I didn't, but I sure did want to

I love beautiful things, and I really love beautiful glass.  I also really love finding a great deal, and not paying a lot for things, which sometimes leaves me conflicted, especially when I find something I love that's just out of my price range. 

Perhaps I have too much fear of Murphy's Law: if I really love it, I pay a lot, and it's fragile, I'm probably going to break it.

So I only buy glass pieces I love when I find them undervalued, which isn't too often.  Or sometimes I'll find a beautiful pieces with a tiny chip (sometimes almost invisible) that drastically lowers the price.

In the past few months of wandering antique malls, I've seen some really beautiful "almosts" - as in, I almost bought them.  But they were just a little more expensive than what I wanted to pay.  (But as always, worth every penny of the price.)

Whether it's for The House of Goodwill or for myself, the real fun for me of thrifting is finding that amazing thing that somehow got overlooked and is undervalued.

Here are some pics of one of my very favorite things, L.E. Smith glass.  The L.E. Smith glassware in antique malls is vintage (in other words, not antique because it's slightly less than 100 years old).  Some of the most popular pieces are goblets, canister sets, candleholders, vases and compotes.

My heart always stops for a second when I see a vendor booth like this one.

SO beautiful!!

But whenever I see a vendor who is obviously a collector as well, I know the prices will be higher.

It's when you find a little random piece amidst a bunch of other stuff that you find the deal.

This little fairy lamp (you put a candle inside) stopped me because of it's beautiful shade of blue.

The usual blue L.E. Smith glass pieces I see are a different shade.

I really, really wanted this!

This is the "Moon and Stars" pattern that L.E. Smith is famous for.

$45 was actually a good price for this, because this compote was quite large.

I was surprised it was priced this low, and I'm sure it was bought quickly.

Is this not exquisite??

This one stopped me because I had never seen a fairy lamp in this larger size.

I almost always see smaller ones.

At $65, I did not buy it, but oh how I wanted to!!

So I have no idea who the maker of this was (it would be fun to research) but it caught my attention because in all my years of antiquing I've never seen anything quite like it.

I just thought the design was so interesting and pretty.

"A lot" for me to pay for a piece of glassware is $25-30.

While certainly not cheap, L.E. Smith glass isn't all that expensive, considering it's age and beauty.  I dread the day these get popularized on Instagram and the prices shoot up.

One of my hopes when we move eventually from our current house is to have a lot of windows and places to display the pieces I love.

When colored glass catches the light just right, it'll stop your heart for a minute.  One of the things my foster kids loved was to look at the rainbows on the walls and ceiling of my dining room when the afternoon sunlight passed through the crystal prisms on my chandelier.

They'd run in the kitchen shouting "rainbows" and pointing.  I loved their joy; it was mine too.

To turn down the lights at night when you're watching a movie or to light the fireplace surrounded by the glow of L.E. Smith fairy lamps - this is magic!

A little winter surprise

Sometime last summer I bought a reblooming red azalea.  I had had my eye on them for a while; I'd noticed some in people's yards while walking my dog and thought they were really pretty.

My "normal" pink azalea (just blooms in the spring) is one of the small joys in my life.  My neighbors have always commented on how much they love it; when it's in bloom you almost don't see green leaves at all.  Just flowers.

Anyway, I found a reblooming red one at Lowe's on the discount rack last summer.  I think it was $6.

I have the perfect spot for it at the home/house - a shady area under a tree where I'd love to have something colorful.

I've been so busy working on The House of Goodwill that I wasn't home in the fall to plant it.  Well, I was home to plant it, but I didn't want to since I wasn't staying long enough to water it daily to help it get established.

So it remained in a pot and I brought it indoors this winter in order to keep it from freezing.  I put it in my husband's office in front of a window.

Around the middle of January, I came back to The House of Goodwill to paint for a week.  When I returned home, I went to water it and noticed it was covered in flower buds.  In the middle of January!

A few days later it was COVERED in flowers.  Beautiful, red flowers.

I'm pretty sure this was supposed to happen in October.  I guess living indoors confused it.

And I never thought of a reblooming azalea as a potential house plant, but it was pretty great!  To have a beautiful small shrub blossoming in the middle of winter brought a welcome reminder of hope and spring energy.

I had bought this BEAUTIFUL antique planter last year at an antique store.  It was not a discount, but I thought the price ($26) was totally worth it.  I haven't seen anything quite like it before.  It was a beautiful transferware-ish, Victorian (?) green planter.

When I inquired about it, I was told it came into the shop the day before from a dealer who'd just received a shipment of antiques from Europe.  That's all I know.

But I got to use it for the first time - I had to bring the azalea downstairs where I could enjoy it, and it was the perfect planter for it.

By the time I thought to take a photo, about half the flowers had finished and fallen.

I couldn't believe how many flowers it made in January!

I always love this pale green color.  It reminds me of spring!

The other side has a different picture.

I don't know which I like more!

While I don't know anything of the origins of this planter, and I wouldn't qualify it as a discount buy, surely it must be worth more than what I paid for it?!

I think it's absolutely beautiful, and considering that regular, plain, mass-produced ceramic planters at Home Depot cost about the same amount, I think this was one of my favorite finds!  (I have a few of those. 🙂)

Being surrounded by lovely things just makes life a little lovelier, don't you think?

Sayonara dark '70s molding!

The snow is gone (almost!), the family's gone, and now it's just me by myself at The House of Goodwill.  After a week's delay by the big snow storm, I am ready to get to work again!

Of all the rooms in the house to paint, the entryway is one of the biggest, because it contains a total of 2 windows, and 8 doorways.  Plus molding circling the room on the floor, chair rail and ceiling.  In addition to all this molding (the most time consuming portion to paint, by far), there is wallpaper to strip and the walls to paint.

About a third of it is already done.  The door frames to the bedroom and hallway were painted when I worked on those rooms.  And I spent a week last summer painting two of the closet door frames, one window and part of some wall/ceiling molding.

But there's still a lot left!

Yesterday I got it all deglossed and ready to paint.  (My least favorite part.)

So once this post is up, I'm off to put on the first of the five coats of white paint.

I've been waiting FOREVER to tackle this room, and I am so excited about it!!

Here's where it's at right now:

My husband built this platform for me over the spiral staircase so I can put the painting ladder on top.

He's quite talented! 😍

Oh, this dark entryway!

I swear, I'm adding skylights eventually!

In the meantime, we'll see what lightening the paint can do...

Here is the double door entrance to the living room and a small coat closet.

Looking into the entry from the hallway.

There is one bedroom off to the left, and the living room entry and three small closets on the right.

It's hard to believe that this dark, dark molding was ever considered a good look.  As I tell my son - who constantly tells me that Birkenstocks worn with black, ankle-length socks is a legitimate style - not everything that is popular looks good.  Just because something is in style, doesn't mean it has style - at least not to me.

Ironically, I'm actually not a huge fan of white molding.  I actually prefer stained wood; I just love the look.  But there was no way to lighten the stain of the molding (at least to my knowledge) and anyway, all the color choices I'm using in this house are an attempt to lighten it up.  And it's working so far!

Incidentally, it's really weird to be in a house without even a dog.  This silence feels so foreign.

But enough of this for now.  It's time to paint!

When you hit Goodwill just right

It's nice to have an excuse to go thrifting.  And my excuse this year has been perfect, since I've actually needed to find things to fill up a house with.

When you hit the thrift stores regularly, you find that from time to time when you go, the timing's off.  For whatever reason, there's not much there, or it's just not what you need.

But from time to time, the timing is ON.  Once in a while, you hit it just right, like this time last year when I went right after someone seemingly donated their entire beautiful plate collection to Goodwill.

I LOVE antique dishes.  I love transferware.  I even love beautiful new dishes.  To me, they're often beautiful little pieces of art and I like to display them that way.

So here are some finds from one Goodwill trip last year; these will all be wall decor when I finally get this house painting finished:

I love the colors here.  

This one is actually new (I think from Williams Sonoma?) and it's dishwasher and microwave safe, so I contemplated just keeping it for a pretty kitchen serving dish.

But it's just so colorful I want to see it every day on a wall!

I don't know how old this one is, but it's definitely vintage.  

I love the rose illustration.

Another newer one.  Isn't this lovely?

Between the bird art I've found and these, I think the house will have a really pretty nature aesthetic.

This one's old too.

It reminds me of old Homer Laughlin patterns.

This Lenox plate is brand new.

I'm not usually drawn to new stuff, but I just loved this, and the message it conveys.

If I can find the right spot in the entry, I will put it there.

(I loved it so much I paid the big money for it - $6!)

This would be so pretty to serve cookies from too, wouldn't it?

For around $20 for all, I've got some beautiful wall decor for the house.

I never eat off of antique dishes, because some of them contain lead in the paint (which can contaminate the food sitting on top), so it's not recommended.  Not to mention that they weren't meant for the microwave or dishwasher, which can break them down.  (And the high heat of the microwave can cause the lead paint to leach into the food super heated on it.)

Eating the occasional sandwich off of one is probably fine, but they're not practical (or safe) enough for me to use daily.

So I stick to display with my little antique works of art.

Thank you Goodwill donor, for your good taste!  💓  These will definitely be enjoyed.

The prettiest desk organizer ever?

Last Friday, on the way to The House of Goodwill, I stopped mid-route to visit an antique store I've never been to.  It was huge, it was fun, and all I could think was - with all of my trips back and forth between houses this year, why have I never done this before?

You may have noticed from this blog that one of my favorite things in the world is beautiful colored glass.

I am so drawn to it, but I only buy pieces that are affordable, in part because when I see a huge price tag (though of course it's always worth it) - all I can think about is - if I pay this much and it breaks, how much more will it hurt?

Anyway, I saw this great glass container set that I've never seen before.  I've seen glass this color, this style, but nothing quite like this.  At first I thought it was a tall jar, but no, it has three different compartments:

So beautiful!

I assume this is supposed to be a multi-layer candy dish. (?)  But since we try not to have candy just sitting around, I think I'm going to use it as a desk organizer - paper clips, rubber bands, etc.

Organizing my desk area is a project for the future.  🙄  But with something this pretty to inspire me, I've got the motivation to get it done!

It's fun to be at a lake house in winter!

Ok, so this won't be a post about vintage anything, or something recycled, or anything cool and free.

But it will be about The House of Goodwill!

This ice/snow storm has been so fun, and such an unexpected delight that I want to post just a few more pics from this week.

First, photos from outside, where we have been spending as much time each day as possible:

The house glowing at night.

Each afternoon we walk the dogs, then play in the snow, then go for another evening walk in the dark.

When the snow is falling, it's just so magical.

This photo wasn't altered.  The falling snow looks so cool in this pic.

For some reason all the street lights looked green in the photos.

I wish they actually looked like this!

Another pic of the house at night.

The birds have been cleaning me out!

I think they are even happier that we're here this week than we are.

And in indoor news, here are a few more pics:

We got the gas fireplace lit in the downstairs for the first time!

It's the perfect place to dry the outdoor clothes.

Book #2 in the Mitford series - I'm really enjoying it.

These books were given to me by my mother-in-law and I think of her as I'm reading.

I'm still enjoying my Valentine's winter roses.

They're in their perfect state of rose openness now.

The evening activity for a week now?  Tri-Ominos!

My husband and son want to play something else, but I've lost every single night so far.  We can't move on to a different game until I win once.

Sorry.  (Not sorry.)

I look forward to spending future winter snowfalls here.  When the house is ready to rent, I'm sure others will as well.  I wonder what games they'll be playing?

When life hands you an ice storm...

After three weeks at the home/house for work, I was so excited to get back to The House of Goodwill last Friday, to get back to my painting.

I'm heading toward the home stretch with the painting - I probably have about six weeks left - and then I can really focus on "assembling" the house, and making it feel more like a home.

While we've been living here (mostly) since June, much of the furniture is still in the garage; the collected art is still in piles; the rugs are all rolled up downstairs in the kitchen.  I've been waiting to get the painting done before moving most of it in. 

When I bring all that stuff in (the most fun part) - it's going to feel a lot cozier here, and I'm looking forward to it.  I just want to get this painting completed!

My husband thought it would be nice to spend Valentine's weekend here.  Then he and my son were going to head home (with the dogs), leaving me here to paint distraction-free.

So guess what happened?

If you guessed freezing rain, you would be right!  And guess who's been snowed in here all week with me?  (And guess who hasn't got any painting done?)

Goodbye, productive and focused week.  But hello to snow!

It truly has been a *beautiful* week, and I'm so glad we've been here to enjoy it.  Here are some pics my husband took outside Tuesday morning:

On Monday, as the snow was coming down, we HAD to be outside.

Knowing it was supposed to snow before we came, fortunately, we all brought some warm outdoor clothes.  Unfortunately, not realizing the extent of the forecast, none of us brought "real" snow clothes.

("Real snow clothes" as people from the north - as I am originally - know, are not merely warm clothes for cold weather.  They are clothes specially designed for playing in the snow.  All our best snow clothes were back home, and we had no sled, either.)

So what does one do with an unexpectedly "bad" snowstorm, no real snow clothes, and no sled?

You play in the snow anyway!

The dogs LOVED the snowy dog walk ❄

No sled?  No problem!  A wakeboard for the lake worked just fine.

We could sit between the "shoes" and hold them to hang on.

My husband was the only one to try the steep hill in the back yard.  I was afraid I'd end up in the lake...

There was absolutely no one outside.  It was like our own little winter wonderland, and so peaceful!

The icy water didn't faze the geese at all.

We watched the lake ice over throughout the day

So blessed to enjoy these beautiful sights.

I stayed outside as long as I could possibly stand it.

I can always paint next week, right?

When arbitrary works in your favor

For people who like to go flea-ing, thrifting and antiquing, perhaps the thing about it that makes it the most fun (and also the most frustrating), is the seemingly arbitrary way that items are often priced.

Sometimes this is bad.  For example, when I walk into an antique store for the first time - that's in the middle of nowhere - and everything is really, really expensive, it's always a surprise.  I always wonder who the shoppers are and how the place stays in business.

But on the other hand, sometimes you discover a place that (unexpectedly) is really affordable and has great stuff.

Most of the time, though, places will have bit of both.  Since antique malls rent their booths to different vendors, people will price things differently.  And once in a while you find that great item that seems priced WAY below what it's worth.

(This is also why Goodwill is great and antique dealers are always trolling thrift stores for things to resell.)  Often people donate to Goodwill not knowing the value of their donations.

Those Holly Hobbie plates I paid $10 each for and then saw at Goodwill for $3 each?  A good example.

But here a couple of times lately when seemingly random prices have worked in my favor:

Remember these adorable duck planters that I found at thrift stores in the fall?

Here they are after I filled them with chrysanthemums.

See the price tag when I bought them?  I paid $3 and $4 each.

Well, I saw one at the antique store last week.  It looks nearly the same as the one on the left:

Do you see the price tag?  $25!

And here's a beautiful pitcher and basin I saw in a different antique store last week:

Such a pretty color!  I always want to fill these with flowers!

But this price!  $129!  Wow!

Here is my version, you may remember this from one of my original posts last year:

Perhaps this one's design is a bit less detailed, but I paid $5 for the basin and pitcher.

Really!!

With $8 worth of alstroemerias, I thought it was the perfect spring arrangement.

Like I always tell myself when buying an expensive vase I don't need - it makes a beautiful gift if I want to pass it on.

And one final score from last year, one that I use all the time at The House of Goodwill:

Excepting the water glasses in the bottom right of this cabinet, all the other glasses in the cabinet were part of a carload of things I got for $55 from Denise's basement.  (A lady who was selling garage sale leftovers from her mother's estate in bulk.)

Those beautiful Indiana Glass green goblets on the second shelf - they are one of my favorite things.  I probably got 16 or so in the heap of stuff I picked out.

I run into them regularly at antique malls, and they aren't cheap.

Here's a posting from online; this is typical pricing:

Yes, that's $50 for 3 glasses.

Yes, once in a while arbitrary prices favor the buyer!

And that's the fun of it.  To create something beautiful on a budget - that's the game!

Take that money you save in little bits here and there, add it up over the years and you've got the down payment on your lake house. 

An Ideals Valentine's Day

This morning, my Valentine's Day started beautifully with some of my favorite things:

My son gave me these roses yesterday.  They look like beautiful winter roses!

I usually stick to reading just the Bible on Sunday morning, but it's a special day, so I pulled out one of my vintage Ideals Magazines.

I love these magazines; they are filled with beautiful photos, poems, recipes and nostalgia.  They remind me of my mother-in-law, who is the only other person I know who enjoyed them as I do.  Whenever I find copies at antique malls or estate sales, I pick them up.  I've noticed lately they're becoming quite collectable - they're getting popular on ebay.

Here are a few of the pages I read today:

I read this out loud to my husband.  "That creates such a vivid picture, I love it," was his comment.

(If you click on the image it will be readable full size. 😀)

The photography in Ideals is always stunning, really.  So many of the photographs remind me of my childhood in New York.  I miss the beautiful snowy days of winter.

Isn't this sweet?  I can't say this ever happened to me...

I love this arrangement of roses and daisies!  I would never have imagined putting those two flowers together, but they are a charming combination.  I want to make this!

I don't have crocuses, but I DO have tulips and daffodils, and -

It is ALMOST daffodil season!  I divided my daffodils last spring and planted them all over the place in my yard - I can't wait to see the payoff this spring.

Crocuses in the snow - this is hope in photo form.

Lovely poem, lovely image.

I don't know where this is, but I want to go here!!

Ideals gives me that magic that reading always does - it takes me somewhere else.  And I guess in a world that lately often feels ugly and vulgar and hard, the sweetness and the simplicity in the life captured inside appeals to me so strongly.

Perhaps this gentler, softer, "ideal" life never really existed - but if even the shadows of these ideals is possible to find - this is the life I want.

Happy Valentine's Day! 💗💗