A few "new" things

Over the last few months I've made a few Goodwill visits and a few antique mall stops when I've had a day off now and then.  While I have most things I need for the house at this point (though the house has yet to be "arranged"), when I see something I'll be able to use I still pick it up.

When we're finally done with all the interior painting and we put the house together, I'll be able to see what furniture and items I'm missing and still need to find.  But it's nice to know that we've already bought most of what we need.

Here are a couple of things that caught my eye that I really liked, and wanted to put in the house:

A lot of my "art" I'm going to use in the house are vintage and antique plates, which I absolutely love.

I liked this one for it's 1970's color, and its date, 1976.

This is my birth year, and it's also the decade The House of Goodwill was built, so it feels very appropriate.

My dad always called me the "bicentennial baby."

Plus, with everything going on in our country right now, it's gotten me feeling very patriotic. 

$7 at an antique store.

Though not a Holly Hobbie plate like the others I found, this one from 1973 still felt like one.

I love it's color, it's sweet message and vintage vibe.

$5 at the antique store.

This twin quilt bedspread has the perfect colors for the house.

Since we're going to rent it, I want to have a good stockpile of linens for all the beds.

Whenever I find one like this, in perfect condition, I pick it up.

I think it was $8 at Goodwill.

I found this - apparently never used - great orange and white blanket at Goodwill for $4!

Since I've started crocheting, I really notice these beautiful blanket patterns.

This was probably one of those beautiful blankets that took so much work, it was likely never used, and just sat in a room to be admired (sadly).  The condition is pristine!

I imagine that when someone cleaned out grandma's house, they just donated this to Goodwill. (There were at least three other beautiful, in-perfect-condition crochet blankets there that day.)

But this was the one in the perfect color scheme for The House of Goodwill -

1970's orange!

This blanket falls in the category of "but it's so perfect, I hate to put it in a rental just because it was cheap!"  A part of me wants to keep it beautiful and perfect.  A lot of time went into making this!

But then again, I'm guessing that's how it got to Goodwill.  It was just so beautiful and took so much effort to make, that no one ever wanted to actually use it and possibly mess it up.

But what's the point of living in a museum of beautiful things?  Eventually someone else will just send them to Goodwill - SO - you might as well enjoy those nice things now, right?

I have always struggled with the tendency to hang on to something special/valuable/nice when I have it; to save it for that perfect occasion that never seems to come.  I'm learning to let go of that a little.  To enjoy what I have.  

I remember visiting a neighbor of mine over twenty years ago.  She was a little old lady, and when we sat in her living room, we sat on a pristine (probably 30-year-old) sofa covered in one of those plastic sofa covers.  I also remember all the never-burnt candles on tables that I imagine had been there (unlit) for at least a decade.

And I remember promising myself then, that I would never be an 80-year-old surrounded by unlit candles.  Because, why?  When she passed away a few years later, I have no doubt everything in her living room ended up at Goodwill.

The moral of the story?  That crochet blanket WILL be used.  And I now have the strongest urge to go light a candle somewhere...