Oh Danny Boy, the Thrifts, the Thrifts are Calling....

After my hectic couple of weeks, I realized that I needed some retail therapy.  I have about 2 hours to myself on Thursdays while my daughter is at school, and today I definitely wanted to hit the thrifts!

It was a very good decision!

And I actually had a good reason to go- we've been busy preparing things to go up to our cabin in a few weeks, and part of that is moving our old TV and entertainment center up there. This is a huge, heavy piece of oak furniture, and something that is dated in this age of wall-mounted TVs. We've been wanting to rid our living room of this for years, and planning to bring up my father-in-law's 1959 hi-fi console in its place. Which we did last night.

Problem is, the entertainment center also housed a component stereo system, which I use all the time to play my LPs. Moving the EC meant that the stereo now has no home. So my husband actually asked me to go out shopping to find something we could use to hold the stereo. Yes, he actually told me to go thrift shopping! (And boy howdy, you don't need to ask me twice to do that!)

I happen to know exactly what I want to use for the stereo- a 1950s record cabinet, the kind with some shelves to hold records and components, in blonde wood with tapered legs and glass door. (Yes, I have a specific mental image of what I want to get.) But as we all know, you can't just go out and buy one of those at the thrift store. You have to keep going until you find it. So I knew I needed something temporary, but not throw-away.

My first stop of the morning was a converted Goodwill (now religious-run) in town, that I have had some good luck at. They price things fairly well and seem to have a good selection. I headed first to the housewares and spied this immediately:

A Cosco kitchen cart, $8.

 It will hold all the stereo items in style until I find what I really want. Then I can use it on the patio or the kitchen. With that need taken care of in the first 5 minutes, I was free to wander the store (minus the squeaky cart, which I left at the register.)

I want to thank the lovely MaryDeluxe for pointing out vintage jewelry boxes to me :). It had never occurred to me that these were even out there, but apparently they can be worth some $. Something to look out for! I love this one- very masculine- and got it for $1.

I had some more time and decided to brave the local Sally Ann. This store is only a couple of miles from me and is huge- probably over 10K square feet. I think it used to be a Kmart. It really is that big! You'd think it would be a slam dunk, that I'd be there every week, but no. It just hasn't paid off for me very much. Lots of smelly stuff and smelly people. 

But today I found a few gems, and in the housewares section. Other than the furniture section, which is miniscule, and the jewelry section, (which is non-existent- where does it all go?) the housewares section of this store is probably the worst.

This is a McCoy covered soup crock. If anyone is a McCoy expert , I'd love to know the pattern name. It was filthy, but in otherwise great shape. For $1.99, I figured I could use it or sell it.

I have never, ever, found Pyrex in this store, let alone a fridgie in great shape and in a pattern I collect. But there it was, a primary yellow 503 with the old-style lid for $3.99. It, too, was very dirty, but cleaned up nicely. I'm halfway there to completing the primary set!

This is the best find of the day, perhaps the year. Yes, it is jadeite, and not a repro. I think I must have knocked over a few babies and old ladies getting to it. It was $2.99. You're reading that correctly.

It's a large mixing bowl, and I happened to know exactly what it belongs to:

A perfect fit! Never did I think I would find it, and for only a couple of bucks. See, there really is treasure at the end of the rainbow!