Little Big Shop Sale!

Here’s what’s up in the shop!

Recent Additions to the Little Big Shop:

Embroidered Vintage Clutch, granny chic.

Daisy Wall Plaque, your bathroom needs this.

Thrift Store Gore – White Elephant Gift Exchange Gifts:

(Confused about this section of the store? This should clear it up.)

Frightening Anne Geddes Bear.

Handcrafted Abalone Lamp.

Instructional Romance Book.

Speaking of the Grandchildren Photo Album.

Burned Down Schoolhouse Commemorative Plate.

Remember! Lucky buyers of Thrift Store Gore will get a photo of drunk Santa for your troubles. Someone’s been naughty this year! SPOILER ALERT: It’s Santa.

Little Big Shop Sale Items:

Designer Chrysanthemum Mug, price lowered by $6.00!

Vintage Baby Book, price lowered by $10.00!

Copper Parthenon Ashtray, price lowered by $6.00!

Vintage Glass Storage Jars, price lowered by $10.00!

Keep checking back as I’m adding more items all the time! Sale ends in a week or so or when I remember to change it back.

Little Big Gift Guide: Thriftier Stocking Stuffers

Today is the second installment of a three-part series I’m doing on inexpensive, yet still fun and creative and useful, Christmas gifts. The goal is to give items that would be a welcome gift and not just junk that will likely be tossed out at the end of the day. To be included in this gift guide it must be useful, lovely, and budget-friendly. Previously, I posted about Thrifty Stocking Stuffers, today we have Thriftier Stocking Stuffers, and last but not least, later I’ll feature Thriftiest Stocking Stuffers.

      Chocolate: I put a king-sized Snickers bar in Anthony’s stocking every year, and every year he looks forward to it. I tried branching out and giving him fancy-pants chocolate, but that turned out to be a bad idea. A Snickers bar is what he wants so a Snickers bar is what he gets. For myself I’d rather get some of these Belgian thins or dark chocolate-covered pomegranates, but hell, I’d be glad to get some plain-old dark chocolate chips as well.

     Craft Patterns: If you have a crafter in your life, you can support their habit by giving patterns in their stockings: sewing patterns, embroidery patterns, knitting patterns.

     ‘Designer’ Gifts: Give the designer in you life a font or a fancy vector. Write your gift on a piece of paper and tuck it in their stocking. I really think even a small gift, as long as it would be used and enjoyed by the recipient, is better than a more expensive gift bought with no real clue if the recipient will enjoy it.

     Rifftrax: Have you heard of Rifftrax? Some of the guys from MST3K get together and riff current box office disasters which you buy in audio format and then play along with the movie. This way they can keep the jokes coming without having to afford the rights to each movie they riff. It’s brilliant. It’s hilarious. It’s the most fun you can have while watching the Twilight series. I want to convert the world to that magic that is Rifftrax.

      Kitchen Gadgets: Spatulas wear out, pastry brushes become gross, and mandolins dull. Some kitchen gadgets are always useful. Also consider slightly more usual gadgets, such as potato ricers, melon ballers, or apple-slicers.

      Ornaments: Many lovely and inexpensive options are easy to find. I’d advise against giving ornaments unless you know the person you’re buying for has room for them. It seems like people are on one end of the ornament spectrum or the other – too many or too few. My aunt and mother started a tradition of buying each of us cousins an ornament each Christmas so by the time we left home we’d have plenty of ornaments for our own tree. If you have a friend or a relative with a new baby, an ornament a year could be a great tradition to start.

      Colorful Duct Tape: Duct tape in general is a wonderful gift item, useful for everything from making wallets, repairing household items, and taping ducks together (that’s why it’s called “duck tape,” right? I mean, I assume so.) Now it comes in various colors and patterns—even better! This is the kind of thing I’d want but wouldn’t buy for myself. While at my local craft store I found this adorable monogrammed tape and picked up a roll for my cousins.

       Hobbies: if you have a relative with a particular hobby you can almost always find something small to give them that would be both useful and welcome. Do they play D&D? Give them some minis. Do they garden? Another pair of gloves or a kneeling pad is always useful. Do they like crafts? Buy them another rubber stamp. Get a comic book for your favorite reader. You don’t have to get them something big to add something meaningful to their hobby.

       Napkins & Washcloths: I have friends who knit who make small things like a stack of washcloths. It makes me all sorts of jealous. They just crank them out like it ain’t no thang and they are just gorgeous. If you knit, share the love. Cloth napkins are another wonderful thing to put in a stocking. If you can’t find any while thrifting but are handy with a sewing machine, consider whipping some up.

       Boxers: I like to put a pair or two of fun patterned boxers in Anthony’s stocking every year. I don’t know what I enjoy more: shopping for them or watching him open them to find yet another ridiculous pair of underwear inside. Because they are funny it’s not weird to give with family. This is kind of a one-way gift, as opening panties of any sort in public would be weird for me. Boxers avoid that sexy connotation so they are a go.

Today’s installment was for those of you lucky enough to have a budget, but what if your budget was too strict for these ideas? Never fear, later this week I’ll be coming out with one more gift guide for really-low and even no budget gifts that still meet the lovely and useful criteria. Stay tuned!

Little Big Gift Guide: Thrifty Ideas for Stocking Stuffers

Today is the first installment of a three-part series I’m doing on inexpensive, yet still fun and creative and useful, Christmas gifts. The goal is to give items that would be a welcome gift and not just junk that will likely be tossed out at the end of the day. To be included in this gift guide it must be useful, lovely, and budget-friendly. Today, Thrifty Stocking Stuffers, and later this week, Thriftier Stocking Stuffers, and last but not least, Thriftiest Stocking Stuffers.

Instagram magnets: for $14.99 Stickygram will create 9 magnets out of the Instagram photos of your choice. My plan is to do this and split the photo magnets among family members.

Phone cords: for whatever reason, the necessary USB cord for the iPhone seems to always crack and wear, leaving exposed wires that result in a poor connection. I could always use an extra USB cord, and for that matter, extra screen protectors and replacement ear buds (they always find their way to the washing machine at our house) make handy stocking stuffers, as well.

Flash drives: I’m lusting after this key-style flash drive. Particularly useful for students and nerds! Especially useful for nerd-students.

My Etsy shop: Shameless self-promotion time! In my shop I have a number of smaller items that would make excellent stocking stuffers. Support small business and an active reuse market! Also, my thrifting habit.

Books: The thriftiest way to give books is to give away books you no longer want to keep (which I’m cool with as long as the recipient would be interested in it), or to find something while thrifting or at a library book sale. But don’t forget independent book sellers or even mass-market retailers. My dear friend Stefanie loves to give books at holidays and we all look forward to getting them.

Personalized calendar: for as long as my mother has purchased calendars she’s always had a cat calendar every year. Somewhere along the line Anthony and I started purchasing calendars for her as our Christmas present. After a couple years I had the idea of making her a cat calendar using photos I took of her own cats, and she loved it. When Isobel came along we made her cat and granddaughter calendars. She looks forward to this every year.

Shop Etsy faves: If you do happen to have a budget for presents, and the person you are buying for has an etsy account, take a look at items they’ve favorited through their profile for ideas. My friends and I started using Etsy faves as a wishlist and like to buy items off their lists when we can afford it. We know they’ll love whatever we buy them, and since we all know about this idea we include faves at a few pricepoints. We have had the issue of two of us buying the same present for someone only once (since faves aren’t an actual registry, after all) and overall this system works well. I love supporting small biz while making a friend happy.

Magnets: I always need more magnets, Instagram or otherwise, and by this I mean cute magnets, of course.

Gift cards: Gift cards aren’t an usual gift idea, but when times are tough sometimes the best gift someone can receive is a gift card for some much-needed clothes or a luxury they wouldn’t purchase for themselves otherwise. When my cousin had her second child, my Aunt Kay said she’d by her the gift card of her choice: a mani-pedi, a massage, or one month’s worth of a housecleaning service. (For the record, my cousin chose housekeeping. I would have, too!) I like to buy gift cards for iTunes, Target, Amazon, Old Navy, or our local favorite sushi restaurant.

Dishtowels: It’s common knowledge that I’m a dishtowel junkie. They are an inexpensive way add style to a kitchen—a room that’s hard to change without major remodeling. And they fit in a stocking perfectly, too.

Mouse pad: It seems like mouse pads have a short shelf life before they get all faded and gross-looking. Adorable options abound on Etsy.

Photo books: After Isobel was born I scraped together the three brain cells I had left and made a photo book for each Grandmother. I bought inexpensive photo albums at Michael’s and filled them with photos of Isobel, starting with a shot of my giant pregnant belly and ending with Isobel at three months old. In my mom’s book I included photos of her holding Isobel plus other shots of the family, and vice versa for my mother in law. We had these ready in time for Mother’s Day and they were a huge hit. The grandmothers had their books on them at all times so when people asked about their grandchild they could proudly show off their photos. After all was said and done they cost less than ten bucks each. You can always go to one of those photo sites for a more professional looking book, but they loved their albums and still treasure them. I ended up using a photo book service to make a Friends of Isobel book, which we created to help introduce Isobel to our friends that she might not see that often. (You can read about that here.)

Cute socks: Perfect for winter, warm, cute socks are always welcome in a stocking.

Today’s installment was for those of you lucky enough to have a budget, but what if your budget too strict for this gift guide? Never fear, later this week I’ll be coming out with two more gift guides for really-low and even no budget gifts that still meet the lovely and useful criteria. Stay tuned!

Thrifty Living: 12 Creative, Thrifty Ways to Wrap Gifts

Here are my favorite creative and thrifty ways to wrap presents for the holidays. Have an idea? Add yours in the comments.

1. Stock up on thrifted tins. I always check out tins while thrifting and stock up for the holidays. For a quarter I can buy a unique way to wrap a gift that can then be reused and repurposed later.

2. Use colorful paper bags and printable gift tags. When I still worked at the library I did a whole lot of gift-giving: coworkers, office staff, friends and student aides all got gifts from me. The cheapest way to wrap these gifts turned out to be colorful paper bags and ribbon from the craft store plus printable gift tags that I made myself. This was the perfect way to distribute baked goods and they looked so cheerful. Free printable gift tags can be found all over the web, but my favorites are found here.

3. Wrap an ugly box collage-style. I bought a lovely necklace for my MIL one year and of course the only box I could find to put it in said something dumb on it. I used a page out of a magazine to cover the top of the box and glued origami paper to the sides and it was transformed. She ended up loving the box as much as the necklace.

4. Try fabric scraps and yarn. One year I ran out of wrapping paper altogether so I raided my fabric stash and found this vintage green cotton fabric I found while thrifting. I was able to secure this fabric with scotch tape even though it was a decently heavy weight.  Wrap as you would normally for wrapping paper, add some yarn, and you’re good to go.

5. Embellish a plain gift bag. I can’t remember if this bag was plain or if it had a logo in the middle, but either way it benefited from some scraps from my collage file.

6. Reuse a pretty jar. I save jars like this throughout the year because I like to give spiced nuts and candy at Christmas. If your jar is pretty enough, only a ribbon is needed, though you can always paint the lid.

7. Use sheet music instead of wrapping paper. I have lots of musician friends so I had the idea to wrap their gifts in sheet music. I happened to have sheet music lying around, so I made copies of it specifically to use for wrapping. Collage paper, doilies, and some pink yarn finished it off.

8. Wrap with tissue paper and add a colorful bow. Many times the tissue paper is lovely enough to use as wrapping. I keep a few spools of colorful ribbon on hand for wrapping. I get it when it goes on clearance at the craft store.

9. Use a small piece of fancy paper for accent. A very creative friend of mine made me a necklace and sent it to me in this lovely packaging. I like how she decorated a plain box by adding a strip of fancy paper around it. I bet the sheet of paper was pricey, but using it sparingly makes it last.

10. Reuse a gift bag. I saved so many gift bags from our baby showers that I finally had to go through our gift bags and get rid of some. I didn’t throw them out, though! I donated them to Goodwill. Speaking of, you can find all sorts of lovely gift bags at good will for cheap.

11. Just add a huge bow. Sometimes one large statement is all you need.

12. Add a creative card. I don’t recommend giving tequila for every occasion, but in this case a lime made the perfect card.

Thrifty Living: Thrifty Tips and Recent Scores

Some thrifty things I’ve been doing to save money:

* During the morning and early afternoon I try to find some excuse to use my oven: drying herbs, toasting nuts, roasting potatoes, whatever. I can keep the thermostat down a few notches because the heat from the oven will keep the kitchen toasty while at the same time making something tasty for later.

* I’ve also pulled out my stack of crocheted blankets from the linen closet and just keep them on the couch. When one of us gets cold I insist we put on a blanket or a sweater before we turn up the heat. They look lovely in a pile and are more likely to get used when I keep them out.

* I tried the no-heat curl method to try a new look. I already had the hairband so trying this was free!

* I’ve been using the library a whole lot more. This option should be obvious after working in a library for eight years, but since we also had Anthony’s Borders discount, and since discovering the handiness of reading ebooks via the iPhone, I stopped checking books out of the library. I still went to the library–I mean, between my mother and I Isobel’s been to every story time available since she was a year old. But we’d leave when story time was over. Now I stay and make sure I have new additions to both my and Isobel’s bookshelves every week.

* I don’t have a lot of pairs of pants. Since losing over 20lbs due to my time on the elliptical and the debilitating panic attacks I really only have two pairs of pants that fit. One of them has stylish (or so I tell myself) holes worn in the knees from constant use. I can’t afford to go clothes shopping but I did have enough to buy a few pairs of colorful tights. I love the way they add a pop of color to my outfits while keeping me warm and extending the life of my jeans.

* I’m being pretty strict about our one napkin and one rag per day and I’ve been trying to expand this rule to cups and plates, too. This is an excellent way to save water and saves me a lot of work in the dishes and laundry department. Score!

* I haven’t been doing any major thrifting because I’m still in the midst of my giant Etsy storage and reorganization project, but I’ve stopped off yard sales and a thrift store here or there over the past month and these photos are some of the things I’ve picked up: a colorful crocheted poncho for Isobel, pegasus and unicorn mugs for me (and Anthony, if he’s so inclined), and some lovely wooden hangers covered with a delicate web of crocheted threads. These were obviously handmade and came from an estate sale. I wish more people would learn how to do this because it’s gorgeous and I’m afraid it’s a dying art. I got all six hangers for a dollar. Can you even imagine how long it must have taken to make these?

Anybody doing anything differently to save money? This time of year I could use all the help I can get.

Little Big Shop: White Elephant Extravaganza

This year many of you will be invited to holiday parties in which you will be required to bring a gift of questionable taste. Although terms vary from place to place, this is generally what’s known as a White Elephant Gift Exchange. A good friend of mine has participated in such an exchange with her siblings for many years, and each year they try to outdo each other by finding the most ridiculous, most ludicrous gift of them all.

Perhaps you have been invited to such a get together? If so, do I have the Thrift Store Gore for you.

Yes, I’ve seen some pretty awful things in thrift stores over the years. Adult-sized Spiderman Underoos. A luncheon with a cheetah. Whatever this is. But now, dear readers, you can own a piece of Thrift Store Gore history. I have assembled some of my weirdest finds so you can become Queen (or King, we don’t hate) of the Gift Exchange.

These last few months have been spent tracking down the weirdest thrifted items to ensure only the most tasteless and uniquely terrible gift giving possible.

How about a decorative plate, commemorating different school houses that burned down?

Or a  book called “Wild Animals at Home,” a primitive predecessor of LOLCATS, in which someone took photos of animals at the zoo and then wrote offensive, and at times, horribly sexist, captions underneath them.

The author thinks animals really hate Democrats.

It’s a fun read for the kids! (Not really!)

I’m pretty taken with this handcrafted abalone lamp sombody’s cracked-out uncle cobbled together from a sea shell, a light socket, and an electrical cord. Bonus: it might be a fire hazard!

Years ago my friend Stefanie and I found a book called “I Can’t Think Of A Thing To Say!” while thrifting. It gives all sorts of advice on what to say to that boss hunk with the parachute pants.

The inside cover says “Especially for Girls.” It looks like Kotex packaging.

For those with crazy parents, who wouldn’t want to give them a “SPEAKING OF THE GRANDCHILDREN” photo album from 1970? (My mom thought this was a great idea, actually. But since she has only one grandchild I’d have to fill the rest of the album with cat photos.)

Last but not certainly not least, I found a creepy Anne Geddes doll that suggests she may be into furries. Give this to that extra irritating coworker who belches loudly and smells of Redbull, powdered donuts, and hopelessness.

But wait, there’s more! The first customer to purchase something from this section of my shop will get this slightly disturbing sheet of vintage wrapping paper free:

It’s a little crinkled so I’m not selling it, although it’s definitely weird enough to qualify as Thrift Store Gore.

Those of you who’ve purchased from me before know that each order comes with a photo thank you card and these gifts are no exception. Lucky buyers of Thrift Store Gore will get a photo of drunk Santa for your troubles. Someone’s been naughty this year! SPOILER ALERT: It’s Santa.

Stop by the shop and visit the Post-Cyber-Monday Sale, and pick up some Thrift Store Gore while you’re at it. Because you are never too old to be eaten by an Anne Geddes bear.

Guest Post: The Thrifty Advent Calendar

Today I’m pleased to have the lovely and talented Amber joining us for a guest post about an advent calender of holiday activities. A good friend of mine from the twitters, she is the mother of an adorable toddler and one on the way. I’m really excited about this idea because  it’s as easy on the budget as you want it to be. I can’t wait to put something like this together for Isobel. Be sure to check her out on Pinterest as she pinned tons of fantastic resources.

The Thrifty Advent Calendar

I’ve never celebrated the Christmas season with an advent calendar. Sure we noted the time until the holiday but there was never a formalized way to count down each of the days in December leading up to the main event. I’ve always thought they looked like a lot of fun to make and use. Since my daughter is at the age where she’s starting to really “get” Christmas I’ve decided to make a commitment to this particular tradition.

I touched on this idea on Miss A when I wrote about a toddler friendly holiday. I plan to wrap up 24 holiday themed children’s books to create a Christmas Book Advent Calendar. You and your child open one book a night to countdown the days in December left until Christmas. In my version each book will be numbered, but the tag will also list an activity to do during the day.

Photo via BABYCCINO KIDS

I’ve been collecting TONS of kid friendly Christmas ideas on Pinterest. There are endless ways that you can enjoy something holiday related each and every day. Some of the daily activity ideas I have so far are:

• decorate the Christmas tree
• take a walk to see holiday lights at night
• make a gingerbread house
• go caroling
• visit Santa for photos
• ride the town’s Polar Express
• go see the Nutcracker
• make a paper-plate snowman
• watch Charlie Brown’s Christmas
• wrap a gift to donate to a child in need
• make cookies for Santa

It’s seriously cheap and easy to do. Eventually maybe we’ll own enough Christmasy books to have 24 on hand, but for now we’re utilizing our public library for most of them. Many of the daytime activities will be free or close to it since I’m participating in township programs and using craft supplies I tend to keep on hand. There’s almost no real prep time. All that needs to be done is to wrap 24 books and write up their coordinating tags. I may try to plan everything out on a calendar so the activity for some specific days match up with things that are already scheduled. I do wish we had a lovely mantle to display them on, like in the photo above, but I’ll most likely find a cute basket to file them in. Either way, these books will look like lovely presents that add to our holiday decor. That’s it…easy peasy!

I’d love to hear of some ways that you and your loved ones celebrate the holiday season. Sometimes the anticipation of the big day is the best part.

Amber is a NJ native with Southern roots. She is a recovering mommy blogger with recently acquired journalistic dreams that are being explored on Miss A’s fantastical website. She enjoys long naps, but with a toddler and another on the way, who are we kidding? Amber has way too many interests to pick one as a career or a blog genre, so she writes about everything; from parenting to organizational projects. Please visit her Backwards Life and watch as the world flips upside down and inside out time and time again.

Thrifty Living: Drying & Saving Herbs

Today I’m going to show you the best way for storing cut herbs. No, I’m not talking about one of those herb saver dealies, but you can certainly go out and spend 15-20 bucks on that if it makes you feel better. That might be worth it to you, but besides the fact that it costs money it’s just another thing that serves a single purpose that you’ll inevitably have to clean and store and care for for the rest of your life, or until you chuck it in the garbage. Wow, I really sound like a grump about those things. I’m not, really.  If the situation presented itself I’d love to try it. I do love me a kitchen gadget after all, but the fact is I don’t have the budget to go bandying about on something that can just as easily be remedied by some scissors, a tall glass, and some water. So, here’s the thrifty way to preserve your freshly cut herbs:

1. First, take your bunch of herbs (here we have Thai basil from the Farmer’s Market), and snip off the ends. Just like with cut flowers, snipping the ends every few days helps ensure a crisp, clean stem to help circulate the water better.

2. Fill a glass part way up with water and plunk the herbs in. It will smell really, really lovely, as that is the nature of herbs, but press on anyway. Make sure the stems are well submerged in the water, or else the top of your herbs will dry out and get crispy. (If some do get crispy, don’t panic: just avoid them in favor for leaves that still have life in them.)

3. Place in the refrigerator. Ta-da! They will keep well for several days, and up to a week or more depending on the freshness of the herbs and the type of herb you are saving. You may need to add water or change it out  if it becomes cloudy or murky, but other than that you are good to go.

I buy some sort of herbs every week at the grocery store or farmer’s market. My herb garden isn’t large enough to supply every herb I need, but inevitably when I buy herbs this way I always have a ton left over. In an effort to cut waste and boost nutrition I’ve been adding the leftover chopped herbs to my food on a daily basis. Almost everything you eat can benefit from some chopped Italian parsley (which is usually what I have leftover), so I’ve been adding it to eggs, sandwiches, salads,  over chicken, in soups, whatever. At the end of the week, I’m usually left with a bunch of slimy stems that can be tossed straight in the compost bin.

Last week I harvested some fresh herbs from my garden and dried them in the oven. I got a lot of requests for tutorials on twitter, and you are going to be surprised at how easy it is:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees F.

2. Line a baking tray with parchment.

3. Place clean, dry herbs on try.

4. Dry for 2-4 hours.

You’ll know your herbs are done when they crackle and flake into bits when crumbled. Delicate leaves will take closer to two hours while stems and heartier plants will take nearer to four. The thing you’ll notice is that they are still very freshly green when dried this way as opposed to dried herbs you’ll by from the store.

Thrifty Living: The Dress Up Chest

I am so excited to finally share this post with you. Building this dress up chest from thrifted and secondhand items has been so much fun, and once I tell you how cheap and easy it is to make, you are going to want to make one, too.

You don’t have to build a secondhand dress up chest, but I find that the best stuff, the cheapest stuff, and sometimes, the most realistic stuff, is found second hand. Additionally, the dress up chest helped me think of ways to repurpose items that I otherwise would donate or send to a landfill. And once my friends and family members heard about this dress up chest I was putting together they came forward with things from their closets to add to the bounty.

The best places to shop for dress up items that are new would be craft stores like Michael’s (they have hats, boas, and headbands), the dollar store (sometimes home to some pretty great finds) and the party supply store. Hear me out on that one! The party supply store has lies, hats, necklaces, sunglasses, and scarves,usually for really cheap. Pop-up Halloween costume stores are great, too–but skip the prepackaged costumes and go straight to the accessories. Wigs, hats, and gloves are a better investment than the costumes themselves, which won’t hold up to constant kid abuse.

Creating a kickass dress up chest is part of my life list, so I can consider this item mission accomplished.

(Poppy isn’t part of the dress up chest. She’s just acting as the showroom model. Thanks, Pops.)

By far, though, your best bet is to troll thrift stores and yard sales. Here are some of my favorite items from the chest:

This is something we call “the minky” because it just looks like a weird pile of brown fur if you can’t see how it’s used. It’s actually a large, wide scarf and it functions as a stole or a shawl. It looks and even feels like luxurious fur, but worry not, animal lovers: it’s actually a strange woven mohair-type yard that was knitted into shape. Strange. My Mom found it while thrifting and picked it up because she knew I was putting a dress up chest together.

My mom also found that black beaded purse and the white kitty hat secondhand and contributed the blue Heidi dress from her childhood as well. My Aunt Debbie added the pink-lined white stole plus these glasses.

The black ninja mask is actually a headsock that I saved from my one and only racing experience, and the gloves and mask were leftover from my Rogue costume and Anthony’s Nightwing costume. You might remember the witch hat from Target’s dollar bin, and the make up brushes we bought after having fun with our cousins. The necklaces were contributed by my mother-in-law, much to Zorro’s chagrin. You might remember the bunny ears? Coworkers gave us those. The wings were found while thrifting.

I saved the glasses from Yo Gabba Gabba Live and laminated them at work. They are still kicking! (Though admittedly a bit worse for wear.) We bought the giant magnifying glass when we visited the Children’s Museum and all the kids that come over just love it. What a great $3 purchase!  Isobel calls it her “Lookie Lookie”, but it usually comes out “Wookie Wookie!” Too cute.

That lanyard came from Anthony’s time at Borders. The cat key came from our very interesting time with the White Car. Long ago, before Isobel was even thought of, Anthony and I went on a date to an arcade where we won these Special Police badges and I kept them all this time.

This compass is one of my favorite finds. It’s real and it works and it’s satisfyingly larger than the palm of my hand, making the adventures we have with it extra-epic. It’s a thrift store find.

I bought this sparkle ball at Borders and later I found this stand while thrifting. I don’t know for sure that it’s for a crystal ball, but that was all I could think of when I looked at it.

Anthony found the bag with a moon on it while thrifting and thought it would make a great ‘magic pouch.’ This beaded clutch is one of Isobel’s favorite things, and also a thrift store score.

We also have a fantastic collection of thrifted dress up hats, which I’ll show you later, and besides that we’re adding to our collection all the time.  Whenever we have kids over to play they make a beeline for the dress up chest. It’s one of Kingston’s favorite things to do, and there’s nothing cuter than seeing the kids all dressed up. If you are thinking about giving this a go, I’d like to hearitly recommend it and would love to see pictures of what you find! Link back here in the comments so we can all see. Happy hunting!

Thrift Store Score: Toy Camera

Nothing like letting your kid dress herself and then taking her outside to play with your latest Thrift Store Score: a realistic-looking toy camera.

It doesn’t actually work, but this toy is magnificent. The buttons depress, the dials spin, and the hot shoe is functional. In case she wanted to pretend she abhors flash like mama.

I nabbed it for twenty cents.

Isobel likes to carry her purse and her camera around, just like Mama.

This is easily one of my favorite Thrift Store Scores ever.