Apron Thrift Girl

500th Post ~ a Giveaway

How is that possible that there are now 500 posts here at ATG? I know when my daughter turned 10 I asked my friends how time could go by so quickly. I feel just as perplexed when I noticed that my 500th post was about to roll around. How did I even have 500 things to say? And yet every morning I sit down at the computer and words seem to flow from my fingers to the keyboard and onto the screen.

Thanks to everyone for stopping by, for leaving comments, for lurking, for leaving tips in the tip jar, for supporting me, for asking fabulous questions that sometimes lead to future posts, for making me laugh, for helping build this wonderful community of thrifters and for sharing your own thrift finds with all of us.

To properly thank you, I thought I would do a 500th Post Giveaway that focused on ReSelling. Here's what I have to offer:

• 1 Hour Phone Consultation about ReSelling. We'll set up an appointment and I'll call you.  You can ask me any questions that you might have about ReSelling. It can be regarding an item that you want to sell, how to get going with ReSelling, about a problem that you have or even asking me about items to look for. If you'd prefer we can do a Google Chat instead of a phone call.

Or you can choose this one:

• 2 Hours of ReSelling Research. You send me a list of items with photos of things that you would love more information about. I'll research the item and give you what info I could find on the item, where I think you might be able to sell the item and give you an estimate of ReSelling Value. Some items may remain a mystery. I too experience that but I'll still be able to share with you what I would personally do with the item.

Simply leave a comment and I'll run the Random Number Generator next Wednesday, June 21st at 6pm to pick the winner.

xoxo Selena, Apron Thrift Girl

LuSa Organics Winner

True Random Number Generator:  Result: 14 Powered by RANDOM.ORG

Thank you to everyone who signed up for the LuSa Organics Giveaway. Congratulations to Vicki K. who said "What a nice collection of products - I'd love to win the body care one! Thank you for the generous giveaway. LuSa seems like a great match for ATG!"

Rachel will be sending you the beautiful Body Care Gift Collection.

Thanks again everyone.

xoxo

Selena

ATG's first sponsor - LuSa Organics

I'm very excited to announce Apron Thrift Girl's first sponsor; LuSa Organics. 

                                          

I personally love to buy and support companies where there is a family behind the product. And it's a real family. I enjoy reading the history behind any family run business. You can read Rachel's story here. My favorite part on their "about us" page was this:

"As for our name, LuSa stands for Lupine and Sage, our two favorite small people. Our business orbits their lives as we live, work, play, and unschool together each day. Our intention is to leave the world a better, happier, and yes, cleaner, place for our work, so LuSa is inspired by all kids, not just ours."

At LuSa Organics you will find handcrafted soaps such as the Chamomile Goatmilk Soap which is made of goatmilk that is hand delivered to their door. If you live near Viroque, Wisconsin you have the chance to buy local soap made with local ingredients.

Each bar of soap is complete with moisturizer so that you don't have to use an extra product after you bathe. Their bars of soaps are long lasting and customers rave that they usually last at least a month. And for those frugal shoppers like myself, you get a chance to save money on your bar of soap by ordering it Naked. It will arrive sans packaging material which will save you 55¢ per bar. 

Booty Balm is their best seller and I can see why. It fixes everything which again for anyone frugal we like a one-stop-product that does everything. You can use it for diaper rash, cuts, scrapes, drool rash, windburn, sunburn and more. Plus each product at LuSa Organics features a clear list of ingredients.

Booty Balm Ingredients: *Olive oil, *jojoba oil, local beeswax, *avocado oil; flowers of *calendula, *lavender, and *chamomile; essential oil blend (lavender, patchouli, peru balsam, and chamomile), tocopherol (vitamin e); and grapefruit seed extract, citric acid, and silver citrate (natural preservatives).

Don't forget to check out the Scratch & Dent sale. At the moment you can order an 1 lb sampler of cosmetically challenged soaps for $11.

Rachel is offering Apron Thrift Girl readers a fabulous discount:  free shipping on orders over $50 before July 15, 2010. Use coupon code "THRIFTY".

Not only that, but Rachel is also going to give one lucky reader their choice between these two sweet collections.

The Body Care Gift Collection: This collection includes one small organic sugar scrub, one lip balm, one lotion bar, and one boxed soap packaged in a reusable muslin pouch. Choose from lavender, citrus, patchouli, or mint.

 

or the Baby Collection: This collection includes Booty Balm, Baby Wipe Juice, boxed Calendula Baby Soap, and one organic cotton baby wipe.

Here's how to enter this giveaway. You can earn a separate entry for each of these below.

• leave a comment and mention which collection you hope to win.
• leave a comment if you are a current Facebook fan of LuSa Organics or if you just became one.
• leave a comment if you ReTweeted this Giveaway
• leave a comment if you ReBlogged this Giveaway
• leave a comment if you subscribed to LuSa Organics blog

This giveaway is open until July 11th at 6pm. The winner will be chosen from Random Number Generator. Good luck everyone.

If you are interested in a sponsorship please take a look at my Sponsors page.

giveaway revealed

Here is my 4th Anniversary Giveaway.........

 
Journey Through Bookland    Vintage Compact      Wool Brooch by Sono-Ma

Vintage Wool             Russian Nesting Doll      Book to Craft With

Vintage Graphics             Vintage Postcards        Vintage Christmas

Tiny Photos                Kitschy                    Silverplate forks

Vintage Craft Supplies  Vintage Tacks          Vintage Necklaces

Silk Thread                Martha Stewart

Vintage Buttons          Vintage x-mas cards  Vintage Door knob plate

Vintage Ribbon          Norwegian Yarn          Vintage Brass

Rolled Paper Bracelet     Flashcards                Vintage Sequins

Toadstools                  Beaded Fish                Wool Stuffing

Blanket Wool Felt        Vintage Fabric            Fab Wool Blanket

How is that for a giveaway?

And the winner is...............

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

7

Timestamp: 2010-06-11 17:38:18 UTC

Jeanie Campbell!!!!

I must admit, that it warms my heart that the Random Number Generator would choose Jeanie. Jeanie has not only read my blog for years but she has faithfully commented and is really a part of the Apron Thrift Girl community.This is heading your way next week when I arrive home from our little vacation. Unless of course you want to drive from Colorado to pick it up.

I'm running very behind with packing our trip and picking up the children on their last day of school and taking them to a last day of school swim party. I'm going to announce the other winners of Nest Planner Files next week. Thanks for your patience.

Thank you to everyone who took part in my giveaway. I greatly appreciate it. Here's to another year of thrifting, Thrift Share Mondays, blogging and celebrating this amazing Thrift Community.

once upon a time......

......there was a lonely thrifter. She would go out, thrift and come home in an excited frenzy to share her thrifted finds.

"Look at this amazing lamp with chipped off paint" she'd say to her husband.

"wow, look how big the chips are" he'd say not very excited.

"But look at how shabby chic it is" in an attempt to get more emotion out of him.

"Well it looks like it will light up the corner well." he said trying to muster up some excitement but failing.

The lonely thrifter realized that after ten years of bringing home thrifted items to show her husband, he had finally used up every last adjective to describe an item. She realized that she needed more reaction about her finds than her husband could give her.

Four years ago today, she sat down at her computer and stumbled upon a thrift blog. Her jaw dropped and her heart skipped a beat. Someone was posting photos about items that they had thrifted. And people were commenting.  She discovered that she would never be alone in her thrift excitement again. There was a place for her.  Her eyes quickly scanned around the room and she spotted her small apron collection. She quickly found her name "Apron Thrift Girl." She subscribed to Typepad that same day because her favorite bloggers had typepad like Blair and Alicia. She wanted to be just like them.

Still feeling quite elated, she typed out her first post that began like this:

"My name is Selena, aka the Apron Thrift Girl, and I have been a thrifter since I was a babe in my mother's arms. Ever since I was young I remember going around thrift store after thrift store with my parents. Of course it wasn't so cool back in the 70's to thrift but what did a three year old know about being cool. All I cared about was how many Fisher Price Little People I had to go in my FP airplane."

It's been an amazing four years with this blog. After many years of loneliness in my life, I never really felt alone again after June 4th, 2006. I have made so many incredible friends through blogging. I have been blessed to meet so many of you.

Thank you to all who keep coming back and reading what I have to say. Thanks to those who comment faithfully. I adore each and every comment. I want to offer a fabulous giveaway to say Thank You for the support. I have borrowed my dear friend Cathe Holden's idea and am just giving you a tease of what I am giving you. But let me tell you, it's amazing. Everything is going in this large box:

Here are some hints beside the few items pictured: vintage, blingy, papery, woolly, Martha, Vera, something gnomes sit under and so much more. There are over 70 items in this Giveaway and I didn't count each individual button. I love every one of these items and I wanted to share them with the winner. They are from my own collection. Following in the Cathe style, each item or collection of items will be wrapped in tissue paper and tied with vintage powder blue cotton ribbonette. It will be as if your birthday arrived early. 

Because of the weight and size, I am limiting this giveaway to the US. If you are from outside the US though and enter, I'll pack a flatrate priority envelope full and send it you. I use these envelopes all the times for bookselling and they can fit quite a bit. Anyone can enter the giveaway simply by leaving a comment.

If you would like additional entries feel free to do the following and comment separately since I will be using Random Number Generator to pick the winner:

• follow me on Twitter 
• follow me on Facebook
• Copy the above photo, write a post about the giveaway and link to your post in the comments and you'll get 3 extra entries.
• Subscribe to my feedburner page
• Share this post on Facebook with your Readers by clicking on the FB button at the bottom of this post.
• Retweet on your Twitter page using @apronthriftgirl in your post.
• StumbleUpon your favorite ATG post.
• Add my Thrift Share Monday button to your sidebar with a link back to ATG for 2 more entries.

That gives you up to 12 ways to enter this giveaway. My own personal goal is to hit 2000 pageviews in one day. I average around 1250. I thought it would be fun to spread the word of the giveaway and reach my goal too.

The winner will be announced next Friday, June 11th and all the contents of this giveaway will be revealed. I'm also going to draw 10 names and send the winners the Publisher files for my Nest Planner.

Don't forget that you can also still enter the $25 Gift Card giveaway at Grocery Outlet. It is open until Sunday evening.

Thank you once again. Now it is time to bake a cake and prepare for our small family party tonight for Apron Thrift Girl turning 4.

Organic Food at the Grocery Outlet

I feel completely blessed living only a few miles from the Grocery Outlet. It means that I can regularly visit their store to see what new items have arrived on their shelves. I've loved Grocery Outlet for years and when they recently asked me if I would team up with them to share my Grocery Outlet frugal finds with all of you, I had to say yes. Grocery Outlet has given me $50 to spend in their store and share what I found here on Apron Thrift Girl. Please read my disclosure policy to learn more about how this works.

After a very busy Sunday with the family I looked forward to going shopping on my own last night. I arrived around 6pm and the store was still quite busy.

I find it really surprising to see how many natural and organic brands are on offer. Tom's of Maine products seem to always be in our store. $2.69 for their toothpaste? I don't think that price is comparable anywhere. I also found some Arnicare Cream which we use faithfully on every bump and bruise that happens around here.  I paid $3.99 while the original price was $10.99.

It's fun to spot the natural/organic products while I'm shopping. Organic Beans were 99¢ each, Tomato Sauce were 39¢ a can and the Coconut Milk 99¢ a can. We are using the black beans today in a delicious mango bean sauce to go on our BBQ Hamburgers.

Don't forget to look in the refrigerated area. There is often organic cheese, Smart Balance Margarine and Aidelles natural products. I picked up the pork sausage for breakfast because it has no preservatives or MSG. It was $2.59. The Cheddar Cheese with Alaska Smoked Salmon was $2.49.

I was never a sauerkraut fan as a child. I couldn't stand the stuff but something in my taste buds changed in the last few years and now I can't get enough of it. Eden Organics is one of my top favorite Organic brands and yet I haven't ever tried their sauerkraut. The Sauerkraut was $2.99 a jar and the pickled Asparagus was 99¢.

The Bare Naked cereal is for Dave and was $1.99. The raisins are going in our picnic basket and were $1.69 for 6 boxes.

 

I saved the best for last. My friend Shara told me that these fabulous cookies were in the store. Pamela Cookies were only 99¢ a box. These are usually sold for at least $3.50 a box. Not only are they gluten free but they don't have any processed sugar in them. They are sweetened with grape juice and brown rice syrup. I'm planning to make some ganache to add on top when I next crave a treat. Even by themselves they are mouthwatering. I love being able to buy gluten free products for less. It really helps with my frugality goals.

The Grocery Outlet even offer special savings. Their next ad starts tomorrow and goes through to June 8th. I got to take a peak and was excited to see Alexia Seasoned Onion Snacks on sale for 99¢ a bag. Dave and the children love them.

Don't forget to Like Grocery Outlet at Facebook. They are just about to launch their first ever contest there that you won't want to miss. You take a photo of your G.O. receipt and you could win what you saved in the store. If I take a look at my receipt it says that I saved $43.90. 

Now for the most exciting part of this post; a giveaway! The Grocery Outlet has generously offered a $50 gift card to one of my readers. You probably know the drill by now but let me share with you the rules just in case.

• Leave me a comment on this post.
• If you want an extra entry, become a Friend of Grocery Outlet at Facebook and leave a separate comment for that.
• If you want a third entry, follow G.O. on Twitter and again leave a new comment for me.
• I'll announce the winner next Sunday on June 6th. 

Good luck everyone.

Hanes Hope Pink T-Shirt Giveaway

Hanes sent me this fabulous pink shirt designed by Actress Melina Kanakaredes, the star of the television show “CSI: NY”. Not only did they send me one but they also have offered one as a Giveaway for an ATG reader.

Hanes is making a total of $500,000 cash and in-kind donation in support of Passionately Pink for the Cure and the Susan G. Koman Race for the Cure Series in 2010. Make sure to check out their site and their Mission Pink on Facebook.

My life luckily hasn't been touched very much by Breast Cancer.  But my mother has colon cancer so my interest in prevention and finding a cure for any cancer speaks very strongly to my heart. These beautiful shirts help remind people that we are all connected. We all want a cure.

Leave a comment and I'll add your name to the giveaway. I'll pick a name on Sunday May 23rd.

Sarah's Silks Easter Basket Giveaway

Ever since my daughter was a toddler, we have had a house full of Sarah's Silks. We've had capes, play silks and silk toys overflowing in our toy baskets. We have countless photos of a young Cerys wearing her silks and pretending that she was a queen or princess or a rainbow striped zebra. When holidays would come around we would give Sarah's Silks as gifts to family and friends. In other words, Sarah's Silks has to be our favorite toy of all time.

When I moved to Sonoma County in August, I had no idea that Sarah of Sarah's Silks actually lived in the North Bay Area. When I ran into her at a Waldorf Craft Fair in December I could hardly believe my eyes. Sarah is like royalty to us. I nearly bowed when I met her.

Sarah has generously donated a beautiful Easter basket full of gifts. Here's what the giveaway winner will receive.

• Green Play Silk to line the basket (instead of plastic or paper)
• Yellow Play Silk
• Blue Play Silk
• Reversible Silk Cape
• Mini Silk Streamer
• Silk Parachute

If you would like to join the giveaway please leave a comment. If you would like to have a 2nd entry simply become a Sarah's Silks Facebook Fan. If you would like a 3rd entry, follow her on Twitter. Please post a separate comment for each entry since I use the Random Number Generator to choose a winner. The drawing will end on Sunday evening, the 28th, at 9pm. I will mail the giveaway Priority Mail so that it should arrive by Easter.

Since I know that many of my readers are all about saving money you can also buy Silk Seconds. Half of Keiran's Christmas stocking last year was filled with seconds and let me tell you, I couldn't see a flaw in any of the items. You can find some seconds here or if you live in Sonoma County and want to shop locally you can stop by the Summerfield Waldorf School store. Not only are the seconds half price, but 20% of each sale goes back to the school.

Thanks again to Sarah for her fabulous and kind gift.

Blog Renovation Giveaway

I'm considering offering a new service on my main website that features blog renovation.

I would spend an hour or more looking at your blog and writing up a detailed sheet of suggestions that you might want to take to make some changes on your blog. This is something that could be useful if you would like to take your blog to the next level, build up your readership or even consider looking for advertising. I'm going to start off by giving one Blog Renovation away to one of my readers as a giveaway.

I want to play around with this idea by looking at one of your blogs and seeing how this service would work and how I would approach a blog makeover. Do you have a blog that might need a pick-me-up? 

If you are interested in throwing your name into the hat for this giveaway, please leave a comment with one change that you'd love to do with your blog. I'll pick a name this Sunday at 4pm.

Winner will receive:

• a banner (similar in style to mine with photography and text)
• 1 hour of my time spent studying your blog
• Blog Renovation form with suggestions for your blog

All suggestions and comments will be done with respect and politely. I know how personal our blogs as they do represent a part of us. I'm hoping that this giveaway might be perfect for one special reader.

Good Luck!

Menu Plans Feb 28 & Giveaway Winner

Thanks to everyone for taking took part in our Sharper Uniforms Apron Giveaway. Also a big thanks to Rebecca from Sharper Uniforms for generously donating a beautiful pink apron for this giveaway.

 

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

14

Timestamp: 2010-02-28 18:33:49 UTC

Congratulations to Katie! Katie, I'll email you for your address and send your new apron off this week. You are going to love this apron.

Menu Planning

Dave is heading off to New York on business this week after having been gone all of last week. I have a million exciting things on my plate including meeting up with Holly & Cathy this week. This leaves me little time to spend making complicated meals. I usually turn to family favorites that don't require a recipe when I am short on time.

Sunday: Shrimp & Rice Parsley pg 22 Everyday Food Magazine (current issue) & Salad w/ homemade Green Goddess Dressing.

Monday: Meatloaf - Fanny Farmer Cookbook & steamed broccoli

Tuesday: Leftovers

Wednesday: Baked Potatoes covered in vintage cheese & avocado slices with Murray river sea salt

Thursday: Egg Fried Rice

Friday: Amy's Kitchen Frozen Rice Crust Pizza ($4.99 from Grocery Outlet)-adding additional toppings

Saturday: BBQ Steaks, Baked Fennel w/ Parmesan & Thyme pg 110 Everyday Food (current issue) & cherry tomato salad.

What's your favorite staple dish when you are tired and need to get something out on the table?