Recent Finds

I don't live in an area with a lot of thrift stores, which for someone like me, could be a good thing. In our first apartment, we lived in an area with thrift stores nearly every mile or so. We'd spend our days off scouring the shops looking for whatever struck our fancies. Here, yard sales rule! While we haven't been hitting them heavily this year, the few we have gone to, we've done well. Here's a few of my favorite finds:



I picked up this Fire King dish in the Summerfield pattern for free. Yes, free. They had fishing lures in it for 25 cents apiece and I just wanted the dish. When asked how much for the dish, she let me have it. Ooooo-kay! I'm not gonna argue! Sadly, a couple of days later, the dish got knocked off the shelf and a chunk of the handle chipped off, but it's still usable. I won't be able to turn around and sell it, but I'll probably use it for holding craft supplies or something.

A recent sale had loads of boy clothes in Peter's size and I had fun rummaging through clearly-marked bins for warmer winter clothes. Usually, clothes are piled up and you have to check each tag for sizes, and I dread going through those-- I have limited time and if Peter is with me, he's usually running off or struggling in my arms to get down. This sale had them neatly folded and sorted and I really appreciate that. I scored a bunch of tops, bottoms, long sleeve pajama sets, and some shoes for Peter. When I got home, I found that two of the pajama pants had bad elastic waists. The rubber rotted and no longer had any stretch. An easy fix and I had elastic on hand, so a quick sit-down at the sewing machine and they're good as new again!

I have a thing for vampires. No idea why, just always have. Not that I want to be a vampire or get bitten by one, but I guess it's just the mystery of the unknown. I devoured Ann Rice's Vampire series when I was a teen, then I dove right into the Twilight books (but I don't care for the movies), and right before we canceled our satellite, I watched an episode of True Blood on HBO and was just a teeny bit disappointed I wouldn't be able to see what happened next. I always meant to check out the books, but never remembered the author's name or the original title of the series. Lo and behold-- the entire Sookie Stackhouse series for 70 cents! That's 10 cents per book! And I don't have to wait to read the next one either! I've already read 3 and they are so enjoyable, something I can really sink my teeth into! (har har) I'll have to see if I can find the True Blood series on dvd.. hmm.


I saw something similar to these in a magazine ad: skeleton salad servers at one of those pricey home goods stores for $20 a set. They were so cool! Andrew and I love Halloween and we're getting ready to start pulling out the decorations and get into the spooky spirit. The only thing I didn't like was the price tag, so I knew I'd never go to the store (which is far away) or even bothered to check online for one of those. Then we went to Target the other day and found these at half the price. Pretty similar to the ones I saw in the ad, though I don't have the magazine anymore and I'm too lazy to check online. I don't need them, but they're so cool and our salad tongs did break over the summer, so technically, we do need them. But really, I was just excited to spot them! They were the very last pair left, except for some cheap-o plastic ones, but I wanted the metal ones; they're sure to last longer. I'm looking forward to the next time I make salad for dinner so I can use them!

Any good finds for you lately?

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