Apron Thrift Girl

gone fishing

I loved receiving a comment yesterday suggesting that I take a picture of me reading a magazine with the title "gone fishing." Well more to the point I'm going to thrift today. I plan on really trying to take it slow and make sure I enjoy the day with no pressure to find anything that I.have.to.sell.

Yesterday I spent three hours with Cathe, sipping coffee and discussing my goals and future of blogging. I left renewed and inspired. I picked up Keiran from his half day of school and took him to ice cream at Screaming Mimi's in Sebastool, followed by a visit to a thrift store.

We finished our day together grocery shopping. Two moments stand out from yesterday. The first is when we were eating ice cream. We were each on our own bench although the benches were side by side in a park in Sebastol. He said to me "I want to sit next to you and be closer." What a tug at my heart. The second thing happened when he was reading Martha Stewart Living on the ride home and he exclaimed "this is the best magazine ever!" Of course it was the Halloween edition which he is excited about. He's counting down the day on the fridge. Spending time with him yesterday was the perfect and needed reminder to slow down.

Cooking more is also going to help remind me to take it easy. I plan on spending a lot more time on my foodie blog Flavor Stitch and in the kitchen. Here's a favorite recipe of mine from my past Chicken Teriyoki.

Do you have a favorite taste from the past that you have tried to replicate as an adult? What is it?

an office makeover for less than $50

The thing about thrifting is that it will constantly surprise you. A couple Fridays ago Keiran and I had no idea that we would be driving up to Ukiah to an estate sale. It was only when I opened the newspaper and saw that the local says didn't look too good that the ad from Ukiah jumped out at me. We got in the van and headed north.

I also didn't know that I would later spend the weekend emptying my office and creating havoc on the rest of the house in the meantime. My little office held a lot of boxes of stuff that now linger in the dining room, living room, bedroom, hallway and seating area in the hallway.

After Keiran and I went to the estate sale we went to a couple more yard sales and eventually to the local thrift stores. We picked up two Steelcase office chairs for $10. Keiran asked to stop at Thrift Land (Salvation Army Compound of 5 Thrift stores) on the way home in Healdsburg. Little did I know that we would end up buying a Drexel Mid Century Hutch. I could not resist the price of $50 for a solid wood, gorgeous hutch. (photos to come in a later post)

We have a teak hutch already in our dining room but it wasn't blatantly dining room like. I decided that it would be perfect for my office. Combined with my new chairs it was time to give my messy-chaotic-can't-get-much-work-done office a makeover.

This ReSelling season is going to be my busiest ever. I have so much inventory to sell and I need to be efficient. My work day will consist of 5 1/2 hours while the children are in school. Friday I'm out scouting for new inventory which leaves me Monday through Thursday. I'm also doing some ReSelling Consulting this fall and may have one day a week where I'm out of the house working. This means I need every second in my office to be time well spent.

I'm a person who can't really imagine what a room is going to look like until it is practically empty. I took everything out of the office and into all the rooms mentioned above. I next brought the old dining room hutch into the office.

We bought this on Bainbridge for $50 a few years ago.

The Sunday after I bought the new Hutch, I also thrifted a new glass shelf unit and a teak dining table.

Finally all the computer/tech stuff in one organized place. Still wish that the wires could be hidden better. This shelf was $10. Notice the wires running across the door frame, that is our internet wires to the phone system. This house has the same electrics/phone outlets as when it was built in the late 50's so we have wires running all over the place. This was going to be a temporary rental for us when we looked for a house. Here we are a year later.

I found this table at a yard sale. They were asking $20. I offered $10. It has some damage but for an office sorting table it should do the trick. Under the table on the other side is where I'm planning to line up my boxes of list-able book inventory. That way it will be easy to access from my desk.

I found this wire rack at an estate sale last winter. It was in Dave's office to hold my listed book inventory but I felt that it would be put to better use in my office. At the moment it is holding these sorting boxes:

• eBay to sort (to be divided up in smaller boxes in my eBay closet under categories)
• Books to list
• Items to Research
• eBay to photograph
• eBay to List
• Items to Photograph for Etsy
• Etsy items to list
• Items to price/package for Flea Market/Craft Shows
• Box to the side of shelf unit - Yard Sale

My goal is to bring my purchased items into my office and place them in their boxes along one wall area. Over the weekends I hope to sort as much as possible so that when Mondays rolls around I'm ready to get to work. Excess items are going to be moved out of my office and into the garage in order to prevent inventory buildup. I simply cannot work when it gets like this. I'm sure that every thrifter and ReSeller can relate.

It's not the most beautiful chair in the world but it is incredibly comfortable. This is a Steelcase Chair and they are very expensive to buy new. Here's an idea of prices for this brand of chairs. The two that I bought were dated 2007. $10 for the pair.

Saturday morning brought me to another Mid Century Modern sale. I arrived at around 6:30 a.m. for a 9 a.m. sale. Once we got in the door I realized quickly that the prices were again way too high. A MCM rocking chair for $600 or a MCM dresser for $1000 was out of my budget. I left with some Vera napkins and a little troll. I stopped at another sale on my way out of the neighborhood where I found two of these chairs for $5 each. They now are on both sides of my sorting table.

I bought this on Sunday at the Friday MCM sale that I posted about. It was originally $25, later marked down to $15 and I bought it for half off, $7.50. It is perfect for my desk.

My first flip clock. I had been keeping my eye open for these ever since I read a post about them at Mid Century Modernist. It was $2.

I try not to place much art on the walls because this is a rental and most likely the walls are redwood. I did feel that my office makeover was in need of some inspiration so I did hang up a few items, mostly nailing in the grooves of the wood.

I found these two little bulletin boards at Target a few weeks ago. It was the color that won me over.

My recent office makeover did come in under $50. If I had to price my entire office out from past purchases it would look like this:

• Teak Hutch $50
• Filing Cabinet $10
• Wicker Filing Basket $5
• Metal Wire Shelf Unit $10
• Teak Dining Table $10
• 2 Vintage Teak chairs $10
• Steelcase Chair $5
• Vintage Desk $10
• Orange Lamp $7.50
• Vintage Metal Office Tray $3
• Metal & Glass Shelf Unit $10
• Teak Trash Bin $2

Total cost: $132.50

In my heart of hearts I wished that my space looked like the studios of Alicia Paulson or Cathe Holden. Eventually I'll get there. For now in my rental home, I've made it as cozy as I can. It doesn't drip of eye candy but it has little bits of inspiration for me to blog, write, take photos, research items and ReSell. When I eventually do get my studio, the wait will have been worth every second.

Making a Summer Schedule Part 1

Summer arrived with a bang yesterday and my neat and organized typical Tuesday became a mess of figuring out how to proceed with summer. I had 10 orders to ship, a blog post to write fail, a summer schedule to prepare and a summer outdoor space to create. Not to mention unpack from our trip and tidy up the not so tidy house we left behind.

Let's go back to 2006 where I had a similar problem. This year though the new challenge that I have is the need to make a lot of money. Thankfully our renter is still in our house on Bainbridge although for much less than our mortgage. It's up to me to make up the difference.

Usually in the summer I can take it a little easier with bookselling and I tend to not sell on eBay at all. This summer it's different. I'm going to have to work a lot more hours. Therefore a schedule is needed this year more than any year previous. This post is going to be in two parts. This part is the planning stage for our Summer Schedule. I began to brainstorm things that I want to do this summer on our drive home on Monday from Sacramento.

Fun things to do with the children:

• Join the Summer Library Program
• Craft Time
• Berry Picking (to freeze or make jam)
• Bicycle Trips - Howarth Park, Santa Rosa to Sebastpol
• Reading Time
• Freezer Paper Stencil T-Shirts
• Carve and prepare Walking Sticks
• Dying Wool
• Listening to Audio Books
• Beach Days
• Farmer's Market (every Wednesday afternoon)
• Pen Pal Letters
• Hiking
• Make a Hiking Kit
• Summer Journal
• Swimming (pool, Russian River, Beach, State Park)
• Thrift Store Shopping (hopefully a weekly visit to the Goodwill Outlet)
• Geocaching

Summer Chores

• Laundry (I avoid it at all cost but plan to tackle it this month)
• Pack winter clothes away
• Grocery Shopping
• Clean Out Garage
• Create Summer Space on Covered Patio
• Children's chores: room tidy up, weed garden, tidy up toys outside
• Tidy up Office every week
• Organize Craft Area in Office

Summer Work

• Weekly eBay auctions (goal of $300 in sales every week)
• List Books on Amazon (goal of $300 in sales every week)
• Write 5 blog posts a week for ATG
• Write 3 blog posts a week for food blog

Without a clear schedule, I think the summer would fly by in a mess. Dave and I are going to sit down this evening with our calendars and plan our vacation days, his travel dates for work, our goals for the summer and this list above. Together we will create a Summer Schedule that will create a rhythm in our lives. We all need rhythm, even in the summertime when we are looking to relax and enjoy the warm sun and long days. 

What are you planning?

Sorting Laundry

If you are a regular reader you know that there isn't much I keep to myself. I try to be an open blogger and share some of my worst secrets without stepping on the lines of overshare. Today I'm talking about Laundry. Most of our household clothes cost anywhere from .25 cent to $5.00 each. That's an average price. Clothing overall is very cheap for us and it is therefore somewhat easy to accumulate. When I am into my work and kind of neglect the housework, the laundry pile grows. I have been known to go a month without doing laundry. I know...that I must sound terrible. I just don't enjoy this chore very much and it's only at the end of the month when the children start complaining. I don't mind the washing of the laundry as sorting clothing can be therapeutic. But it's the folding and putting away that is most painful for me.

Dave has referred to the laundry pile before as the Nightmare. I guess it was getting too big when he couldn't get to his office easily. I suppose that is a reason to complain a little. The laundry does seem to fall on my shoulders. When Dave gets involved my wool clothing shrinks and my whites become pink, blue or purple. We came to an agreement that I would do the laundry and he would do the dishes. His current issues is that we have too many clothes and that we need to get rid of some of them.

I came up with a system where I look at every item of clothing when it is washed and decided what to do with it then and there.

I usually fold laundry in the dining room because the children are near and there is a large bay window to sort the clothing into different piles. Before I fold an item I make sure it isn't too stained, see if it fits the child or for me it's a matter of if I want to wear it again.

This leaves a pile of unwanted clothing. I next divide the clothing into these categories:

• Children Consignment
• Adult Consignment
• Thrift Store
• Future Cleaning Rags
• ReSell On-Line

I have a bin marked Children Consignment.

Inside the bin I have two piles; one marked Winter and the other Summer. This makes it very easy to just grab what I need before heading down to the Consignment Store.

This is a rolling clothes rack that I bought from a thrift store. I think it originally came from a retail store so it's really solid and perfect for my consignment and on-line ReSell clothing. If I didn't have this cart I would probably store my clothing either in the back section of my closet or in a plastic bin. Adult consignment is sometimes more strict about the present condition of clothing. Some actually insist that all clothing is ironed and on hangers. Since the iron and I don't get along too well I do try to avoid these stores.

Last but not least I have a banker box where I keep all the items heading out to the thrift store. Goodwill doesn't necessarily advertise this but some stores do take stained clothing and actually recycle them. Here's an older article about what can happen to stained clothing and why they shouldn't always go straight into the garbage.

If you are crafty you can always make something new out of something old. Here are some of my favorite books that might encourage creativity:

• The Sweater Chop Shop
• Sewing Green by Betz White
• Handmade Home by Soule Mama
• Refashioned Bags
• Sweater Surgery

If you want to be inspired in the laundry room....and believe me I need every bit of help that I can get...check out Mama's Laundry Talk. An entire blog dedicated to the art of Laundry.

sod for a song

Just a warning that this may be my most boring ever post because it's about grass and mud. And I can't think of anything less exciting than that but being a thrifter I just have to share this story with you. As I have mentioned many times here that I tend to keep a good eye on Craig's List. I go through cycles though. Sometimes I don't look at it for days while other times I check it out at least ten times a day. It was last Friday when I decided to take a look at our island listings. If you type in the name of your community in the box on the left hand side, it should only show listings that mention your town.

What I love about thrifting is that I sometimes find things that I didn't know I was looking for. It's not that I had trouble surviving without something but when I find it I have a little "wow" moment. When I typed in our island into Craig's List, a listing five down jumped out at me: "Sod". I clicked on the post and saw that someone was selling rolls of sod from their yard for $25. I ran to Dave, stuck the phone in his hand (I don't like using the telephone except on rare occasions) and told him to call the number.  As always he doesn't quite know how to handle my spontaneous excitement and does this weird shaking of his head as if he is trying to get a hold of the situation. He then usually says "What"? while continuing the head thing but has since added this strange eye thing too. I finally take a deep breath and explain about the sod and tell him to call this guy immediately. He takes a deep breath and finally takes the phone from me and calls him.

I didn't know I needed sod but the minute I saw it I thought it would go perfectly here.

 

I don't show too many views of our yard because it is such a work in progress. The yard seems to take so much money and we prefer to do smaller projects inside the home. Although with that said when a school auction item came up for bid last November I found my equally frugal husband bidding before I could even properly register the fact. He was bidding on 12 school dads (including a landscape architect and a couple wood guys (they make wood from cut trees and then build neat things with the wood) coming to our yard for one day and doing anything we would like. Dave won, I gulped, and we went home with our voucher in hand.

In the spring the architect came over and talked about our ideas and plans. He later sent us an estimate of something crazy like $8,000. Which I'm sure would have been money well spent. But we got back to him asking him to lower it to a $100.00 budget and see what we could create from there. Instead of making a new fence (ours was rounded and looked odd) we recycled as much as we could from the old fence. Instead of renting equipment we borrowed it. I picked up some cedar wood to build garden beds from a sale and so on. Despite our low budget our yard looked so much better after their day here. The photo above is where the fence was moved to. It used to hug the mini kiwi plant in the left side of the picture. The dirt you see was part of the gravel driveway. When we went to LA for the week my father brought dirt in ready for grass seed.

After speaking to the sod guy Dave grabbed Cerys & Keiran and took my father's truck (which he is loaning us for the summer) to look at the sod. He arrived home about an hour later looking less confused and instead a little hopeful.

It's not very pretty at all but here is our truckload of sod.

This is what our work in progress looked like. 1/4 of the sod is down at this point. The grass is in beautiful condition and the soil very moist. At the cemetery I used to take up sod and place it back down after burials so I have some limited experience in this area. Ironically....

Finished. We were short about 7 inches which we can fill with a small planter near our gate. While it looks a little clumpy it will even out and should grow nicely next spring. Our grass doesn't usually die in the winter. Instead it just stays a lovely shade of dark green.

I never envisioned buying dirt and grass second hand. It just confirms the idea that you truly can buy practically anything on the thrifted market. Without our typical moist fall weather this grass with bind to the soil underneath (I'm sure there is an official grass way to say that) and it will thrive. Now our yard is complete with grass. Now we just need to get our fence painted....

What is the weirdest, craziest used item that you have purchased?

Thrifty Dog

Last September when Elffin (mostly referred to as Elffie and sometimes Elffington Stanley) joined us

I sort of ignored the fact that summer vacation was 10 months away. I was too much in love with him to even consider the fact that we generally travel for at least three weeks every summer. Not only that, but we generally stay in virtually stranger's houses. I'm not sure they would be too keen if we brought a puppy with us who still loves to eat Hanna Andersson Clogs. (sigh)

By November we contemplated the idea of staying at home this summer. We could take weekend trips, work on the garden and actually enjoy island life in July. January arrived though and with it a depression about the dark, gray and chilly weather. Like every January for the last four years I started to look at real estate in warmer areas, started to plan trips anywhere but Washington State and spent way too many hours just trying to dream up sunny days to warm my freezing body. I'm a sun girl at heart and no matter where you put me in the world, I need lots of sun. I went back to the Home Exchange site, signed up for a year membership and started planning our summer.

That brings me back to Elffie. What were we going to do with him? I learned from a friend that another friend also recently had a corgi join their family. I contacted her immediately and asked for a puppy playdate. Elffie didn't have too many chances to play with other dogs and he was bored with herding the cat by then. I brought Elffie to Charlie and they were instant dog friends. I brought up the idea to my friend Sarah, about possibly doing a dog swap in the summer.

 

Elffie at nearly a  year old. 

Sarah agreed and as soon as our vacations were planned we firmed up our dates with each other. Not only was Elffie going to be with his friend Charlie for a couple of weeks running around while they herd each other, it was going to save us a lot of money. Your average kennel can run anywhere from $12-$26 a day. If you go boutique with the bells and whistles it can cost you $22-$55 a day. We left Elffie with Sarah on the 1st of July and she dropped him off at our house on the 15th of July (to be looked after by our 2nd house exchange family). If a kennel charged $20.00 a day then our cost would be $300.00.

Besides the swap with Sarah I also had two back up friends who offered to take Elffin in exchange for some home organizing that I would do for them.

Want to try swapping pet care yourself? Here are some tips:

1)  if it is dog care you need, you might find a friend or acquaintance with a similar breed. Of course if you have a Great Dane it might be a full house to look after two of them.

2) You can also look for someone that has a slight interest in owning a dog. This way they could do a dog trial to see if they would like to make the committment to own a dog.

3) If you can't find anyone in your immediate circle I'd suggest emailing an appropriate local list that you are on or possibly hanging up a flier. Our community is quite small so this would be very easy for me to do.

4) Plan in advance. You don't want to agree to swap and then realize that your vacation is planned at the same time. We had our swap agreed in March with tentative dates planned. When we return, Charlie is coming over to our house for about 8 days. Since she had Elffie much longer, I hope she'll bring Charlie over for some long weekends this fall.

5) Keep a little notebook handy to write down information about your pet. As you know pets can have quite the personality and the more information your swap partner has, the better they will be able to handle your pet. 

6) Remember to take dog food, doggy treats, leash, crate and any dog toys that will make your dog feel more comfortable.

Because there were some gaps in our travel and when the two families were arriving for the house exchange, we needed to have someone come and look after the chickens and the cat. Being the thirfty person that I am, I asked a friend if she was interested in looking after the animals in exchange for all the eggs that she collects. She happily agreed. We are also going to bring her some local wine as a thank you gift.

Having pets doesn't mean you have to spend a lot of money boarding them when you travel. It also doesn't mean you are either stuck at home for the rest of your pets life or you have to take your pet with you. Luckily you can take your pets with you on vacation now but at least with swapping, you have a few more choices at hand.

I can tell you that we miss Elffie very much. I saw a Corgi at the Renegade Craft Fair and I had to spend at least five minutes petting him. When Alicia posted her photos of the Corgi picnic I felt very homesick for our puppy back at home. It's amazing how quickly they become a part of your family even when he eats $30.00 mary jane crocs. Owning a pet can be expensive but there are many thrifty options available to you when you think outside the box.

Pecking Order

Do you remember our small, tiny chicks?

They were two weeks old when we purchased them in May. (much to dh's surprise when he returned from the UK on business)  On Sunday we introduced them to the rest of our flock. You have probably all heard of the phrase "pecking order" but it isn't until you introduce new chickens into your existing chicken flock that you really understand this. This will be our third chicken pecking order introduction. The house came with 4 chickens but the chickens were not really giving us enough eggs. I found some free chickens on Freecycle and our flock became 11. We introduced them and we soon found out who was the superior chicken of the flock. They walk around each other, fluff up their feathers and then peck at the each other until everyone knows who is the queen/king of the chicken yard. I next found 4 chickens at a yard sale including this green-egg-laying-big-bad-mama:

The children named her Beardy because she actually has a beard although it isn't too visible from this photo. Beautiful chicken and definitely the Queen, beard and all.

We had kept the chicks (The Buffys as their breed is Buff Orpingtons) separated all this time. They weren't too keen on leaving their pen as you can see from dh having to negotiate with them.

My suit wearing dh has become very good at working both the board room and the chicken yard. I'm very proud of him.

Okay girls, welcome to the world of freedom.

Here comes the big mamas to peck the chicks letting them know who is boss. Luckily the chicks are not only extremely fast but they will be as big if not bigger than the 4 large hens so the pecking order may change in the next few months.

Here they are taking cover in a bush. Although having to avoid the big bad 4, they loved their new found freedom and definitely prefer being out to being in.

On a thrifting front, my mother and I left the children with dh and my father and took off to the thrifting sales in Bremerton. After thrifting (more photos to come this week) we went to Port Orchard and walked the aisles of a really great antique store. Nearly every stall was having a Labor Day sale.

The prices here were so affordable compared to many others I have been to. The glasses (which are either hard to find or at least $7.50 and up each) were $3.00 each. The cloth napkins (Vera) were $4.95 for 3 and the large panel of bark cloth was $8.00. I rarely spend much money in antique stores and am lucky if I buy one item. But I felt these prices were great and what is not to love about those glasses. Slowly I'm giving away my cheap IKEA glasses and am replacing them with the vintage ones.

The day ended perfectly when I took my parents to our 1930's independent theatre to watch this movie. I highly recommend it, especially if you need an honest to good laugh.