This week I traveled to Los Angeles for work. I spent most of my time in Monrovia, where I didn’t find too many thrifting opportunities, but I had a little time open on Thursday morning and decided to attend a few estate sales after dropping my colleagues off at the airport in the wee hours of the morning. I started bright and early in Bel Air and then headed to Silverlake.
The Bel Air estate was lovely and I found a nice sized bundle of treasures – some of which are shown below.
After the first sale, I headed to Silverlake. I had to park about half a mile away from the sale and the roads were really curvy and hilly so I was pretty reserved in terms of what I got, knowing I’d have to carry everything I got back up the hill. It was also a really funky house…with so many different levels to explore – indoors and out!
I also got a chance to visit the Giffith Observatory for the first time.
I also got a chance to stop in to see the Monrovia History Museum.
Below is a digital collage I made on the flight home using some of the things I found at the Bel Air estate sale…and below that is a printable page including clippings of some of the cool ephemera I found. Help yourself and enjoy!
Check out the link below to my sister site (Country Crafts, where I’ve posted about different kinds of theme parties I’ve thrown and crafts that I’ve created). That posts contains samples of the invitation I created, the menu (with recipes and a shopping list), a seventies-themed scavenger hunt and decoration ideas using vintage and thrifted finds.
Happy New Year! I hope the year is off to a good start for you, dear reader, and I want to give a very special shout-out to my Mother and Father in Law who sent my husband $30 to give me to spend at the Goodwill. I made two stops this past weekend and landed at $29.30 ($32 with tax) and a cart full of goodies at my first stop! And I found a few more treasures at my second stop as well. A thrifted gift is my very favorite kind of gift…as are all of these amazing new salvaged finds.
At the end of this post I’m going to add some pictures of some of the things I’ve already crafted with my finds. And feel free to visit Unearthed Relics on Facebook to see a recording of me sorting through my entire haul https://www.facebook.com/myunearthedrelics.
I had about two hours to spend between family events at the Goodwill outlet in Greenwood this weekend. The fact that this outlet is a little smaller than the others in the Indy area actually made it a little easier to navigate in a shorter period of time and it certainly did not disappoint in terms of the types of treasures I was able to uncover. Check out the corresponding video for this week’s haul at: https://fb.watch/gWbEObr5Wg/
There’s treasure in trash if you aren’t afraid _to_ hunt…meant to put the number 2 in there since I couldn’t find more T’s but forgot! Vintage Rumplestiltskin Puzzle Letters and Postcards from the maiden voyage of the Cunard line to Antartica Pieces of a Masonic CertificateMork Action Figure Lone Range Press Button Toy from the 40sFisher Price Vintage CameraLennon Sisters Paper DollsVintage Halloween Decorations
Was it the best day ever at the Goodwill Outlet in Indy? Let’s take a look…
On this trip I found some amazing old books, vintage photos and vintage postcards. I also found some great craft supplies, and Christmas decorations and vintage linens.
The angels above were in a box marked “fragile” but that warning had clearly not been heeded. Only one was intact and one was in several pieces, but all the repairs looked fairly straightforward and all the pieces seemed to be present – so I took a chance – and I rather like how the came out.
I’m not sure it was my best day ever, but all in all it was a pretty good day. Check out the video of this week’s haul to see more: https://fb.watch/f21r7TUwFz/
My niece Evie made it to the finals in several events for her state swim meet yesterday. Great for her, but good for me too since it gave me a chance to go shopping before going to see her swim in the finals. I went to the Goodwill Outlet on the west side of Indy because my parents were having lunch, and it seemed to be the closest option to Evie’s meet.
The first great find of the day was a vintage cooking set – similar to one I remember playing with at my Granny’s house when I was a kid. It looks like it was designed to be something like an easy bake oven – with a power cord that had been cut off (probably for the best since it was a little rough…and definitely old). I loved the stove, but the thing that delighted me about it even more was finding a little note tucked inside along with some of the tiny metal pots and trays that said it had been owned by Janet Kinsey Beanblossom and she’d received it around 1944.
I was also surprised to learn a little more about the creators of another object I’d found – a tiny dollhouse dresser. I had to scavenge through the bin to find all the pieces, and didn’t notice it at the time, but it seems to have been signed by its creators on the bottom of one of the drawers.
The next great treasure of the day was a 1919 Singer Sewing Machine. Whenever I find a vintage machine I love thinking about all the outfits or home decor items that had been sewn on it…and all the hours that its former owner would have spent on it stitching those items. Admittedly, this one is in rough shape…but it is still a treasure…having survived for more than 100 years and also surviving the Goodwill Outlet bins. I found the base earlier in the day but didn’t see the machine…so I ended up letting the base go…but I realize in hindsight that I should have grabbed it and put it back if I didn’t find the machine…because I later discovered the top of the wooden traveling case…and then the machine itself.
From the time that I was in High School I had a home-crush on Woodruff Place – a neighborhood in Indianapolis with beautiful Victorian Homes – set apart from those on the opposite side of strip of grass with fountains interspersed throughout. To my great delight, as I was driving for a quick visit to the Goodwill Outlet after I dropped my husband off at A movie theater downtown, I came across signs announcing that this was the last day of their annual Flea Market. The lure of the outlet was too strong to pass up, so I headed to the east-side for a quick stop to search the bins, and then made my way back to Woodruff Place. In addition to finding some lovely vintage patterns, one of my first stops at the Flea Market yielded a treasure trove of books and pamphlets, including two copies of Kinsey’s seminal work and a cool old painting book and engineering book that were both in rough shape but have lovely illustrations. I also found a cute tin with two dachshunds. After roaming the streets and getting quite warm and thirsty – I finally found another treasure worth investing in: a set of vintage paper dolls made all the more appealing by the fact they were in a cool Santa Claus box.
A quick trip to the airport gave me a chance to duck into the Goodwill Outlet in Indy for just about an hour…and I found a few treasures…can you spot the winner?
Despite it being a short visit, this Goodwill trip provided quite a few “winners.” But one was a bigger win than the rest. One of the items above is worth more than $500.
Was it the collection of Indy 500 collectors cards?
Was it the 1829 newspaper (TBD whether it is a reproduction)?
Was it the box of 4H ribbons from the 30s and 40s?
The Abraham Lincoln pamphlets and book?
…Or rather…something worth its weight in gold…or silver?
Ding, ding, ding! The bowl, an award for sales from the mid-fifties, turned out to be sterling silver. It was the last thing I grabbed, just on a whim, and turned out to be the best find of the day.
The theme of this week’s thrifting adventure is: “Flip it Over!” I found several amazing treasures during my stop at two Goodwill Outlets in Indy yesterday…but the surprise treasures I found on the backs of several items turned out to be even cooler than the things that caught my eye in the first place.
Notice the really cool game board in the back, I did too…and it turned out to be reversible, with an equally cool bowling game on the back. In fact, it was a great day for games in general. The Chinese Checker boards have a cool checkerboard on the back (and this one happened to have all the checkers and 20 of the original marbles as well). I also learned a little about the Cleveland Indians and the Curse of Rocky Colavito.
I’m getting ready for our annual puzzlefest event this coming weekend…so puzzles were definitely jumping out to me as I searched through the bins. And speaking of “jumping out,” this one caught my eye because it is 3D! It had been broken up into four large pieces of assembled blocks…and I didn’t see any other pieces around it in the bin so I decided to take my chances. The fact that it was mostly assembled made it really easy to reassemble and I was delighted to find that all the pieces where there…as well as the 3D glasses! But the cooler thing, was discovering the Star Wars spoof comic on the back of the box. I totally missed that while I was shopping! The cards in “The Game of Authors” were also neat, and I was happy to find so many of them (though admittedly not a full set) because they led me to the box, which is interesting in its own right.
Next up: Photos! I found so many old photos on this trip. I was going to count but forgot to do it while I had them out. I’d guess at least 100. Sometimes I find clusters of photos that all seem to be from the same family, but these were in zip lock bags (marked $10)…so they seemed to be sets that had been reassembled for sale. The photos are amazing, but I happened to flip one of them over and loved the image on the back almost as much…so then I started checking all the backs of the photos too and found a few other ones that were neat as well. This proved to be another example of the benefits of flipping things over.
It was also a great day for Christmas finds. I couldn’t believe that these vintage ornaments and tree toppers had survived the bins! I was super-happy to rescue them…and managed to get them all home without breaking!
I found lots of vintage hand-sewn goodies as well. Some were in pretty bad shape, but I’ve been seeing lots of crafts on pinterest that I can try…and because they are stained or torn in some spots, I won’t feel super guilty for altering them.
And there were lots of other decorative and crafting goodies in this week’s haul…
I also found what appears to be a Redmon basket (the brown one)…based on comparison to another one that I had in my collection. I took a few other photos for comparative purposes.
The Thrifty Sisters 