Thrifts of Horror

I feel kind of bad about adding this as a Thrifts of Horror post, as I'm no artist and criticizing someone else's art seems mean. That said it's pretty bad, mainly because the father and son just look... well creepy. If you look behind it you can see a similar sculpture of a George Washington lookalike and some random kids. I suppose all people like different things and someone may love this, but the last time I was at this thrift store both figures were still there. I just can't imagine spending any money on this.

It's that time again

image via google images

It's memorial day and aside from barbequing and remembering our fallen veterans it's also 50% off thrift store day. If you, like me, plan to brave the crowds and score some deals this memorial day here are few tips I have for participating in these bargain hunting escapades.

source

1. Know What's on Sale. Yes they're called sale days but that means different things to different retailers. Make sure you know what is and isn't on sale at each thrift store. This ensures you don't end up falling in love with an item you thought was on on sale.  If you're in the Twin Cities metro area Meghan of High Plains Thrifter has a round up of local thrift stores and what they're offering on sale today.

2. Expect Crowds and Crowding. Believe it or not your not the only one who loves a good deal. So, on sale days all the bargain hunters descend on your favorite thrift stores in search of great deals. This means lots and lots of people. If your not in the mood to brave the crowds don't go and save your sanity. People can be pushy and irritating and there will be lots of them.


3. Know Your Limits. Don't just buy something because it's on super sale. Make sure that even if the item is a measly $1.50 it's something you really like, fits you well, and you have room for it. If you can, make a budget for the day and try not to overspend. A tip I got from Sammy of Sammy Davis Vintage is to budget a set amount for each store you're planning to go to and stick to it. Sammy rations out $20.00 a store, which I think is a pretty good amount, if you go over that amount at one store subtract your overages from your budget for the next store and spend accordingly. You can read more of Sammy's thrifting tips here.

4. Be Prepared. Another tip I got from Sammy Davis Vintage is to be prepared. Make sure you've eaten before you go and bring a snack. Bring along some tunage if your favorite thrift store has less than desirable tunes. One of my favorite thrift stores' station of choice is a christian radio station. I don't have anything against christian music or radio stations they're just not something I listen to on a daily basis. Sometimes the music a store plays can really get to you, so bringing along and iPod just in case never hurts. Also be aware of what your wearing, this is especially important on sale days. Sale days are notorious for long dressing room lines, so wear something form fitting so you can try on clothes outside of the dressing room. Many people recommend leggings, a tank top and maybe a skirt.

5. If Your Unsure Grab It Anyway. I do this sale day or not but it's even more pertinent on a sale day since the amount of people in store grows significantly. Try on the item or carry it around with you, but don't put it down unless you've though it over and are sure you don't want it.

6. Be Courteous and Keep a Cool Head. I can't tell you how many sale days I’ve gotten irritated by my fellow thrifters. Someone blocks the aisle with their cart, moves slowly, pushes you into the aisles with their cart etc.Try and keep a cool head. People are going to irritate you, being amongst so many energetic bargain hunters will do that to you. Breathe deep and if it's really getting to you leave. No bargain is worth your sanity.

7. Carts Only When Necessary. Personally I hate carts in thrift stores, especially on sale days. I generally try to avoid carts like the plague no matter when I'm thrifting. But, sometimes rules are meant to be broken. The last sale day I participated in I ended up getting a cart of sorts (one of those weird roll-y shopping carts they have at savers) because I found a piece of Pyrex I wanted and didn't want to put it back as doing so may mean losing it. If you get a cart be courteous of other people and try not to push them around with it. Carts are also necessary if you plan on stocking up on lots of items or are having a particularly fruitful day at the thrift store.  Also, if you end up with a cart also be sure to guard it well and don't leave it unattended, doing so may lead to missing items.

These are a few of my favorite things (this week)

1. Gabifresh's striped dress and sneaker wedges.  When sneaker wedges first hit the runway I was skeptical, way skeptical. I like sneakers and am OK with wedges but the look of a sneaker with all the reduced comfort of a wedge didn't really sound amazing. Then I kept seeing them and when I saw Gabi's take I kinda fell in love. I'm still not sure I'll be plunking down the cash to participate in this trend, but It has inspired me to dust off my sneakers and incorporate them into outfits outside of pants.

Image via Gabifresh

2. Nicolette Mason's shoe collection. I've followed Nicolette's blog for a couple years now and love her style. I knew her shoe collection was drool worthy but when I saw all the glittery goodness in one photo I'm even more envious of her awesome shoes. Check out her interview here with Glitter Guide.

Image via The Glitter Guide

3. This fabulous lady's street style via the ModCloth blog. I saw this image on pinterest and immediately loved it. The cat eye glasses and the mint and polka dots, this lady has some serious style..

Image via ModCloth Blog

4. Star Trek Decor. I'm kind of a trekkie.  I'm not a super serious I speak Klingon and go to star trek conventions one, though I'd totally go to one. But I do like star trek. I've watched a lot of the original series and some of next generation. So I kind of love all the star trek paraphernalia I've found via pinterest. Most notably this awesome vintage light and these cool pillows.

vintage star trek light, image via Retro Renovation

star trek pillows via Yellow Bug Boutique

5. The coolest waffle iron ever. Waffle chair anyone?

apparently it's a prototype, Image via google images and pinterest

6.  This pineapple slicer. I love pineapple but don't like paying extra for the pre-cut stuff and aren't a huge fan of carving it manually. So, when i saw this I was kind of in love, I think I need one.

Vacu Vin Pineapple Slicer, image via pinterest

7. JULIA SARR JAMOIS. Her style, her hair, I love it all.

 *all images via google images


8. Jewelry from Nasty Gal. 

All images via Nasty Gal

9. This collar from ASOS. My mom has a vintage collar that I thought I could wear but it has some stains, tears, and is in need or repair. I will attempt to fix it but in the meantime this collar from ASOS is a close match to it and I'm kind of in love with it.

Image via ASOS

                                                                    image via ASOS

What I wore to a sweltering Art-A-Whirl

Skirt: Thrifted Top: Forever 21 Sandals: DV by Dolce Vita

  I wore this outfit Friday to go to the library, do a little thrifting and attend a few Art-A-Whirl shows. We went to my best friend's close friend Rudy Fig's solo gallery show at the Rogue Buddha Gallery. She has a cool whimsical style best described as "a cosmic world of candy coated vixens, magical garden tea parties, and psychological purging." If you didn't get out to art-a-whirl last week or didn't see Rudy's show (and you're in the Minneapolis area) you can catch it at Rogue Buddha Gallery until June 16th. We also visited Tarnish and Gold's Buy Art show that my best friend was showing in along with lots of other great artists. The Buy Art show runs until the end of June so go and see it if you're in the north east Minneapolis area. We ended the night at the Future Presence 5 show at Future Presence Gallery. It was our first time at art-a-whirl and it was a pretty fun night despite the hot and humid weather.  

       You may or may not remember this skirt from this post a couple weeks ago. When I got the skirt I knew how I wanted to style it for the colder months but was at a bit of a loss with what to wear with it in the summer. So, I went through my wardrobe and came up with different tops to pair with it for Summer. I came up with more than a few that I'll definitely be posting later this summer. Although it may not look like it I'm actually mixing patterns. The top is a thinner striped top and the skirt has a cute little skeleton key print. I think they work well together, although the colors of the skirt and the top aren't exact matches they complement each other well. The sandals may have been better if they were a neutral color, but I love these sandals soo much I just couldn't help but wear them. I was lusting hard for these sandals last year when I saw them on karmaloop in turquoise. I loved them but I didn't have the money to buy them. So, when I finally got a job I knew I had to have them. The only problem was they were out of season and unavailable at most stores. There were some on PLNDR and eBay but they weren't in my size. Miraculously I found a pair on a random website and bought them, in February. So when it was finally hot enough to rock sandals I was super excited. In other words, expect to see these a lot in the coming weeks/months.

Gwynnie Style

Inspiration

Today I'm trying something different and linking up with the lovely ladies at Two Birds and their inspiration monday feature. Basically every week they post a photo of a celebrity and then style an outfit inspired by the photo. This week's inspiration is a casual yet chic Gwyneth Paltrow. 

My interpretation

ignore the mess in our backyard we're in the process of moving things around/ spring cleaning

Sweater: ASOS  Dress worn as skirt & Tights: Target  Boots: Gifted

Gwyneth's dress (skirt?) reminded me of a target dress I got a couple years ago so I wore that as a skirt and paired it with this light pink kitty sweater I got from ASOS.  I liked it because the cat on the sweater looks my cat Tang. I decided to forgo the necklace since the sweater I chose had an image on the front and a necklace would look a bit too busy. I probably could have added a few other accessories but I was in a rush when I left the house and didn't have any time to grab any.

     Since Friday and Saturday were incredibly hot I was afraid this look would be a bit too warm.. Luckily by Sunday, after a Saturday rain/hail storm, the temperature had cooled and I had to add tights. I actually really like this outfit. I would have never put it together by myself but I like it and would wear it again. In case you were wondering the random white dog in my gif is a friends dog we're watching while he moves. His name is Famous and he's a white German Shepard. I took my pictures outsides so I could throw the ball/spend some time with him and try out a new picture location. I think he thought all the jumping was a little cooky but he's a good sport.

What I left behind

     A couple of the blogs I read do a "what I left behind" feature and I've fallen in love with them, so I've decided to add it to my blog as a feature as well. I'm trying to get over my feeling-odd-taking-pictures-in -places-no-one-else-is and just do it.  And I have to say I'm happy I did, it's more like I took you all thrifting with me. Plus you can finally see the good stuff I passed up. These pictures are from a few weeks ago and now you can finally see the sideboard I left behind, and I promise this will be the last post in which I talk about it. Anyway here are the things I left behind:

1. These Milk glass-esque containers.
      I like milk glass but I don't really need more glassware in my house. 

2. These (there were one or two inside) Forest Fancies Pyrex Cinderella bowls. 

        Honestly I'm just not a big fan of this pattern, though it's growing on me. I see it everywhere but it's never been cheap enough that it was worth buying, at least in my opinion.

 3. These funky mid century cups (?)

        I liked these but I didn't really understand their point. They're not really deep enough to be good  cups and though I like the pattern it just wasn't enough to get them. 

  4. These Fondue pots
      I just think fondue pots are fun and someday I want to have a 70's fondue party. These were cool but I see fondue pots everywhere, I guess i'm waiting to find the one I can't live without.

5. This Pyrex Red Hostess Oven and Table Set 
Honestly this looks better in the picture than it did in real life. Though cool it was scratched to within and inch of it's life and had some chips so I passed. I also think it was a bit too pricey for the condition and I decided not to buy Pyrex in bad condition.

6 . The infamous mid century sideboard
OK I do regret not getting this. I don't really have a need for it but it is super cute. For some reason at the time it's $25.00 asking price was just a bit too much for me (I was being cheap that day) and I just couldn't reason buying it. So now it's the one that got away.

7. This mid century(?) side table
 I thought the side table next to the sideboard looked a little mid century too and was kind of cute.

8. This funky owl lamp
This is another thing I kind of wish I had gotten. It's just kinda funky and random.

So that's what I left behind. That was actually a pretty good day thrifting, a lot of times there isn't that much to leave behind. did you leave anything behind recently? do you regret it?

Orange-cha glad

Top: Thrifted  Skirt: Jason Wu for Target  Shoes: DSW

      I wore this outfit to go to a belated Mothers' Day celebration with my mom and grandparents. I like the simplicity of the outfit but I think it would look good with a few accessories too. In the Spring/Summer I have a harder time punching up outfits since layering is not really practical. So I'm gonna try and add more with accessories this season.
       Anyway although I have a few Target/Designer collaborations most are pieces I found while thrifting. I'm not really one to wake up early to get to the collaborations. All the crowds and frenzy just aren't very appealing to me. But this year when the Jason Wu collection came out I decided to give it a try since I had an old Target gift card from my birthday burning a hole in my pocket. I went in the afternoon the day the collection launched and there wasn't one piece of the collection left in stores. I suppose I should have gone earlier but I'm not a morning person and designer collections just aren't enough to get me up in the morning. So I gave up and figured I might be able to find some in a thrift store some time. Cut to a few weeks later when I had a fiery urge to shop and decided to go to Target, since I still had my gift card. To my surprise the Jason Wu collection had been re-stocked and there were still quite a few pieces available. I checked out a few and decided on this skirt. I really like the skirt it has a cute floral pattern and goes well with a variety of shirts. I'll definitely be remixing this skirt a lot this summer.

Thrift Find of the Year?

Last wednesday I went to the dentist and the dentist is near my local thrift route. I wasn't really sure if I wanted to go thrifting or not and sort of went back in fourth in my mind but decided to go. Savers was having a mothers day sale which was 30% off clothes, accessories (not jewelry) and bedding. I went to Savers and didn't find anything good but was kind of in the groove and decided to go to the other three.
Goodwill was OK, I found a cool piece of comic book art that someone made. The frame is crap but I thought the art was actually really good and nerdy. I've recently been looking more for cool art at thrift stores but haven't had much luck. So I liked this enough to get it.

 After goodwill I went to the Salvation Army, I didn't expect to find anything since though it's on my route it hadn't heeded any great finds. so I was browsing and went to the furniture section to see if I could find anything cute and mid century. I didn't really see anything but I did see a dresser that looked kind of like campaign furniture, but wasn't. So I went over to look at it and then when I saw it wasn't campaign I looked to my left and recognized a distinctive handle of ... a Broyhill Brasilia dresser! I almost couldn't believe it, I looked it over to make sure, grabbed the whole tag (apparently you're only supposed to get the bottom of it) and giddily sped to the register. It was $79.99 but with tax it came out to $85.00! I've been stalking Broyhill Brasilia online and recently saw a local vintage re-seller sell a credenza for $400.00. And on Craigslist I know mid century dressers are listed for around 100.00 to 400.00, So I knew it was a steal and I was getting it. It needs some work, someone decided to paint the top and it has a few nicks here and there but I still love it! Anyway, I was so full of adrenaline after that I couldn't look around anymore. I quickly browsed the dresses and purses and then decided I just had to go and call my mom to tell her. Unfortunately she was at work so I left a message and decided to go to my last thrift store despite my adrenaline high.

We haven't moved it to my room yet, it's kind of heavy, but this is what it looks like.

Oh hey there Oliver.

 

After that high I calmed down a bit and decided I should finish up my round and go to Value Village. I figured with the Brasilia find I was on one hell of a roll and shouldn't stop the momentum. Thankfully Value Village didn't disappoint and I found some cool 70's canisters. I've wanted some of these ugly kitschy canisters for a while but never bought any. These were in good shape and pretty cheap so I decided to get them. The middle one doesn't have a top, despite my searching, but I figure I can use it as a planter or vase or something.

I'm linking up again with Her Library Adventures' Flea Market Finds, so check out all the other cool vintage finds over there too.