thrifted :: folded measuring stick

this week's thrifty find is a folded measuring stick. i found this beauty at the same flea market as my tea box. it's actually from the same vendor! it was marked $15 but crossed out and marked down to $5. when the seller wouldn't budge on the price of the tea box i asked if he would throw the ruler in for free. when he said "yes", i was stoked!



not sure what it is about these old folding rulers, but they grab my attention every time i see one. i think it's the wood/metal combination along with the amazing old patina. this one unfolds to 72 inches!

thrifted :: bingo ball

i found this vintage bingo ball at a thrift shop a couple weeks ago. in case you don't know what a bingo ball is, it's where you put all the numbers for bingo. the caller spins it around and the next number comes out of the little rotating cup.



i found the bingo ball and immediately knew what i wanted to do with it. i brought it home and made it the perfect home for my grandfather's childhood marbles.



what would you put in a bingo ball if you found one?

thrifted :: things to fill my type drawer

one of my 101 in 1001 goals is to fill my vintage type drawer with fun little items. i went to a HUGE flea market the day before i left for the national stationery show.



here are all my treasures from the flea market. i found a lot of little goodies. it was hard trying to find inexpensive little things. i tried to keep each item in the $2 range because when you have a million little spaces to fill, the cost adds up quickly.

i got the 2 buck/reindeer on the top for $4 for the pair. they're about a millimeter too big to fit in the largest hole. darn. but i think they look just as cute on top. i found some great copper and wood type. i got a few individual pieces like a clown face, and a unicorn and then some individual letters to spell out "fin" and "roe". i found some hand cast lead toy soldiers, a cow, two little white ceramic birds, and a few other farm animals. looks like i have quite the little animal theme going. it's fun to start seeing it come together.



i also bought this super heavy, i assume it's lead, horse. she's so lovely and has an amazing patina. i believe she was once covered completely in a copper finish that you can see on her head and rear legs. i also believe she may have had a real hair tail, or some other sort of attached tail as it's now gone. she's a little too big to fit in my drawer spaces, but she's found a home right next to the drawer and keeps the other animals company.

thrifted :: vintage tin

since it's been foggy and overcast the last couple days i haven't been able to take any photos of vintage finds. luckily, i found this photo in my archive that i've never posted about. i found this great vintage tin at a flea market this past summer. i love the coloring and the ornate pattern design. i think i paid maybe $1 for it. 

homemade :: holiday gifts

first of all i need to apologize for the blurry first photo. i forgot to take final photos of this gift until after i gave them. i had to take photos in the evening at my mom's house.....



this was my first official cross stitch design that i've ever done from scratch. i've done small cross stitch projects in the past from patterns, but had never designed one myself.



it all started when i saw the quote: "home is where my mom is" somewhere on the interweb. i knew i wanted to do something with it, and finally decided on cross stitch. i made one for both my mom and my mother-in-law.



i was surprisingly able to create these with mostly thrifted materials. the hoops were all thrifted, some of the thread, and even the aida cloth. i bought maybe 2 or 3 skeens of thread retail.

bonus post :: a thrifted christmas

way back when the weather was warm in wisconsin i spent every friday morning thrifting around town. it was my “me” time....no kids, no work, just me and lots of cheap vintage goodies! it really became a way of life for me and my family. i decided early on in my thrifting adventure that i was going to try and do a totally thrifted christmas for my boys. (ages 5 and 2) they’re still young enough to not care that they’re getting “used” toys and since they outgrow them so fast it just made sense. the boys did occasionally come along with me on my adventures and so i prepared them for their thrifty christmas every time they asked for something at a sale. i’d say, “well, we’ll need to go home and write santa a list of all the things you see at these sales and then maybe he can get them for you for christmas.” and we did just that.



the big gifts of the year were two school desks that the boys happened to be with me when i found. the little dude begged for them. he sat in one and wouldn’t get out. they were an amazing steal at $5 each! yes, $5. they needed a little cleaning since the tops were covered with stickers, but otherwise in great vintage condition. i secretly let the man who was running the sale know that i wanted them and would be back. meanwhile i told the little dude that he needed to add it to his list for santa while he begged all the way to the car.

i spent the summer collecting other gifts and was so excited about christmas. i had found so many goodies. that is, until i started wrapping the gifts. i started second guessing what i had done. would the boys like all these gifts? would they care that they were from garage sales? what had i done to my boys? was i scarring them for life?

that feeling promptly left on christmas morning when they saw their desks and opened all their gifts with wide eyes and smiles. it didn’t matter what they got or where it was from. in fact, i think it made it more magical to them that santa actually read their letter and managed to get all these things that they had seen and written about. how in the world did he do that?





here are both the boys sitting in their desks opening the rest of their gifts (which they insisted on). you can see the huge stack of thrifted books they both got and the excitement in their faces. i think they each got approximately 15-20 books. something that would have cost a fortune if purchased new. i’m very particular when buying used books. they either have to be really cool with vintage artwork or new and high quality. i like to dig through to find things like caldecott winners etc. things that aren’t just garbage.



here you can see some of the other gifts....a little computer, a basketball game (where you try to shoot the ball from a lever and beat your opponent), a school bus (that is fought over often). these are just a few of the other things they received, there was much more yet to be opened. all in all i’d guess i spent less than $30. for EVERYTHING! their ENTIRE christmas. they got way more gifts than they normally would have if we had bought them new and enjoyed it just as much. in fact, my hubby expressed how he thought i bought too much on several occasions. it’s just too much fun when everything costs 25 cents or $1.00!

oh, and the best part of being thrifty? the toys are already out of their original packaging! that’s super great for 2 reasons. #1. less garbage to throw in the landfill, #2. spending our christmas morning playing instead of trying to get things out of all the overdone packaging these days!

will we do a thrifty christmas again? absolutely! will our kids know the difference or care? not for one second!

weekend "up north"

this past weekend we headed "up north" to visit the hubby's side of the family for a few birthdays and anniversaries. while there we swam, rode skateboards for the first time, and scored some vintage jewelry from my mother-in-law that i'll talk more about in later post. (because it really does deserve it's own post) have a great weekend! we'll see you on monday!

vintage pins

these are all my new vintage thrifted pins! i've been having so much fun looking through old boxes of jewelry at rummage sales, thrift shops, and flea markets. the feather pin in the top photo is my favorite! i'm excited to start embellishing my outfits, purses, etc. with all my new finds! oh, and i don't think i paid more than $5 for any of these. honestly, on average they were probably less than $1 each!