It's Been a While

I hope everyone had a great weekend. I want to start off by apologizing about the lack of posts. I've been wanting to post more but have been having a rather creative streak as of late. I don't mind it but sometimes it seems like I don't have enough time for everything.  I love it when my Muse visits me so I can't really complain. I've made a couple of pieces of clothing and have been working on some knitting. I'll make a separate post about all the goodies I've made.

I'm not sure if I've mentioned it but our car is old. And it's dying. The last couple of weeks we've noticed that it's not getting enough gas. We had this problem one year ago. We had to replace the gas tank and straighten out the up-take lines. it cost us over $200. The car is 25 years old. The hubby seems to think that it's okay just needs some work. I think we need a "new-to-us" car. We've be seriously talking about it and my mom is willing to give us a loan. Interest free. What more can we ask for. And on top of that she's willing to wait until we pay off of AmEx to start making payments to her. We've looked at buying from private parties but the used car market out here is ridiculous $7500 for 1990 Honda in okay condition? No thanks pass. Hopefully we'll be going to check out some of the used car lots this weekend.  We actually did the math on renting a car vs owning a car like if we decided to visit family. It's much more cheaper to buy a car and make payments then to rent it. If we rent a car for the weekend it runs us like $350 plus gas. If we buy a car our payment would be $200 a month and it would be ours.  The good thing about Nevada is that insurance is way cheaper. We paid $125 for  6 months. Sure it's liability but my in-laws were paying $300 for the same car.

Anyways, sorry for rambling on. The last month I hit thrift store gold. I had a couple of weeks where I found a ton of great things. That was before the car was having trouble.

This was one of my finds at the annual St. Gall Rummage sale. It was hidden under one of the table in the gym. He's super glittery and totally awesome.  Let me tell you. I thought that the rummage sale was going to be small and very dinky. Boy was I wrong. It was HUGE. I was told by one of the volunteers that people plan their vacations around this rummage sale. It was pretty awesome.  I also bought some silk Christmas ornaments, a few bowls, a vintage Gloria Vanderbilt umbrella, some terry cloth, and a packet of hair combs. It was all under $10.






I've been having really good luck finding Carmen Miranda style jewelry. This set I bought off of eBay. It's a neckalace and earring set from the 1940's. It's got some damage to the earrings but the necklace is in great condition. I really like this set especially since the necklace has jalapenos on it. I  haven't  seen very many sets with jalapenos on them. Now i want to make a floral fascinator with roses and chile peppers. Pair it with an off shoulder blouse, my red leather sandals and a black skirt with colorful ric rac and I've got one colorful outfit.









These beauties I almost passed up. There was a new booth at the local antique store. It's a huge two story building. It's old enough it doesn't have any kind of air conditioning. They have to keep fans running during the summer and that's just barely tolerable. I found these earrings hiding in the top of a dresser under some scarves. I've gotten in the habit of looking under things since sometimes that's where the goodies are hiding. The fruit on these earrings are in great condition. The wiring and beads aren't. I've had to apply some glue to prevent the beads from breaking off. Other than that I love it. The colors are still vibrant and smooth.



I've been lusting after Lucite jewelry however since we're trying to save I can't justify paying $25 for a pair of earrings. I usually have a budget for how much I'm willing to spend on jewelry. So far the most I've spent on any one piece of jewlry was $15 for the necklace and earring set earlier. I've been luck finding vintage earrings for under $5. The first two pairs I got $3.50 each and the shell earrings were .75 cents.




Gold flecked Lucite earrings.



These tested positive for Bakelite with 409. These are also riveted in the back which makes me believe they are Bakelite.


These are cute and small. I like sea shells but never really knew how to work with them besides just gluing them to boxes or frames.



Last but not least is this vintage leather tooled shoulder bag.I bought it at one of the local charity run thrift stores. I like that thrift store a lot. I've found 1960's circular knitting needles in package for $1. Pretty sweet deal. This cost me $8 out the door. It needs to be cleaned up a little and some mending on the side pockets but it's a  Maraf leather bag . I have tried to look into how old it may be but I can't seem to find any info on the company. It's really comfortable and has lots of pockets to organize you things in. I'm super happy with this. I've been wanting a leather bag but didn't want to pay $40 plus for a bag in okay condition.





 And as always, I leave you with a pick of Ridley being cute.  Thanks for reading.