On this week’s shopping adventure I came across to divine pieces of luggage from different eras. I can only imagine the fabulous trips they got to take in their hey day.
Do you know who Inez Milholland Boissevain is? No worries if you don’t, I had to look her up too. Turns out she was a famous suffragette who was a labor lawyer who collapsed while giving a speech in 1916. Learn more here if you are curious.
When I got home from the Goodwill Outlets yesterday, Devin and Chris were watching Goonies…which Devin had apparently never seen that before. I don’t know how that’s the case because Goonies is one of those movies I usually stop to watch at least a little bit of every time I happen upon it randomly on TV. I love the theme song “Good Enough” by Cyndi Lauper…and whenever I hear it it always makes me think of Goonies. My last two trips to the thrift store haven’t given me anything I’d call an epic treasure, but they’ve been Good Enough.
The line art images are from a McCalls magazine from February 1910. I also snapped photos of some ads from Saturday Evening Post Magazines from 1943 and 1963. Among the other treasures were two bride dolls – possible Madame Alexander (but I need to do a little more research). Also displayed are some Easter gifts I made for family members today…all pieces are from the Goodwill (with the exception of the rabbit images I found on the Graphics Fairy website). There’s also a picture of my new doll house (thanks to Evie for finding it up in Indy) and the box of vintage ornaments I found when I went up to Indy for my Dad’s birthday last weekend. All in all, I’d say things things are definitely “Good Enough” for my April thrifting thus far!
Thrift finds from October – including treasures from Salem MA and Indianapolis.
After a long absence, I finally got to venture up to the Goodwill Outlets in Indy on October 9th. I was able to stop at the one on Franklin Street and the one on the West Side and came away with a few old treasures. It took me a while to get around to doing my video and post because things got busy again…but at long last…here they are!
Check out the video on the Unearthed Relics Facebook page: https://fb.watch/gdk9T9EiYY/
After a very successful (and fun!) garage sale last weekend – I couldn’t resist an excuse to go up to Indy to “restock.” I found many delightful treasures over the course of the day – and managed to visit with several family members as well. Some of my favorite finds included a vintage bread box and a few other rusty vintage tins…an NBA game which turned out to be from the early 80s (but nowadays, that’s vintage as well)…some cool old sewing supply and patterns…some old birthday and “get well” cards, an antique photo album, and one lone Shiny Brite that survived the bins. I also found a lot of great craft supplies.
While athletes were battling it out at Wimbledon, I was scouring the goodwill outlet on Indy’s east side for some treasures.
I loved how the patterns kind of tell a story…outfits for a young woman, a sexy bathrobe for a man, a wedding dress, maternity outfits, and kids clothing.
I also experimented with a live walkthrough of these items if you are interested in seeing any up-close: https://fb.watch/eczwB0yXAn/ – feel free to check it out and let me know what you think.
Game, Set, Match!!
While the Indy 500 was in full swing, I was making my way around the city of Indianapolis in a race for treasures. …and a few true treasures I did manage to find.
Some of my favorite finds are the ones I have to painstakingly reassemble…that was the case for the pieces of the 1950’s version of “the Game of the States,” the “Bionic Woman Beauty Salon” the collection of plastic vintage toys, a set of vintage cookie tins, and the remanents of a set of Shiny Brite ornaments.
Other things pop up when you least expect them (though when something exciting appears in a bin I’ve previously searched, I suspect they are often the things that other shoppers cast off) – that was the case with the vintage bingo-like game and a stack of vintage books.
An appointment-free day gave me an opportunity to visit four goodwills, including the three outlets in Indy today. At my first stop I stumbled upon a really cool set of vintage game boards. …and found almost all the pieces of a toy metal barn. Later in the day I found a cool miniature sewing machine…and at my last stop I found an adorable bunny cutout. Without further ado, here’s today’s haul.
With a snow storm predicted for next week, I decided to squeeze in a thrifting trip this weekend at the spur of the moment. I was channeling “board games” (specifically a vintage Nancy Drew game I’d somehow just learned about). I didn’t find the Nancy Drew game, but I did find several others…along with some illustrations that look like they might be prior to 1900 and a magazine from 1903, along with a great hymnal that was in really bad shape so I’m not going to feel too bad about repurposing it for some junk journaling. I also found some fun vintage Christmas pieces and a few sewing patterns.
The coral-colored suitcase was one of the first things I spotted on this trip. It had been turned into a dog bed, but I plan to remove the staples and felt covered pad and recover the insides to make it good as new and functional for some exciting purpose.
I took a gamble on some old art supplies…and have been watching some You Tube videos to see if I can revive the paints. I’ve also seen warnings that it may be ill-advised since older paints are more likely to have materials that are now considered toxic. If I do revive them, I will proceed with caution. In the meantime, I thought the bottles would look good as part of an art-related shadowbox.
I also stopped by a regular Goodwill…thinking that I might have better luck there looking for vintage board games (i.e., before they are sent over to the bins). I left with two small tin plates that were beautifully decorated and a binder that I’m going to use to organize some of my ephemera (along with some plastic organizer pockets that I found on an earlier thrifting trick).
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…
The Thrifty Sisters 