Sunday, August 28, 2011

A swing and a miss....

I have been pouty all weekend.  I took Thursday and Friday off from work in order to attend a particular estate sale in Gainesville, which is about an hour and a half from home.  So needless to say I was super pissed bummed that when I got there I was third in line, especially when what I came for was this....


1962 Austin Chess set with board (the board at the sale was wooden not the blue felt as shown) Kinda awesome right.....ugh.  The first guy in line bought the pieces and the second guy bought the board with the base.  What sucked even more was to wait three hours + in line knowing that you wouldn't get the number one item you wanted.  Of course I did manage to get a few smalls.

Dansk salt shaker/pepper mill

Dansk enamel bowls

These two items plus a couple pair of earrings were all that I purchased, sadly.  But since I had driven so far I figured I would hit some of the thrift stores in the area.  I did find a few cool things to make the trip worth it.

Don Freedman fabric art (this thing is huge!)

Seagull sculpture

more Dansk!  A total tea set for four!


Ciao

Becca

Sunday, August 21, 2011

The Lounger

The only piece of vintage furniture I have that actually came from a family member is my black lounger.  My maternal grandfather purchased it, I think, sometime in the late 60s.  It is basically a huge piece of foam covered with a black almost shaggy-ish material.  While it doesn’t really look THAT comfortable, it really is.  Anytime anyone actually lays in it they don’t want to come out and threaten to smuggle it to their cars.

  
It is the perfect size to fit into the bench seat area in our bedroom.  This is my favorite place to read books while snuggling with puppies.  As you can see it is usually claimed by my dog Max.   I think he likes it because he can sit so high, with the added bonus of getting away from our other dog, the demon Izzy (It is too high for her to jump, I have to pick her up and place her up there like I did for this photo).
There aren’t really any manufacture tags on it.  I was wondering if anyone has seen something similar. Or might know the maker?

Ciao 

Becca

Friday, August 19, 2011

Snatch and don’t look back…

I had my FIRST ever estate sale stakeout yesterday in hopes to lay my hands on some Broyhill Brasilia furniture for my bedroom.  I did all my home work. I scrutinized the online sale photos as well as a real estate listing of the house for layout.  I felt prepared!  The sale started at 11 am and I pulled up to the house at 6:45 am….not another car in sight! Phewwwww.  About this time Mr. Honey (who thinks I’m insane but is awesome enough to come with me on his day off!) is talking breakfast.  So we leave for about 15 minutes to grab some grub via a drive thru and come back.
We are camped out in the Prius….Mr. Honey is playing angry birds and I’m chatting with one of my friends.  I take a moment to give a little coaching advice….”Snatch tags and don’t look back….don’t hesitate for a minute or someone else will get it” Now of course this doesn’t mean you have to be a dick about it.  Basically just make a beeline to your coveted item(s) and get the tags so you can relax and look through the rest of the house.
We get in first (1 & 2 on the sign in sheet!) and head to the back bedrooms like Brasilia seeking missiles.  Grabbed the tags and we were done….i’m was ready for a nap.  After having the tags in hand we leisurely scope out the rest of the house….nothing good.  Just lots and lots of creepy dolls…. (shiver)
This is what we got! 

Broyhill Brasilia Triple Dresser with two single arch mirrors - $360  (I didn’t really want to pay this much for it, but I was expecting the nightstand and the cedar chest to be more expensive and figured it all balanced out)

 Broyhill Brasilia Nightstand - $80 (There was only one….I thought there were two but after looking at the photos again I see that it is two different photos of the same nightstand
 Converted cedar chest - $60
So…turns out that we didn’t really need to come so early.   When we went to pick our items up at 6PM that evening, the other pieces were still available.  I was super shocked, but that is the way of it.  You never know what people are there for and while they weren’t after our stuff this time…..next time we might have some competition!  Funnily enough my brother picked up a couple of the other pieces.  He got the bed (with mattress) for 300 and the Magna chest for 200 (it was 400 originally)!  I’m kinda jealous about the Magna chest (and the 200 price tag) but we truly do not have room for it and I would rather have the large Door Chest.  The only piece left at the sale was a brasilia desk with chair, again no room.  Also is it weird that I’m a little pouty about him having the same bedroom furniture as me?
Now the furniture looks great in place, but I wanted to give it a nice polish…does anyone have any product suggestions? 

Ciao
Becca

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

I spy Brasilia....

I have been wanting some Broyhill Brasilia furniture for my bedroom for a while now, but haven't wanted to pay the big "E" prices.  So I was super excited when I saw some in photos of an upcoming estate sale. (and by up and coming, I mean tomorrow!).  Thankfully my boss (she is awesome) gave me the morning off so I can attend, but that leads to the question "How early do you get there?"  I want to make sure that I'm the first one through the door so I can snatch it all up, but I have almost never been to a sale on the first day. I have read lots of estate sale madness stories and I'm hoping to try avoid that as much as possible.  Get in grab and get out.  Although I do have this vision in my head of snatching a tag and flipping over the bed ninja style to grab the others....but that is just a passing daydream....I think!?!

I'm truly willing to get up at Dark:30 and sit on a door step, but only if necessary.  I even kinda want to do a quick peek in the windows to see which room my stuff is in so I know where to go....quickly.  Is this rude behavior?  Any suggestions?  How early would you get there?  What is the earliest you have showed up for a sale? The sale starts at 11am tomorrow.

Ciao

Becca

Friday, August 12, 2011

Saddest Mail Call ever....

Sooooo....I have been rather excited over the past few days since I found a flat file cabinet that I liked visually AND that is the perfect shape to hold a chunk of my vintage jewelry.  Lets face it a lot of those cabinets are super ugly and VERY large.  They are always beige or gray and have rather industrial looking handles. 

Since I have been looking for one for about two years; when I saw the one I liked on Etsy I jumped on it!  Now here comes the sad part....when I got home today....this is what the package looked like...

This is never a good sign....

 Ugh.  You suck UPS.

The whole piece got bent in shipping so I had a hard time getting the drawers out...after about 30 minutes of messing with it....It looked like so..


This almost ruined my day completely...but luckily I got off work early today and filled that free time with some great thrifting where I found this seemly innocent little mortar and pestle.


I paid a whole 50 cents for it.  I was thinking ok...it is cute and pink.  I might need it or something.  So when I got home and looked up the maker name on the bottom....I was shocked to find out it is made of finely powdered synthetic sapphire.  It is scientific quality lab equipment and retails for around $600.  WAHHhh.  Insane.  Not sure where to sell it but maybe just maybe I can turn it into a piece of Broyhill Brasilia (or two!)  Like magic!! 

 Ciao

Becca


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Thrift Share Backlog!


I’m hanging my head in shame….I have been neglecting my little corner of the web in my drive to get my life organized (Scary thought!).  Since things have calmed down a bit, namely me, I decided to do a little show and tell for all the new stuff I have found over the last couple of weeks.  I haven’t been able to thrift much but I did find a some jewels to share:

 Teak pepper mill

three McCoy mixing bowls

Ultra Fabulous patterned 70s dress

Four flowered glass - super cute!

 Agate carved glasses

Six Otagiri Blue Horizon coffee cups

My first piece of Cathrineholm in the wild!!!  And it was 75 cents! Great day.


Ciao

Becca
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