This past weekend I worked and shopped the bonus Monroe County History Center Garage Sale. Usually it is just an annual sale that takes place in June – but they decided to do an extra sale this year to allow for holiday shopping. It was a little chilly and I was on outside welcoming duty both mornings of the sale, but that didn’t put a damper on the fun. I was thrilled to find one of the Redmon baskets I collect and a great assortment of ephemera that I will quickly put to good use.
My niece came to visit for her Fall Break this week…and she made me watch the movie “Confessions of a Shopaholic” (thus the title for this week’s post). I’m not sure I’m going to be able to recover from this addiction anytime soon. But admittedly there are some real pain points, not the least of which being storage space for treasures. I’m thankful that I still have a good amount of storage space to go, but I also realize that it is the downside of frequent thrifting that results in carloads full of treasures.
Space–or the lack thereof–is a perfect place to start this week’s blog post. I was up in Indianapolis again this weekend and on the way to breakfast with my mom we came across a sign that said “Vintage Sale” – when we came back from breakfast my mom suggested that we stop in to see what was there…and low and behold there was a Redmon basket sitting right up front. Turns out, the woman holding the sale was trying to clear out a garage, that had gotten filled up when she emptied out her storage shed to make a she shed. The shed, and then the garage, had been crammed full of items from a vintage store that she and her daughter had. Anyway, back to the sale: In addition to the basket I also found a few flower prints and a teacup…and I got to tour the she shed. It was hands-down the coolest shed I’d ever seen, and I have a pinterest board full of them!
That afternoon, I spent a little time at two of the goodwill outlets. It wasn’t as epic of a haul as last weekend, but I did manage to find a few fun things in the mix…including a few puzzles that were brand new or in bags, a lovely fur stole with the owners initials sewn into the lining (miraculously found inside a hand-embroidered pillow case just before a rotation), three Fiestaware bowls (buried under a pile of discarded clothing) and some dollhouse furniture in not-too-terrible shape.
I came up to Indianapolis with my husband for a weekend with his friends from High School…but they kindly let me duck away for a little thrifting. It was a good day for games and toys, and cameras and ephemera…and Christmas!
What birthday gift do you get the person who has everything? A day at the Goodwill Outlet to get a little more of everything.
I had an absolutely delightful day looking for treasures…and I think I found a few…
Contenders for my favorite finds were a small (child’s) desk that I’m looking forward to re-sizing so that I can use it, the tin (shown above…that I was totally envious of when I saw it in someone else’s cart, so much so that I almost offered money to buy it from her…but then I saw it in a bin a little later in the day and realize she’d cast it off…and I also found Saturday evening posts from 1973 and 1976 which are coincidentally the years that my sister and I were born. But the winner was the sewing pattern, marked “September 1921” …which means someone was touching it 100 years ago this month…and they’d cut out pieces of the pattern from an old newspaper…which meant I got to take a look at bits and pieces of news from the 20s. So interesting!
We helped my stepson move into his new house this weekend. I had just enough energy after we finished to duck in for a quick visit at the Goodwill Outlet and found a few treasures. There was a small pile of ephemera that I found in the corner of the last bin I rummaged through just as I was giving up hope I was going to find anything of interest. It contained cards and photos from Rosie and Charlie Hazel…and I learned from a quick internet search that she’d passed away last month and is buried not too terribly far from home. They didn’t have any children, so a lifetime of memories ended up in a bin of junk…which is sad…but it would be even sadder if I hadn’t stumbled upon these memories and find some ways to preserve a memory or two on their behalf. Even though I didn’t get home until close to midnight, I couldn’t resist making another digital collage.
I was out for the weekend, visiting friends in Salem MA. We went out walking on Sunday morning and found a delightful vintage fair…but I was still jonesing for a little bin-searching action. Thankfully, Salem did not disappoint! In an artsy alley way we somehow found our way to, there was a little cart set out where you could buy a bag of random items for $10. I had a blast filling mine up with treasures…and then discovered on the flight home that I didn’t have to wait til I got home to make a fun collage. I snapped some photos on my iPad and pulled them into Paper and even though they were photos snapped on a dark and bumpy plane ride, I think they turned out pretty well. And I’m so excited to have found a new way to create ephemera art when I’m on the go. I also think it will be a good way to plan things out ahead of time before I start cutting and gluing. Necessity is the mother of invention!
I finally got around to making a webpage about my Redmon basket collection. I was surprised to find that aside from the “History” page on the WC Redmon Company webpage there didn’t seem to be one already. I’m always happy to help fill in a gap. You can see all the pictures at jenni929.wixsite.com/redmon – if you enjoy thrifting and antiquing you are bound to stumble across one of these delightful picnic baskets yourself.
And while you are learning more about these baskets, check out this great article entitled: “Don’t you just love a picnic?” by Ruth Thompson in The Keene Sentinel August 10, 2023: https://www.sentinelsource.com/elf/pickin_and_pokin/don-t-you-just-love-a-picnic/article_3a6d7d5c-36ee-11ee-b046-77e93639f138.html
MORE PHOTOS FROM MY COLLECTION
Reprints of old seed advertisements (from a placemat that I cut up), some vintage frames and photos, a little burlap and seeds = art!
The Thrifty Sisters 