bit. Go somewhere on date he wouldn’t necessarily want to go, not bitch at me for talking during a TV show, etc. It’s very cute as they’re very tailored to our relationship, I’m already planning a time to redeem my first coupon.

Anyway In honor of V-day I’ll leave you with this adorable video I saw in the New York Times the other day. I think it may be the most adorable love themed YouTube video I’ve seen in awhile. Enjoy.  And whether you’re single or in relationship I hope you had a very Happy Valentine’s Day, or at least go some sweet deals on chocolate the day after.

Vintage Christmas Gifts / Thrift Haul

I haven’t really been thrifting much lately. Christmas always burns me out a little and thrifting (and shopping in general) tend to fall to the wayside as a result. But I did find some cool vintage items before Christmas, received some as Christmas gifts, and found a bunch of cool stuff at the MLK thrift sales. After the MLK sales I figured I finally had enough to do a little thrift haul. So here are my little haul of thrift finds and vintage gifts from the last few months.

1. Vintage chalkware figures

My mom gave these to me for Christmas. I have a similar pair that are “bookends” but one was
decapitated while hanging out on a shelf, so It was nice to get a new and very cool pair.  I’m especially in love the detail on the sleeves of these guys, so pretty.

 2. Italian made Vintage ashtray

No I’m not a smoker, I’m actually asthmatic so I can’t even really have people smoke around me, but I do like a cool vintage ashtray for decorative purposes.  This one I again got for Christmas from my momma and it’s pretty cool, I love the gold marble-ish pattern.

3. Lane Dining Room chair

I randomly came upon this at the thrift store one Sunday and it was $3.00 so I kind of had to get it. My cat Tang is very fond of it and it’s got great lines so I think it’s a win. I eventually want to change the seat upholstery but I gotta find some nice fabric first.

4. Vintage Brooches

         a. Vintage Flapper Brooch

 b. Floral Brooch

These are more Christmas presents from my mom. I’ve always admired brooches and thought I should buy some, but they’re one of those things I can easily talk myself out of and thus never buy. So I was excited to get some from my mom. I really love the 1920’s/30’s flapper one, isn’t it cool? The flower one is pretty as well and kind of reminds me of munchkin land from the Wizard of Oz.

 5. Nefertiti Bust

This is another Christmas present. I love this bust but it’s had a hard life. When you see it up close you notice that poor Nefertiti’s head was definitely glued back on after what I can imagine was a terrible tumble.  I was thinking of maybe spray painting it to hide the “work” it’s had done but I really like the green color so I’m still on the fence.

6. Jewelry
         
   A.  Small faux diamond earrings

 B. Gold Hoops

C. metallic block necklace

 D. Skull Bracelet

 E. Metallic stud earrings

 F.  Geode necklace

I got these all on MLK sale day at some of the thrifts. I sort of stumbled into the jewelry section at one of the thrift stores I visited and found a ton of great stuff. My favorite piece is the skull bracelet, but the geode necklace was also another great find. I’ve been lusting after similar pieces on sites like Shop dixi for awhile now but never got around to ordering one. So I was super happy to find this one, even though I may still buy some stuff from the site. I’ve been needing to accessorize more and now I’ve got some great motivation to get accessorizing!

7.  Vintage Aries Mug

I’m not an Aries but this mug was too cute to pass up. I figure I can start looking for the others in the thrifts and eventually get to my sign as well as the other signs of the zodiac. As you can see it’s a bit cracked but I got it for .40 so I couldn’t really complain.

** As always I linked up with Thriftasauraus over on Sir Thrift-a-lot’s blog. Go check out his and other bloggers cool thrift finds.

What I didn’t Buy at the Thrift Store

1. Display shelf. I’ve been searching for something similar for awhile but it just wasn’t exactly what I was looking for… so I decided against it. Looking back I kind of regret it, it’s pretty cute and wasn’t that bad price wise. oh well.

2.  Daisy Table. This table is super cute but I have no space for it so it was a no go.

3. Cute little cabinet. This was cute too but it didn’t have a back and I wasn’t feeling the doors. I would be probably be a good candidate for a DIY but the probability of that actually happening is super low plus I didn’t have any inspiration for it in store so I left it.

4. Coffee? Bar? cart. I saw this at a warehouse sale for a local thrift store. It was cute and super cheap ($5.00) but in the end I talked myself out of it since I wasn’t in love with it.

5. Mid Century Doll House. This doll house was adorable but it was kind of expensive and I don’t collect doll houses of have a kid to give it to so I left it behind.

6. JESUS (on velvet). If it was an velvet Elvis I would have picked this up in a heartbeat. I like some religious paraphernalia  but I wasn’t crazy about this guy and  I’m not very religious so I don’t really need a velvet jesus i’m not in love with.

7.  Cannisters. These were cool and kind of art deco but they were missing the sugar and to be honest I have a few of them so If it’s not a complete set or doesn’t blow my mind I tend to move along. Although looking back they are pretty cute…

8.  Balloon Ballerina. I saw this at a random estate sale, it’s made of what looks like a bunch of tiny balloons. It was cute and would be adorable in a kids room but I gots no kids.

9. 50’s lamp. This lamp was cute but It wasn’t cool enough for me to get it. And I’m pretty sure it was 25.00 and if you look you can see it was untested and had no shade, so that was crazy.

10.  FDR.  I’ve seen a bunch of framed photos etc of Kennedy (online not in the wild) but never of FDR. This frame was cool but wasn’t cool enough for me to get it.

11. Diamond Rug. OK I’ll admit I regret not getting this, but it was $100.00 and I just couldn’t.

12.  Cacti Mirrors. Aren’t these mirrors so bad they’re good? I seriously almost got the little one but then decided against it since I was already spending more than I wanted. I stand by the choice. They’re cool mirrors but I’m not kicking myself for leaving them.

13.  Shadowbox. I came across this shadowbox earlier in the year but I didn’t like the vignettes on the side. I decided to hold out for a nicer one and am glad I did because I totally found one!

14.  Bacon Genie. Ok I was never gonna get this I was just amused that this was a thing.

15. Dog bowl? I honestly have no idea what this is. It was a target item but I have no idea what the use for it is, do you? It has a bowl type thing in the dogs back is it a dog bowl? a planter? I have no idea. I’ve seen a million of these since taking this picture so I guess no one else knew what this was either.

16. Scandinavian-ish cabinet. This cabinet was kinda cute but yeah didn’t love it

17.  Zayne Doll. I’m not a 1D fan and don’t know anyone who is but the 10 year old in me totally gets the appeal. I remember having a doll of a certain sporty spice girl back in my day (even though doll sporty spice was kinda creepy).

18.  Side Tables. These tables were ok but not amazing. Pass.

19. Bold Wall Art.  Something about these two pieces of wall art were appealing to me, probably the bold colors. They were cool but again I didn’t love em’ so I left em’.

20. Mid Century-ish Cabinet. This was kinda cute but not a cabinet I couldn’t live without and definitely not one I was willing to try and figure out transportation for.

21. Lamps. My mom has a lamp similar to the one on the left which I kinda like but… didn’t need it.

22.  Owl salt and pepper. These were cute, but I wasn’t in love.

23. House drawer? I don’t really understand what this is for. It’s a cute little house ontop of this random drawer.  It was just so weird I had to take a picture of it.

Pinspired

I’ve seen a bunch of bloggers do these posts and always liked them but never actually tried them. So no time like the present right? If I can I may make this a recurring series on the dear old blog. I actually saw the skirt I’m wearing on ASOS before I ever saw the inspiration picture on pinterest and as soon as I saw It I knew I had to get it. All the stars seemed to aline in my favor as I got an ASOS voucher as a gift around the same time. I love the easy yet chic look in the inspiration look and decided to go for that this time around.  I switched out the turtle neck for my scoop neck crop top since i’m not a big fan of turtlenecks and I wore this outfit in the summer when turtlenecks were out of the question. I wore this skirt a bunch this summer although I’m not sure if I’ll be transitioning this skirt to fall ( it’s more of a spring/summer look to me), but we’ll see maybe some fall/winter inspiration for this skirt will hit me.

Pinspiration:

My interpretation:


Top and Skirt: ASOS || Shoes: thrift

Summer go-to

 

Crop Top: ASOS  ||  Dress (worn as skirt): thrifted (originally Kardashian Kollection)  ||  Shoes: Target
This outfit was pretty much my go-to last summer and it’s been in pretty heavy rotation this year too. It’s a cute easy outfit, it’s pretty perfect. I’ve worn this a million times but most recently I wore it to go to a flea market with my boyfriend. The boy is not into the whole thrift/vintage/flea market thing but he knows I am so he sucked it up an went with. It ended up being only a few miles from where we went apple picking last fall, apparently all of our excursions are about an hour NW of Minneapolis. Anyway I was a horrible blogger and only got one picture (see above) but the flea market was fun. There were lots of different people and a good amount of vintage stuff as well as new stuff, vegetables, food, DVDs, videos games, the works.  We got there around 9, I read a yelp review that you should get there by 7 (!) to get the best deals/stuff but I just couldn’t make myself (or the boy) get up at 5 in the morning on Saturday, it’s just wrong.  I didn’t end up getting anything as I didn’t find anything I couldn’t live without, but it was fun to go.

Thrifts of Horror: it’s got legs! It knows how to use them…

Don’t adjust your eyes people that is indeed a table with shapely women’s legs for legs. Yeah… For a cool $300.00, this table could have been mine. Sadly I have taste. Although there were some people checking it out. It’s almost so bad it’s good. I’m really not sure if I should be offended by it or impressed that when the idea of this table came up no one along the way said “oh hell no”.  It looks kinda sexual, like the table is either giving birth or ready for sex. Either way I’m mostly just highly amused that some company or someone made this. It looks like something that should be in Quagmire’s house from Family Guy (giggity). I found this gem while innocently browsing my local Salvation Army and I had to share it, because when do you ever run into a table with legs like that?

Thrift Hurl

I’m back with another thrift haul! This one is significantly smaller as it’s a roundup of the goodies I’ve found in just the last few weeks, but it’s quality not quantity. And away we go!

1. Vintage Thermo Serve Set

I saw this set at the Salvation army and thought it was too cool to leave behind. I love the caddy it comes in and for 7 bucks I couldn’t say no.

2. Vintage Chalkware lamp

I didn’t actually find this piece, a close friend of my mom’s gave it to me. She rents out a space at a local occasional sale and this piece didn’t sell at the last sale, so she gave it to me! How nice is that?!?! I’m obsessed with Reglor lamps and though I’m pretty sure this is not a real reglor it’s in the same style and I’m obsessed with it. I definitely would have paid retail for it so it was amazing to get it for free. If you’re ever in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area you should check out Flamingos, it’s an occasional sale full of affordable vintage finds and just happens to be where my mom’s friend sells her wares. Her spot is in the stairway to the basement, so make sure to check there if you ever happen to go on a sale day.

3. Dansk

After years of looking I found not one but TWO Dansk pieces, in the same day! I found the pitcher first at my local goodwill. It has some nicks and the braiding on the handle is coming undone but other than that it’s pretty nice. I thought the braiding on the handle might have been a camp crafter gone rogue, but after googling a bit I found a lot of other pitchers have the same thing. Kind of a weird touch but cool. The little sauce pan I found that same day at another thrift store. Two dansk pieces, of the same color, at two different thrift stores? It must have been my lucky Dansk day. Unfortunately it didn’t come with the lid, but beggars can’t be choosers. Both these items came out to about $14.00 which is a pretty good price.

4. Vintage Green lamp.

I found this lamp at the Goodwill and pretty much had to have it. I like the style and the cool glaze. I didn’t come with a lampshade so now I have to find a good shade for it. I’ve seen similar style lamps with drum like shades before so I might go with something like that. Or maybe a cool fiberglass shade. I’m not sure so if you have any ideas please share!

5. Lady Head Vases (I don’t know what these are called)

My mom’s friend also gifted us these vases from her booth. Some of them have a few chips but they’re still really cool.

* As always I’m linking up with Sir Thirft-a-lot’s Thriftasaurus link up.

Thrift Haul!

It’s been awhile since I’ve done a thrift haul partly because I’ve cut down on my thrifting and partly because I haven’t found a lot of amazing things lately. I’ve been thinking more practically and that I need to clean, organize, and donate the stuff I already have before acquiring anything new. So I wasn’t really doing any heavy thrifting for a couple months. Of course during those months I didn’t actually make any cleaning and organizing progress so… that’s still a work in progress. But, some spring cleaning is definitely in order (only a few more weeks till spring y’all, hopefully). Anyway I’ve made my way back to the thrift stores in recent weeks so I figured I’d share some of the things I’ve found recently and that I found a while ago but have yet to share.

1. Cathrineholm bowls.

 I got both of these bowls at a vintage store near Milwaukee last fall. I went on a mini road trip there to visit the SC Johnson HQ where they have some Frank Lloyd Wright buildings (more on that in a future post). Anyway we went to a flea market near Milwaukee and though it was a cool market there were hardly any of the vintage goods we were looking for. But, we had noticed a sign for an antique store nearby so we went and I found these bowls for $15 buck (total). The lady that ran the store wasn’t really into mid century stuff so she had great reasonable prices. The bowls aren’t in the best condition but for $15 bucks I couldn’t say no.

2. Chalk Figure Wall Art

I don’t exactly know what these are called but I stumbled upon them a couple months ago at Value Village and had to have them. It’s not often I find such cool kitschy stuff at the thrift store so when I see something I like I pounce. These are also in rough condition but I actually don’t mind that. They’re totally cool and were pretty cheap so I’m totally OK with the cracks and nicks.

3. Embroidered Wall Art

I fell in love with this embroidered wall art when I first saw it on Smile and Wave (here and here) . So when I saw it at Savers a few days ago I knew I had to get it. It’s huge but I really like it, just have to find a place for it.

4. Kitchen Wall Art

I  saw this while browsing a new Goodwill in my neighborhood. I really like the graphics, colors, and look of it.


5. & 6. Friendship and Jadeite

I pretty much only pick up Pyrex if it’s in a pattern I like/love. I see a good amount of it but I just don’t think it’s worth it if I’m not into the pattern. I do however love the friendship pattern so when I saw this bowl I immediately grabbed it and true to it’s name it came with a couple of friends. Tucked inside the larger friendship bowl was the smaller friendship bowl and a slightly larger Jadeite bowl!!! I’ve been looking for Jadeite in thrift stores ever since I saw Martha Stewart’s envious collection in a magazine and wanted to start collecting it. Though I’ve seen it a lot at Antique/Vintage stores I’ve never popped on them. So I was very excited to find this one hiding amongst the pyrex.


7.  Target Frame

I bought two prints from my best friend earlier this year and have been searching for frames for them ever since. If you’re into the art you can buy some of her prints here on her Etsy page (NSFW). I found this one and originally had it in mind for another print but this one ended up working in the frame better.  It’s a simple frame from target that I got at the salvation army, the salvation army and goodwill are good places to get cheap Target frames (at least in my neck of the woods). I may find a better frame for it in the future but for now I like it and the search for a frame for the second print continues.

8. Taylorstone “Cathay” Dishes

I’ve found a couple other dishes in this pattern before, so when I saw a good amount of it at a local thrift store I knew I had to get at least a couple of the dishes. Of course I ended up getting the whole set. Unlike Savers and the Salvation Army this thrift store doesn’t bundle like dishes so I was afraid it’d be more money than I wanted to spend. But after adding up all the prices It ended up being fairly reasonable. I don’t have a complete set but I’m definitely on my way!

As always I’m linking up with A Living Space, Sir Thrift-A-Lot, and Remnant. Be sure to check out all their cool finds too!