...an easy SMILE!

This time of the year in the NE United States, when temps are generally hovering in the teens, 'saling' tends to dry-up!  An occasional Estate Sale or trip to a Thrift Store are about the only ways to get a Good.STUFF.Fix.!!

Yet,

I have noticed lately (as has J), that I rarely come home without an extra box or bag (or 2) of 'STUFF'!

Upon pondering this, I realized that I have gained quite the posse of suppliers to 'feed my habits'!!!

PACKING/SHIPPING SUPPLIES

~Our local Marshalls (namebrand discount homegood/clothing stores ) calls when they have a boxful ready to pick up

~Our hometown RX always has a bag of packing misc. ready for me when I pick up our monthly prescriptions.

~My Mom's hairdresser sends her homes with boxes full of 'peanuts' every 6wks (for us!!)

WE KNOW A LOT OF WINOS!!

When you love to craft & create with CORKS, like I do, this is a GOOD THING (It would be SERIOUS TROUBLE if I had to empty all these bottle by myself!!)

~Sweet next door neighbor waitresses evenings at a high-end Restaurant, and has convinced the bartender to save corks for her!!

~A dear friend works at a local winery doing tastings...

~Our Favorite Happy Hour Bar has a bag waiting for me weekly!

(*One night at Happy Hr., I was surveying the contents of the 'weekly bag'.  One of the 'Hierarchy' of the Company J works for was out with us - he looked at me, shook his head and laughed "Oh Susan, I wish something that simple could put a Smile like that on MY face!")

BIRDS of A FEATHER...

~The Best Man from our wedding has become an avid Hunter/Fisherman in his retirement.  He is more than happy to supply me with FEATHERS to feed yet another of my recent 'crafting inflictions'!

JUNK MAIL

~My 'trendy' friends are more than happy to keep me supplied with catalogs!!  This probably seems REALLY BIZARRE to most, but when you don't do much retail shopping, you tend to get NO CATALOGS!!  I LOVE thumbing through high-end clothing & home goods catalogs to catch up on the latest trends, and get Creative inspiration - like my recent soldering attempt!!

As WONDERFUL as all of this stuff is...

it was fun to get a 'Different Fix' this past Friday, and come home with the Subaru FILLED!!

To sum it all up...

I had my First. Real. DUMPSTER DIVE!!

BOSE Outlet STORE CLOSING!

I missed all of the BIG store display pieces over-flowing from the top and sides of the Dumpster, that first caught my eye when I pulled into the mall from the side entrance... but I had 'real' stuff to do that I didn't want to look/smell like I had been 'rummaging around a dumpster' for.

When I came back through 45min. later, it looked like the dumpster was empty, but upon closer inspection - NOT!

More tangles of wires, cables, remotes, speakers, headphones and other non-sense than you can imagine - but luckily there were TWO Large Plastic totes (with Covers!!) in the dumpster, just waiting for me to fill.  It means NOTHING to me, but it put a SMILE on J's face!  I can Honestly say this is the first time I have ever garbage picked that he has actually APPROVED!

(and Today, 1/29 is his birthday - so I'm glad I brought him home some Fun Stuff!!)

After I had loaded every.last.electronic.bit into the car, I went back for ALL of the unopened boxes of office supplies!(?)...case of scotch tape ...boxful of white board markers in red ...boxful of white board markers in black ...another in green  ...another in brown...  carton (6 boxes of 5,000) of staples ...roll of Bubble wrap ...white board erasers ...tape dispenser ...3hole punch ...boxful of Sharpies in black ...in red ...boxful of highlighters ...pens ...white out ... folders ...wood yardstick ...magnetic displays ... even a Disco Ball light NIB!!   OH MY!!

Yes, we have had TWO DAYS of fun sorting through all of the STUFF!

I can remember my Dad on occasion making comments about People regarding their smiles... "She wouldn't be nearly as Grumpy, if she smiled" ... "She wouldn't be half bad, if she would smile" or "I like her, she has a good smile"

Despite a lack of SALING, I have had an abundance of SMILES in my life lately!

...and HAPPY BIRTHDAY J!

 I love You!! ((BIG Smile!))

...warm fuzzy for a COLD Thursday!

Some days it's just all about THE JOURNEY!

A couple of weeks ago I went to my Parents' for a visit.

They had a couple of trash bags sitting inside their entrance, waiting to be put out for the morning garbage pick-up.  Next to the pile was THIS box for disposal...

The Parents are starting to clean some 'junk' out of the basement.  This reel-to-reel had been my Grandfather's, purchased in the late 60's, and I don't think it has seen the light-of-day since shortly after purchase! (My parents now reside in my Grandparent's home!)

I'm NOT an electronics person, but I threw it in the Subaru to take home for J to inspect...

A couple of days later we pulled it out for inspection...

 EVERYTHING was pristine, albeit musty with a stash of Corroded batteries, that LUCKILY had been stored outside of the machine!

 Plugged it in.

It ran.

Though we could make it produce no sound.

 Even with the aide of the original instructions...

no luck.

J said 'toss it'!

I just couldn't do that, so we photographed it,

 and listed it 'FOR PARTS' on Ebay.

IT SOLD!

We included a note to the New Owner, that if he found anything legible on the tape, we would be VERY interested in paying him for a CD copy of it!

 After all fees, we netted less than $5 on this transaction.  BUT, it is one less thing in a LandFill and after receiving this note today, it was SO WORTHWHILE!!

Good morning,
I've had my eye on this model for years and now that I've added it to my collection, it doesn't disappoint. Sorry to say I did not find any voice recordings that might be of family value. The tape was set up on side 2 and was blank with nothing recorded on it. What you reported as the sound being illegible was actually print through from side 1 overlapping into side 2 and playing very indistinctly, backwards. I played it from end to end, and then flipped the reels over to side 1, which is where Sue's grandfather had recordings of Chicago, The Rolling Stones and other rock music for about a half hour which I don't plan to erase -- it took me back to my high school days. The sound was deep and rich and right on pitch. The machine is in gorgeous, like new condition, and even the tape reels are the vintage ones Aiwa included as part of the original package -- I greatly admire their design. I grew up with reel to reel, and am a very passionate collector. As you can tell, I feel I hit the mother lode. Pardon my geeking out, and thank you again for the great transaction. 

                          SCORE one more for 'LastChance'!!

...wing-butted Cocktail Servers??!!

'Gems' like this are what keep this whole 'stuff-game' FUN!!

Just when you think you can 'dig' / 'sort' "NO.MORE!"  It helps to find a little 'nugget' like this at the bottom of a box!

'designs'

by: Frederick J. Garner

Kinda 'un-assuming', but cool Deco graphics on the cover, so I flipped through it...

Okay, you've got your retro cat staring inquisitively at the Naked lady sniffing Posies...

Very Nice traditional Deco/Nouveau designs...

How many of these designs have YOU come across in your huntings??

Okay, by now I was smitten!

The MERMAIDS!
The SWAN with the Full Moon Backdrop!

FISHIES and LOBSTERS - be still my heart!!

and Children's graphics...

BUT WAIT!
All is NOT 'G-RATED'!!

The last few pages held the....
WING-BUTTED COCKTAIL SERVER
Designs!

As the song says...
HOW BIZARRE?
HOW BIZARRE!!

 Don't be looking for this 'IDEA' book to be in any of our shops any time soon...

...because as the cover permits ~

It was made for ME - to trace & copy,
so I would hate to disappoint!!

...'CROCHET' or 'CROQUET'?!

Only went to a couple of sales this past weekend ~ got some FUN STUFF. There definitely seemed to be a 'THEME'  to the majority of the things that came home with us...

 CROCHET!

CROQUET!

(*N.O. I HAVE NOT taken to hoarding CROCHET PATTERNS!!  I have friends who have 'enlisted' me to be a 'PICKER' for them!)

 As for the CROQUET SETS - we are just Suckers for different and unusual ones!

 ...like this GREAT old (partial) set...

that came in this AMAZING dovetailed box/case!!!

~AND~

guess what time of the year it is...

...What's YOUR gadget?

My 'latest' Loves...

Over the past few weeks we've added a few new GADGETS to our kitchen arsenal, and quite honestly, I don't know how we ever survived without them!! From (L) to (R)...
1.)THE VEGGETTI (NIP 'as seen on TV'... 50¢): Love our squash/zuchini-noodles (szoodles?).  Have always cut them by hand, this makes life SOO much easier - it's FUN!
2.) PAMPERED CHEF "Mix 'n Chop" (like new...25¢): A couple of weeks I met up with my Niece (L) and we hit a Thrift.  I grabbed this immediately upon seeing that it was a P-C!  Had no clue what it was, so back in the car L did some research... it for mashing or 'breaking things up' (see photo!!)
 
Never knew I needed one, but now that I've tried it - IT ROCKS!!
3.) LIME JUICER (.10¢)- have actually been on the hunt for one of these for a while.  After watching one of my fav. bartenders demonstrate, I knew it was a MUST!
  Necessities? NO.  But in our book, anything that makes me WANT to try my hand at the culinary arts is GOOD!
  How about you?  Do you have a mad crush on any gadgets in your Kitchen??!

...(THREE)(little)(WORDS).

Maybe it is a personal 'attention deficit'..

but it seems, lately, that all it takes are (three)(little)(words) to send my world into chaos!!

(BACK)(TO)(SCHOOL)

 resulting in ...

~a reworking of our booth, plus a 'sale' to try to clear out some space for the impending Holidays!!

~ a mad-dash to stock up Ebay & ETSY with a hoard of text/education-type books that I am finally willing to 'let go'.

(JUST)(IMAGINE)(IF)

Those are words that have resulted in 

~the 'rescuing' of MANY a project!

~and the onslaught of MANY 'Bucket List' items that need to be checked off beforeWinter!!

*'Great Bones' lampshade rescued from Dumpster; A metal box of drawers - After it's facelift (Prior to paint & cleaning, it looked like a mini version of one that SHARA picked up recently!); and the 'infamous' Piano Stool from our previous post.

(EVERYTHING)(HALF)(PRICE)

Saturday's HAUL...SEVEN Rosaries, 2 vintage Walking Canes,  plastic grapes, adv. Swizzle Stix, mini pottery Ducks, Orange Glass Shot glass, Minnie Keyring, BetsyRoss (?) utensil holder, Yellow, Concrete Bird, Books-Star Wars & Hawaiian Pineapple, HARDEN furniture cutting board, Brass Pineapple bookends, Word Search books, (9) shirts, copper measuring spoons, and a FREE 9/15 GLAMOUR magazine 

Went to a Rummage Sale Saturday morning.  JUST!ONE!, then it was back home to WORK!!!.  While sifting through things I overheard a couple of ladies talking - "OH!, have you been over to XYZ Street?  EVERYTHING is HALF off!"

So, OF COURSE I had to go check it out.

Enroute I stumbled upon an Estate Sale "EVERYTHING 1/2 PRICE!"

So, OF COURSE I had to check it out.

Then I proceeded one street further to find the "Original" 1/2 price Sale.

...and find it I did!

High-end Golf shirts & Jackets =3/$1...  OK!

At the first Rummage Sale, I must have been channeling my 'inner EDDIE' (*for anyone 'not-in-the-know', 'Eddie' is Bloglands Go-to-Afficionado for all-religious!)

S.E.V.E.N (7!)  Rosaries

Including one that I've never seen before with a SKULL and CROSSBONES on the bottom of the front of the cross!!  EDDIE?? Any Help Here?

and last, but not least

(SUMMER)(IS)(ENDING)

aka

(COLD)(IS)(COMING)

'NUF SAID. 

...and The Bucket List is a 'bit' lighter!

...3,000 miles...10 days...5 states...2 countries!

I haven't been to Canada in about 10yrs. , and now in the last month I have been there twice!!

'Nova Scotia' and 'New Brunswick' have been staples of my Bucket List for years - NO LONGER!

What an AMAZING ROADTRIP!!

...and I am 'single-handedly' trying to bring back 'The Hat'!

Who else would be soo amused by the Bathroom Signage?

"Who is that Crazy Lady in the Hat, taking pictures of the Men's Bathroom??" !!

Now we are back home, and trying to get 'in-the-swing-of-things' again!

Saling... charm bracelets, Vera Bradley Bags, old Crisco canister (we collect them in different colors), misc. jewelry, Fossil watch, sqwish toy, mink Poodle pin, Dr. Seuss birthday figure, ..and S's keys?!?

Did you see that - TWO sweaterclips (one is even a signed LISNER, on original card!



AND a Great FirePlace screen!!  Bought with the 'intension' of taking to the shop to sell, but we better get it there quick, 'cause jewelry display images are dancing in our heads!!!

It is hard to tell from this horrible photo, but we also picked up a GLITTER CROW w/ a lime green tummy!!

Taking advantage of our Wonderful 'at-home' weather, A photo shoot has been in progress in our yard... 

Wouldn't these be sweet 'mannequins' for a Fall Craft show,

Do you know of anybody who makes Build-a-Bear / Am Girl Doll clothers for resale??

THAT's all for now...

and remember:

a