The sign of a good time.

I know this sign well. I learned last year that if you follow that arrow, good times await. The ladies of St. Paul work hard to make your shopping experience a pleasurable one. I know, I know...I'm starting to talk about shopping for junque like it's a stay at the Ritz Carlton. But I was greeted with a glass of ice water (!), and they stage everything at the sale so beautifully. Much better than these photos show. Perhaps my camera was melting from the heat (it was about 100 degrees Kelvin in the church basement, unfortunately). Look how organized:


I'm used to just seeing piles of stuff everywhere.

I went home with a little bag of treasures. Here are my china pretties:

I overpaid for the dish rimmed with purple flowers ($3) but consoled myself with the equally as lovely green dish marked down to 50 cents. Both are Austrian and will be used to make dessert stands. For Austrian pastries? Seems only right.

The Johnson Brothers bowls are for me, and were a budget busting $12. But that's really only $2 a bowl, and I really like them...so in the bag they went. Won't they be great for serving autumn soups?

Three vintage ornaments, a dollar each and the perfect gift for a friend:

Since I started sewing, I can't pass linen tables. And now, mismatched napkins = fat quarters. This one is already in the midst of becoming a pillow back (I used it to practice installing zippers with my zipper foot attachment. And by "practice" I really mean "I'm never doing zippers again."):

I think I also overpaid for this sampler remnant at $3, but it will make a fabulous pillow! I have some scraps I can use for the back, so I guess a $3 investment for (what I hope will be) a great little vintage pillow isn't so bad.

This damask tablecloth was only $3, but it's in great condition (complete with dry cleaning tag still on!). I'm already feeling bad about potentially sacrificing it to the Singer:

On my way home from the bazaar, I spotted this:

Are those tents and umbrellas covering flea market tables? Three blocks from my house? I really need to read the local paper. Anyway, I got there pretty late so nothing much struck my fancy except for this bag of buttons:

Hello, disco LP. I can not wait to use you on a tote bag!

And this sugar sack for $5, which I think I can squeeze two pillows out of.

The vendor said she had "tons more" vintage sacks and fabric pieces but didn't think to bring them because no one makes their own things anymore (she was primarily selling quilts). So she and I have planned a rendezvous in the early hours of September 12 at the giant Ocean Grove Flea Market so I can take a look at her wares.

Hopefully I'm a better sewer by then. No pressure.

And...it's now officially Thursday. Which means the lovely Leigh will be sharing a whole heap of Thrifty Thursday finds with the rest of the blogosphere. I'm gotten a sneak peek and I happen know she picked up a few bowls that were even a better deal than mine. So click here to head on over to her place...

Sunflowers. Everywhere.

The man of the shorehouse thinks I went overboard on the sunflowers this year.

I think he may have a point.


These past couple of weeks they really took off, in a Jack and the Beanstalk-type way. I had to dig all sorts of spare plumbing parts and corner molding wood out of the basement to make little (big, really) stakes for them. The photo above was taken this past weekend, and the photo below was July 26 -- really only three weeks prior. Look at how wee they were:


This one looks to be the biggest of this year's crop. I should have measured it, but it's about eight feet tall.


And here's a bit of a horticultural oddity...I believe I've grown some sort of Siamese Sunflower Twin:


They've blocked out the rest of the garden, which is sadly showing some of its last blooms of the season. These yellow flowers, from the garden of fellow Jersey Girl Black Eyed Susan, really grew nicely from a handful of shoots I was gifted with early in the summer. Now that I know what they look like (tall and gorgeous, with a mum-like flower. Any idea what they are?), I will move them to a better patch of the garden next year.


And speaking of Black Eyed Susan, those are blooming as well:


I had a small bunch of roots last year given to me by a coworker. In one short year they've grown to be lush and shrub-like. I love how they've filled in.

Given all this yellow, I've made a note to find some flowers of different colors that are late bloomers that I can add to the mix last year. I think I'm off to a good start, thanks to these gifts of seeds including gorgeous purple Lupine, cultivated from the garden of another fabulous Jersey Girl Maureen.


Maureen and I met through the world of blogging (she should totally have a blog. No pressure. :-), and met for real last week. Along with the seeds she brought me a fabulous piece of Ocean Grove tent memorabilia (more on that coming soon) and this sachet she made using lavender from her garden. I wish these here internets had smell-o-vision, because this little lovely smells divine.


"L" for "lucky to have so many great people and in my world." And in my garden, which is just about 100% grown from seeds, shoots and bulbs gifted to me by others. A true community garden!

One cool yard sale.

This past weekend brought me to a yard sale at this peach of a house...


Isn't she a beauty? I was in the house a couple of years ago when it was on the Historical Society's home tour. It was one of the homes that made me say, "This is the town I want to buy a house in." Two years later, we did!

The yard sale was a fundraiser for Ocean Grove United, a local group committed to promoting a diverse and welcoming community and to ensuring the rights of all residents. Without getting on too much of a soap box, I will say that our town is a very diverse one and I believe in loving all of God's children. Ergo, I'm a a big supporter of OGU's mission.

And when a yard sale was held for their benefit, I actually woke up early. Earlyish? And I was rewarded with what I have long considered the Holy Grail of yard sale finds: A perfectly vintage Westinghouse oscillating fan. In working order. For four dollars.


How cool (pun totally intended) is that? Someone actually stopped me on the street on the way home to ask where I got it, and to tell me, "even the fan thinks you're cool." I told her how much it was and her response was "Four, forty, whatever. I knew I should have got out earlier."

I got a cute Nippon poppy plate for a dollar that I'll use for one of my crafty plate stand projects.


And a cloche (OK, cheese board cover), also for a buck. I'll use it to cover one of my crafty dishes. Maybe the new poppy one!

That was all at the sale, but the fan was really the find of the weekend. Of the year? Could be.

After dropping off the (HEAVY) fan at home I moved on by bike (lest I lose my prime parking spot) to my favorite little store Country-by-the-Sea in Avon-by-the-Sea. They were having a big outdoor anniversary sale (with free food. Yay, free!) but all I managed to find was this tablecloth ($4), which I'll use to make tote bags, now that I've embraced the sewing machine.

When I got home and unfurled it, I found out it's quite a large rectangle with minimal wear so I'll get a couple of bags out of this for sure. I like the orange edging so I have to use my little pea-brain-not-quite-yet-wired-as-a-sewer to figure out how to incorporate it as some sort of trim.

In the same store I also saw this gorgeous hall table for $145 that I've been trying to convince myself should come home to the shore house.

But I don't think there's any room left at the inn. Or money in my wallet, for that matter.

Hop on over to Bloggeritaville to see what "fan-tastic" thrifty finds others came across this week. That's where I'm headed...

The sick, and the bazaar.

I'm feeling a little, well...


...blah. Nothing says "summer cold" like a hooded sweatshirt on a 90 degree day.

To add insult to illness, when I was driving home from the shore house the other night my car was making a distinct and somewhat scary noise that I suspected was my front brakes. I took the car to the mechanic yesterday and turns out it was the brakes. I had none. (In the front, at least.) The other distinct and somewhat scary noise you may have just heard was my mother yelping as she read this.

Anyhoo, I'm OK, the car's (going to be*) OK, and all is well. I've got things in the bag. And I do mean that quite literally. A bag-for-three-bucks bag, in fact.

There was another Ladies' Auxiliary Bazaar in town. My old friend Kelly (she is not old, but our friendship is) came over for a visit and we took a stroll through the aisles and piles and PILES of stuff and "exceptionals." And yes; there was actually a table labeled "exceptionals." We took a gander at some other "exceptionals" -- the people who were stripping down to their swimmies to try on clothing from the masses of it spread over several banquet-sized tables. Our heads did a sort-of Linda Blair 360, and we had to leave. It was just...too much.

That is why I fear Kelly may be yelping right now as she's finding out that I returned the next day and did some shopping.

The next morning, my young neighbor friend/TGT (Thrifty Girl in Training) told me that after 12:30 prices would be slashed and anything you could stuff in a brown grocery bag (with the exception of the "exceptionals," natch) would be three bucks a bag.

Game on.

So with TGT in tow I headed back on Saturday. I immediately headed to the Christmas table -- but on my way got distracted by this vintage Flamenco dancer doll.

It's kind of odd, but in a cutesy vintage way (I think?), and my friend is a Flamenco dancer so I figured she'd at least get a kick out of it. (Happy belated birthday, Daniela!) I tossed it (her?)in the bag and moved on to Christmas.

I've had luck in the past at "bag-stuffing" events with ornaments. I immediately spied the boxes of balls, many newish but many vintage. Especially the fabulous bell-shaped ones:

Even Flamenco girl let out an "Olé !" when she saw my final haul.

These will be used to stuff vessels and vases, and perhaps even make one of those ornament wreathes.

I lost TGT at this point but she reappeared to show me a fabulous straw hat. Which quickly went on someone else's head. I reminded her that this was like a competitive sport; grab first, think later. One of life's lessons learned.

A quick scan of the linen table (I wished I had stopped there earlier) turned up two souvenir bread warmers:

I'll use them as gift wrap.

And then for some reason I can not explain I stuck these copper prints in my bag:

They're small (about 4" by 6") and oddly fascinating to me. At this point I realized I had likely jumped the shark, so I tucked my bag under my arm and headed home with TGT.

* After $340 is shaken out of my pockets. I should hope the car is OK at that point.

A tale of two covers.

Having worked in publishing I know it’s critical to be one step ahead of the competition. Daily newspapers in the same town with similar or – gasp! – identical headlines spells trouble, and weekly magazines with the same celebrity photo on the cover is an equally egregious error.

But as far as I know it’s a horse of a different color when two catalog covers are total doppelgangers. Like the latest Pottery Barn and L.L. Bean catalogs to arrive at the shore house:

While I expect a sort-of homespunny lilt from L.L. Bean, I was surprised to see Pottery Barn following suit with their fall line. Looks like my recent foray into the world of patchwork quilting is totally en vogue.

I am so darn hip.

I’m going to guess that this whole quilt theme is a result of the sagging economy. People are looking to return to a kinder, gentler time when things were made of fabric scraps and not, say, leather imported from Peru and carried on the back of a Sherpa directly to a Madison Avenue designer showroom.

Sales of cosmetics also tend to increase during times of uncertainty. “The Lipstick Index” describes this phenomena of eschewing designer duds and other costly purchases in favor of a ten dollar tube of fabulous that leaves less of a dent in your wallet and a colorful smile on your face, empowering you pucker up and say, “Look at me! I look great! What recession?!”

Designers tend to work in shades of purple at times like these – deep amethysts and vibrant orchids symbolize regal piety, so perhaps it’s done to distract us from our otherwise humble existence.

What do you think? Are PB and L.L. Bean responding to the economy, albeit in uncanny synchronization?

I do know this: If the next Pottery Barn catalog features a purple hand-made quilt with a complementary hued lipstick, be afraid. Be very afraid.