What I didn't buy at the thrift store

1. A Fox

I found this Illustrated fox/ cardboard cutout at Savers a few weeks back. The fox is very handsome and would be a fun piece in any room really, especially a kids room, but I didn't really have a need for it and lately have been trying to not bring in unnecessary things. Hopefully this got a home on some adorable child's wall.

2. Brass and Marble side table 

I really liked this side table, but wanna know what I have a lot of? side tables. I'm not even kidding I have five in one room. This was cute but I need closed storage more than side tables, so I passed.

3. lil Wishbone

I used to have a dog named Wishbone (before the TV show started thank you very much) and she was the sweetest dog. I also was a fan of the PBS show and even went to meet wishbone once at the Mall with my best friend and her mom, but the line was so long we got fed up and left. Anyway I spotted this mini Wishy at an estate sale and had instant nostalgia, but stuffed animals I need not.

4. Rich n' Creamy Nestle Cup

I loved the typography on this mug and the cool 70's vibes. I was going to get it if I ended up finding anything else, but I didn't find anything else that day and forgot about the mug. 

5. Mid Century Modern Library cart

I've seen these before on craigslist and such but have honestly never really got them. I'm sure there is someone somewhere who styles these bad boys amazingly and would make me regret not buying it. But, I'd rather have cleaner looking closed storage or storage with non-slanted shelves. I thought about this for a while (it was super cheap) but I decided to pass and let it go to someone who'd be really excited for it.

6. Gold Lamp with potential

Something about the clean lines of this gold lamp drew me to it. With the right lampshade and/or a coat of spraypaint it could be really cool. But for the most part unless it's an amazing Mid Century lamp that I just cannot live without I generally pass on lamps, like side table I already have too many. 

7. Men's symbol Mug

This was another piece I told myself I'd go back for if I found anything else, but I didn't. It's very Austin Powers and I love that about it. The only thing with vintage mugs is they are often pretty small. That is obviously coming from the land of huge portions and giant mugs but I've become so accustomed to bigger mugs I find it hard buy cute smaller ones at the thrift store. I feel like I'd opt for the bigger ones and they'd be used mostly for decoration, which is kind of silly.

8. Backpack

I was given an old real leather coach mini backpack a few weeks before I saw this one. When I first spotted it I was hopping it was a bucket bag, so when I found out it was a backpack I was a little bummed. It's super cute but I don't really need two small backpacks, so I left it.

8. TACO CATS IN SPACE!!!!!

I saw this shirt hanging on a dressing room and loved it. But I wasn't really in the mood to check the tag or try it on.  I love it though, had I been in a different mood ( and it been in my size) I may have bought it. 

9. Small Mid Century Lamp

I carried this around with me a bit, it was only three dollars but in the end I decided it really wasn't cool enough for me to bring home. Plus I don't really have a place for it.

10. Big Box Light

I liked the look of this lamp. Obviously it's very big and bulky but something about it was appealing, I still passed though.

11.  Mixed Media lamp

 This lamp had a cool look i'd never seen before. But didn't need it.

12.  Sand Dollar Lamps

There were two of these lamps and I actually think they're really cool. I love the texture on them and think they have a really interesting shape. But I really have no place to put them, so I passed.

Wanderings: Des Moines, Iowa |Day 2|

The second day of our trip the first thing we did was check out some vintage stores near our hotel. We went into a vintage costume rental store that was kinda fun to look at and then checked out a vintage/antique store across the street. The vintage/antique store had a lot of cool stuff from a variety of eras.

Heywood Wakefield dresser, swoon

Cathrineholm fondue set that was too expensive for moi. 

this old pool hall ball rack was pretty cool 

Cool signs and glove display hands. 

Barbie and Bakelite

This french bulldog statue was super cute

Scary or cool? you decide

The Rocket shaped candy/toy dispenser was pretty awesome.

What up Ronald?

The best part for me was that the whole upstairs of the shop was a Mid Century Modern wonderland. Ugh I just wanted to take everything in that room. The store was nice but the prices were a bit high. My mom ended up buying a cool Mexican necklace but that was about it.

Mod/Atomic chair 

Eames chairs and other mid century delights

Cool ball chair ( I so want an egg/ball chair you have no idea) and to the left are those cool planter chairs that i'm also obsessed with.  

Heywood Wakefield table and chairs as well as part of a Barcelona chair 

If you look on the top right of this photo those orange and yellow sphere things are cool retro pool floats. One is a chair and  the other a floating table thing. So cool. 

After the vintage shops we went to the Des Moines botanical garden which was just ok aside from the very cool water lilies they had in their water garden, they were definitely the highlight of the gardens. Our favorites were the big round ones that kind of looked like trays. But it was also cool to see the others as well, some of them had shower head like stigma ( I think that's the right word) which was kinda freaky but also pretty cool.

these were our favorites. Someone should totally make a tray that looks like that it would be so awesome. 

After the botanical garden we went to the Robert D. Ray Chinese Gardens. The gardens were built by a Chinese immigrant association to honor a longtime Iowa governor, Robert D. Ray, who did a lot to help bring different immigrant and refugee groups to Iowa. The building and gardens were beautiful as was the skyline and scenery around it.

I also went a bit on a the modern arch bridge you can see in the Chinese garden pictures. It split into two and got wider in the middle and then re-connects on both ends. It was nice bridge with a pretty view.

We checked out some thrift stores later on that day but we didn't find anything good and the prices there were also pretty high. After two stores we didn't really have the motivation to check any others out. But if you're a Des Moines-ian and you are a vintage collector/thrifter let me know where you go, I'm curious.

After the thrifts we were pretty much beat  so we had dinner and  didn't do much of anything else that day.