I Shop, So You Don't Have To

Now that I finally have a phone with a camera on it, we can, as they say on The Bachelor, take our relationship to the NEXT LEVEL.

I'll let you know what treasures I find during my thrifting excursions, and you can tell me if you want me to pick them up for you!

Today's Haul:

World's Largest Lampshade. To grasp the enormity of this item, please use the man's head, the wheelbarrow, and the brass chandelier as reference points.

3 inch Tall College Cash Crock. Yeah, believing that 2 fistfuls of change will offset any college expenses IS a crock.

The One-Use Wonder: If you are driven to distraction when your tacos topple, I'm sure you could use a chili-pepper-shaped taco holder:

Cutesy Air Force Sign, 3 iterations available: Also known as, "The Air Force keeps moving us and I refuse to pack up this crap one more time."
Old Hair Dye: Why buy new when you can pay the same price at your thrift store and help some old lady downsize all in one fell swoop?

...And last but not least, everything you'll need for those fun At-Home Gynecological exams:

2 Exam tables, stirrups included, felt bunny extra:

Let me know what you would like. I ship C.O.D.

A Tisket, A Tasket, Check Out My Great Big Basket!

So, I had a little lapse in my "no thrift store shopping summer" on Monday. I managed to spend $60, mostly on clothes. My new theory is that if I go MORE OFTEN, perhaps I won't spend as much. Thoughts?

The bargain of the day was this gorgeous basket. Please don't ask if I needed a basket, or if I had recently gotten rid of a ton of baskets at our charity yard sale. This is an entirely different basket, you see. It looks a little orange-y next to our oak front door, but it's really a nice, weathered color.

Couldn't you just picture it in my (non-existent) mudroom full of shoes or beach towels, or backpacks?

At 25% off of $2.92 (that's $2.19 people!) it was a steal.

Problem is, I've told Tom I'll sell it on Craigslist if I can't find a place for it.
So far-- too big for the kitchen, hallway, office. Please help me find a use for it so I can keep it.

Here are some visuals, and a 9 year old girl, to help you with scale:





My favorite is the one where Shadow tried to get in on the action and knock the basket over.
Linking to Second Time Around Tuesday.

P.S. I know it's Wednesday.

It's a Wrap

Big goings-on over here. First of all, my beautiful new Chevy Traverse passed a big test--thrifting! While car shopping, I had 2 major requirements:

Enough cargo space for thrift shop purchases (who wants to have to borrow a pickup truck when you could just shove whatever in the back of the car?)

and

Power Windows so that I could chat with the adorable 6 year old boy on our street who stands by his mailbox waving as I come in and out of the neighborhood. When he was on my driver’s side (coming into the neighborhood) I rolled down my window to chat, but when he was on the passenger side (leaving) I’d be too lazy to do the across-the-car-reach-and-crank and I'd feel guilty for blowing him off.

So, I got to greet little Daniel last week with a simple push of the button, AND I shoved a major purchase into the Traverse on Monday with no ill effects.

Wooohoo!

The purchase? Two large white laminate cabinets ($18/ea.) for our basement storage room. Tom was less than thrilled. He is the same one who actually said to me, wait for it… “Why do you need so much room in the new car? Don’t we already have everything we need?” Silly man.

When he saw the monster cabinets sitting in the carport, he groaned, and I knew I had the challenge of making them an indispensable part of Chez See.

On Tuesday, Molly was “sick,” so I missed work, parked her in front of the tv and got to work in the basement. I pulled every single box, bin and piece of furniture out of there, checked and sorted all the contents, and consolidated in order to make more room. Some items were super heavy—military trunks, dressers, a foosball table, toolboxes, and bins full of rollerblades not touched since I was fun and single. My back is still screaming.

You may be asking, “If you are bringing more storage into the basement, why did you need to purge first? Well, my vision for the cabinets was to make a gift-wrapping station. Let it be known I’m neither a good wrapper nor a good gifter, so I might not really need a designated space for this, but that’s beside the point.

In addition, all of our wrapping supplies have been happily ensconced with the dust bunnies under the guest bed for 6 years bothering no one, but you can’t stop a woman with a vision. So, in ADDING the cabinets and the wrapping supplies to the basement, I had to SUBTRACT other things.

Chairs went to the shed. My old teaching supplies went to the recycling bin, and a huge pile of junk formed for our Water Project yard sale.

The result? This:

Went to:












I know I could have cuted it up a lot more, but I decided to only use stuff that was already languishing in our storage room. The painting of my grandparents’ house was done by my mother in high school, the huge lamp is awaiting a make-under, and the ribbon holder was my mom's. I even have her brass turtle ashtray from when she would sneak a smoke late at night, thinking we didn't know. These are things I didn't want to get rid of, but they don't really fit in elsewhere in the house.



Don't you just love my little Sunday School drawing of my family?

One cabinet is for for gift bags, tissue paper and wrapping paper, and the other side has my fabric scraps.

So much fun!

Of course, now I have to deal with the yard sale pile:

Anybody need a tiki torch?

Vintage Train Cases

Rhoda over at Southern Hospitality gives readers a chance to show off their Thrifty Finds on Mondays. Here are mine:

I snagged these 2 vintage train cases seconds before my friend Theresa swooped down to get 3 or 4 more. I guess someone donated a slew to the thrift shop in one day. Cost: $1.50 each.

I thought they would be fun to put on the stairs to catch the assorted junk that piles up there. Realistically, they’ll remain open, because if they close, I’ll forget to carry things up. And when I say “I,” I mean it, because the other members in my household have no concept of carrying stuff up the stairs.

If I’m going to do the work, I might as well enjoy looking at these train cases while I do it.

Frugal Friday

I’ve written several posts about my penchant for dumpster diving and thrift shopping. These are two things I enjoy doing, but if they don’t float your boat, I understand completely. Personally, I don’t like going to yard sales (too early in the morning; I don’t like seeing the people associated with the stuff), and I’m not a coupon clipper (they fester in my purse until I realize they are expired and throw them out), so I realize we all have different shopping habits.

I thought it would be fun, however, to compile a short guide for those of you who may not have much experience in the dumpster diving/ thrift shopping arena. If this isn’t your thing, I’ll see you next time!

There are certain items you never have to buy new, because they pop up regularly at thrift shops and curbside. These are items that someone feels the need to Get.Rid.Of.Immediately. because they can’t stand having them in the house one minute longer.

Think: Seasonal, Bulky, Short span of use.

Many items fit in all three categories.

Here of some of the things I see frequently:


Seasonal:

Artificial Christmas trees, Christmas tree stands, lawn decorations (such as reindeer covered w/ white lights), ping pong tables, those seed/fertilizer spreader things for the lawn, hose handlers (plastic boxes that you wrap your hose up in), turkey roasting pans and croquet sets. Croquet sets? I guess they seem like a quaint idea at the time of purchase but they must not get much use. I am convinced the sets I’ve seen curbside around town are all the same one, passed from family to family.

With seasonal items, when the season is over, people don’t seem to want to store them. Oh, and if the idea of buying an artificial tree doesn’t thrill you, particularly one that might seem a little Charlie Brown-ish, you can do what I do: real downstairs, fake in an upstairs hallway to hold all of the kids’ treasures and the Disney and professional baseball related items from the in-laws.

Baby Items:

If you are a first time mom, you might cringe at the thought of using someone else’s cast-offs. You’ve done the research, registered for presents, and are probably all set. I myself had a $40 nursing stool to position my feet at the exact right angle while nursing my firstborn.

But let’s say you find yourself pregnant with number 3, you’re pushing 40 and you gave away your baby stuff a few years ago; there is no need to purchase anything new.

Baby items fit the bulky and short span of use criteria and include: exersaucers, bouncy seats, high chairs, strollers, baby gates and big, bulky plastic toys such as doll houses, work benches, and slides. Baby bathtubs? I saw 23 the last time I went to the thrift shop. Baby stuff lasts forever, and glad is the mom who gets rid of it and sees her house grow larger instantly. You may want to avoid thrifting cribs and car seats b/c of safety concerns, but they are widely available if you are interested.


Pet Items:

Aquariums, hamster cages and Habitrails pop up curbside and in thrift shops all the time! Sure, you may have to wash them, but free is free. With the small pet deathwatch finally over, eager moms get rid of these items as fast as they can, both to ease their children’s pain and sadness, and to ensure the family is not properly equipped to take in any new rodents in the near future. Empty promises of “I’ll clean the cage every week!” hold no more value in in these households. Sometimes moms will bundle together aquarium rocks, fish food, and pet toys so you’ll be set.

Generally Bulky:

You’ll find a lot of kitchen items in this category, particularly small appliances that only have one use. Bread machines, crock pots, ice cream makers, turkey roasting pans, crab pots, George Foreman grills, coffee machines, iced tea machines (my favorite!), and toaster ovens. The shelves of my thrift store are LINED with these items every day.

The nice thing about free or cheap is that you don’t have to feel guilty when you, too, decide after a few uses that something is taking up too much space in your kitchen and you donate it to the next person. Other items that aren’t big but present storage issues are ice buckets, wine glasses, pitchers and serving platters.

Well, this list is by no means exhaustive, but I’m now exhausted. This will either make you want to check out a thrift store or dumpster today, or in my case, go clean the basement and see what you can purge.

Give Me A Staple Gun, Part 2

Here's a closer pic of a zebra print chair. I was too cheap to get enough material to cover them all in it, so there are only 2 of these. Ever see any brown and white zebras running around?

Give Me a Staple Gun, I'll Give You a Chair

A month or so ago I bought a run-down 60's or 70's dining room set at my favorite thrift shop. I was initially pumped up by this awesome score, but I got bummed out when I realized they reeked of cigarette smoke and "old taxi cab." Ick.

A lot of Murphy's Oil Soap helped cut down on the stench, and replacing the foam seats helped, too. They either smell much better now, or we've just gotten used to it, much in the way we don't smell the dog anymore.

Tom stained the table dark brown with gel stain that was a vast improvement over the old orangey color. I spray painted the chairs and made new seat pads and covers with my glue and staple guns. I did a pretty crappy paint job, but the overall effect looks pretty decent. The nice thing is, with all 3 leaves in, and using a hodge podge of chairs, this bad boy will seat 10 people!

Here's the tab:

Table and 7 chairs: $44

New Foam: $15

Zebra Fabric: $18

Blue Velvet: $0 (already had)

Gel Stain: $0 (already had)

Spray paint: $40

$117 for the whole shooting match seems like a pretty good
deal.

Here's an "after" shot:

One More...

Ok, I forgot about these. Here is a collection of leatherette jewelry boxes ranging from 50 cents to $5.00. I like them even more than the $100 ones in the PB Catalog.