Thrify Finds October Part 1

Here are a few of my goodies this month that will be making their way to finding a home in my home. 

I love the Scandinavian feel of the Santa pillow and that it was made in Colorado.  I also couldn't resist the adorableness of the reindeer.

Finally got an animal tape dispenser.  I had been looking at a cat one from staples, but didn't want to pay the sticker price.  the basket with linking will make it's way to my command center. 

I loved the colors and saying on the art print, but not so much the frame, so before snapping this photo I swapped out the art with one of my frames.  I like it much better, but I realized that my frame is breaking -- super sad face.  Though to the frames case I've had this one for 5+ years so it's seen better days.  

I also couldn't resist this bull.  she is so adorable and I love the yellow flowers and body coloring which gives it a cool vintage vibe. 

I know I didn't need this juicer, but I just love the design & the splash of orange.  I'm hoping to make good use of it or at least find the space to display it.

so pretty.  I love the rounded wood trim that compliments the ceramic print.

mushrooms!!!!! I was so excited to see these as I used to own this very same planter a year+ back in brown, but it broke.  I was very sad on that day.  Now it's in a bright and fun color.  I also hope to find a good use for that mushroom vinyl.  it's so adorable and cute.

score!!  owls and macrame my weakness.  so loving this and in yellow.  It instantly found a home in my half bath. 

I just adore these felt deer that I purchased these from a FVH member the other week.  They'll be added to my Christmas tree this year and I can't wait.  

IKEA towels and in blue and red, there were 5 and I took them all.  Yes, I'm greedy like that.  I also love the color and flower pattern of the hot plate.  It easily found a home on my coffee station.

Love this cute adorable scallop lid plastic laundry hamper.  It has a few scuffs on it, but hoping after a little cleaning it will be good as new.  Seriously the most adorable hamper I've seen that's not just for little girls. 

Thrift Score August

SimR Ware Slow Cooker

Just look at those feet, sigh.  That's what got me when I saw her on the shelf.  I know she's missing a knob and she's also rusting around the feet and the back seam, but the inside is a perfect opal.  I hopeful that she works great and that I'll be able to sell my smaller more 70s style slow cooker to pay for this one. 

4-PC Stacking Mugs & Tupperware Veggie Steamer

I'm loving all that green, especially those darling stacking mugs that I spotted on etsy a few months ago.  There is one set of 2 currently for $18.  So I'm pretty proud.  they are so me!  I'm planning on cleaning up my "measure" mug holders that I was trying to sell and use it to hang these ladies up.  

The Tupperware veggie steamer sells for $25 NIB and I recently purchased on in Like New Condition from a friend for $20 and I didn't even pay a 1/3 of that for this lovely gal.  I'm super excited and plan to resell the other one and keep this one.  Love those colors, sigh. 

Mushrooms Mug

This guy is uber awesome and he'll look great at my coffee station where my mushroom collection is growing. 

Half Cup of Coffee Mug and Floral Japan Mugs

I wasn't able to find the mugs so I'm not sure exactly who the designer is, but there were definitely a wide selection of the half cup mugs with a listing price ranging from $5-$18.  I like the mug, but not sure I would pay the higher price point for it.  All 3 of these babies are heading for resell. 

SALEM Stoneware Mugs Georgetown Floral

These are super adorable and range anywhere from $5-$12 individually to a set of 4.  I picked them up because a) I'm a sucker for anything stamped Japan and b) they are colors of my bedroom.  I know I wasn't going to use them there, but figured I could add them to my resell pile. 

Movement is happiness

Movement is happening is our Simplifying Home Goal & our outbox is filling up with items that we are letting go. It’s pretty exciting and I’ve really been getting into this more now. I’ve cleaned up the items and already taken photos of most of the outbox items and now it’s time to edit & research. This is the process I dislike the most mainly because it takes time. I could spent around an hour just on one items, because I have anywhere from 3-6 photos per item, and then I’ll adding them to frames, searching ebay and etsy to know the going rate and then adding the description and photos to at least 2 online albums. It’s pretty time consuming, but overall I love the outcome. My spirit is lighter, my anxiety is getting better knowing that things are moving out of the house. There still is A LOT of stuff everything and I’m still working on figuring out the best way to organize everything and feel like I’m living in a house and not a hoarders paradise, especially when I have people coming over to look at my larger pieces that simply won’t fit in my car to meet them nor do I have the muscle to move the items. 

This week I’ve taken another 50+ photos using my make shift low cost photo studio and a few towards the end I started adding props in with the items. I love what the color pops do and how it helps to give each item life and added dimension.

Another thing I decided to do to keep my items rolling out the door is making sure that I upload a preview item of every photo that’s currently hiding in my camera. This will remind me of the items that still need to go through the final stages and allow my items to still be seen.  

Thrift Score June

I found these lovies my last trip to drop off donations.  I'm super excited about the PYREX S/P Shakers, especially since i didn't realize they were PYREX until after I got them home and was ready to fill them.  The branding is an etched glass very small towards the bottom.  they work great, actually the only set of shakers I've brought home that I've actually used. 

The farmers tin is perfect for our flea market money box and the tulip dish goes (well mostly) with my Japan Tulip Canister set that I have in my bedroom.  They are both stamped Japan, have the same coloring, but  but the tulip pattern is different...I was so close.

I found this green Hoover beauty on a local FB Yardsale page and I'm loving how well she still works.  I need to order new bags, but outside of that I don't regret my purchase. 

This guy has an funny store as he almost didn't even make it home with me.  I walked by him twice at a local church's annual flea market my mom and I participated in.  After some debate I realized I wasn't even spending a dollar on him and if I found that he would have no purpose in my home that I would just simply resell him for what I paid so I happily paid for him and took him home.  

He was useful for about a week as a place to store extra change, but then decided to use him as part of my staging to sell my IKEA BESTA TV Stand and I've had multiple buyers interest in him.  I should seriously start a bidding war for him.  Highest bidder gets the whale! 

Happy Thrifting!! What kind of goodies have you found???

SM: Learing to Simplify

I've definitely made some progress this year when it comes to simplifying my home and feeling like my life is balanced again:

• I scaled back on my possessions by committing to work the flea market on a bi-monthly basis.
• I created a facebook page solely for posting my items for sale. 
• I've opened a separate bank account so that the extra income actually goes on bills.  
• I've caught up on 3 bills that I neglected -- though I still have 2 more before I'm completely caught up.
• I've accepted the fact and realized that it's not possible to clean the house, workout, take/edit/post photos of things for sale, declutter, spend time with my boys (aka the cats), cook a healthy dinner, work on my blog, and pay my bills all in one day.  Trust me when I say that this was not easy for me to admit.  I'm a perfectionist so my mindset say that I should be able to do all this but I came to realize that trying to do all this wasn't adding quality to my life, just more stress. 
• I admitted  that I needed a daily and weekly routine to help simplify my schedule and allow myself to work on all the areas that I listed above while staying focused and organized. 

The further I get on this new path of simplifying my life it helps me to tackle more to-dos that once made me feel so overwhelmed.  Life is definitely looking good now that I can see the light of a simple vintage life ahead of me once again. 

As I continue to create these printables for myself I'll make sure to share them with you just in case it may help you in your daily routines and path to a more simplified life.  Below you'll find my first printable that I made to write down my goals for the my Fitness, simplifying my home and my personal / blog for the month of June.   

Just Right Click and select “Save image As…” if you want to use my printable.  
The fonts used are: The Skinny + Orniste TFB and a Gentle Touch.

Here are a few sites that I've found helpful in creating my daily/weekly routine and learning to use a planner:

• Life According to my planner
• The Thinking Closet: The One Thing I Changed 
• From Overwhelmed to Organized:   Why Simplifying Is More Powerful than Organizing

Word of the Year: Simplicity

My 2014 goal is to live a life of Minimalism with less Superfluous, unnecessary, esp. through being more than enough, stuff surrounding me. It's really because I know I spend way more time then I really need to cleaning & reorganizing my "stuff" and what I want to be doing is cleaning less and doing doing the things I love more and that's why I want my word this year to be Simplicity.  I want to live a simplified life and set small goals each month that will get me to 50% of my possessions by the December 31, 2014.  

I plan to donate items and then use Craigslist, and eBay to sell the majority of the items that serve no function or meaning to me and this will allow money to be used towards bills and fixing up my home so it will be ready for the market in 2015 and I can move into a smaller dwelling.

I'm not sure what this year in the end will bring, but I do hope that it entails more time with friends and less time cleaning.  I do also know that it's not going to be an easy journey and that they're will be a lot of work ahead and new habits to form, especially since I have quite a stockpile of Superfluous items spread about my home.  

The Basic Plan:

Start with a Room.
Yep, room by room is the basic start for me and my first room to tackle is My Bedroom mainly because it has the least amount of items in and it's really the room I want to contain as little as possible.

As I've taken time this last week to sort through my room I realize that I have a lot of clothing and jewelry that I really don't wear so my main goal here is to photograph them in the best light, which will include ironing. 

This coming week my plan is to begin the ironing process and then hang all my shirts in one area so that when I'm home and the sun light is shining I can snap out the photos without having to stop. 

Then I will take another day to edit the photos and yet another day to post them on eBay and package them.  Yep, I plan to pre-package everything so that way I have the exact weight of the items and I can easily store them until they sell.