Thrifty Finds

I didn't participate in the thrifting parties last Monday.  I let Sunday night creep up on me, and I was too tired to take pictures.  I'm sure we did something very important last weekend.  What could it have been....

Nope, I got nothin'.  I know I lost an hour of sleep to Daylight Savings Time, so I'll blame that.  (i like dst.  i like the extra daylight in the evenings.  the kids and i take walks, or work in the yard.  it's worth losing the hour in the spring.)

Anyway, I wanted to participate with Thrift Share Monday over at Apron Thrift Girl and Magpie Monday with Me and My Shadow this week.  The problem was the the bulk of my thrifting and yard saling (yea!  the first yard sales of the year are popping up) this week were things that are not very interesting.  A belt for Joshua, flip flops for Bekah, etc.  And while I'm sure there are some who would love to look at pictures of those items, I'm not in the mood to photograph and describe them.  Even I have standards, people.  The most interesting thing I thrifted recently is a gift for Joshua's birthday, and that's not until next month, so it can't appear here before then.

Instead I'm going to show you just how varied the finds can be at thrift stores.  Everyone knows that you can get dishes (yippee), housewares, clothes, books, and furniture, but there is so much more out there.  Things you didn't know you wanted until you saw them!  Things you knew you wanted but never dreamed you'd get for just a couple of bucks!  Are you excited yet?  You should be.  Here are just a few of the out of the ordinary things that I've gotten at thrift stores or yard sales in the past couple of months.

This little prairie dress was hanging with the regular dresses.  It was probably meant as a costume, but maybe not.  The area where I live has a large population of conservative homeschoolers, ourselves among them, and while most of us dress much like anyone else, it is not unusual to see little girls dressed like this in stores.  My children would think nothing of having a girl wearing this in line in front of them at Walmart, and a girl behind them wearing a bikini.  Ok, they actually would ask about the bikini once we got to the car.  Regardless, this is a lovely dress, and Bekah really likes to play dress up from this era.  In addition, there is a Civil War battlefield less than half a mile from us, and they do reenactments there.  Many of the visitors wear costumes, so if it's not too cold, Bekah or a friend could wear this.  Its beautiful blue/green color is probably not very authentically mid-1800's, but we'll allow some poetic license.

This is a double dose of vintage goodness.  The clock is a reproduction, maybe from Pottery Barn or some similar retailer.  It looks like the headlight off a vintage car.  Rachel spotted it at the thrift store and bought it for me for my birthday.  It is heavy, and has a great retro look.  The book is a delightful vintage children's book called "Treat Shop".  It was printed in 1954, and is in fantastic condition.  The illustrations are so cute and vibrant.  Sometime soon I will do a post about vintage children's books and include some shots of the illustrations.

And finally, just to make sure I demonstrate the eclectic nature of thrifting/yard saling, here is a wooden duck call that Joshua bought for himself.  It has a great sound, and is in very good condition.  He's very happy to have it, and has been practicing a variety of calls.

** I'll be linking up early Monday morning, so hop on over and check out what others found this week.