Hunting in Pairs

I’m now on a garage sale hunt for a flower.

Not for my yard. For a dog.

There’s a cute fluffy dog who comes to the dog park, who used to sport a flower from her collar. She looked quite dashing. Her name is Sally, and she and Zoë have romped together several times with never a harsh word between them. Then on Friday morning, that flower caught Zoë’s eye, and she walked over and wrenched it off Sally’s collar and laid right down and chewed it up. I guiltily looked at Sally’s owner, who tried to remain straight faced as she exclaimed, “Your dog has deflowered my dog!”

So I need to replace Sally’s finery. Alas, all the flowers I found this weekend had stiff plastic stems that won’t wrap around the collar. I need something with bendable wire. The search is on!

We did a little different searching Friday morning, though we did manage to take in some yard sales along the way to our destination. They were singularly uninteresting, but our destination was fabulous. We had arranged to visit Wind Dancer Garden, a local nursery and demonstration garden that features ornamental grasses. We want to use a variety of grasses in our relandscaping project, and we were so inspired by seeing what Carolyn has to offer. Zowie.

She took us all over the nursery and the garden surrounding her home. If you’re ever in Salem and you’re a gardener, be sure to plan a visit.

Now we have the hard part coming up…deciding which wonderful grasses to plant, since we can’t have everything. (Dang it.)

As we neared home again, we saw another sale. Yes, of course we stopped! And finally managed to spend fifty cents, on another sofa pillow. It needed one corner stitched back together, which took about two minutes. Hope this one survives the Zoë teeth!

Saturday morning I headed out by my lonesome, and it was kind of too bad because it seemed to be a couples sort of day. The first sale I stopped at was being run by two couples, and another couple was shopping at the same time I was. Can’t remember how it came up, but I mentioned that my husband and I always trade off on cooking, a week at a time. Immediately all the husbands there started groaning and imploring their wives not to listen to me, and the wives were all ears for more info. Good natured banter ensued, which included the wife who was shopping pointing out to her husband the iron skillet she held in her hand. He was quick to agree to whatever her point had been.

A little later I happened on another sale where a couple of couples were shopping. Both husbands had white hair, and one of the ladies thought she was standing next to her husband when she wasn’t. You know how you just look from the corner of your eye sometimes and think you’re seeing what you expect to see. The guy she was near was quite surprised when she nudged him and demanded some money for something she wanted to buy! Of course a second later she realized it wasn’t her hubs, and they all cracked up. Her actual husband said he’d be quite glad to have the other guy pay for her stuff though. I like it when people are generous like that, don’t you? ;o)

I managed to spend a whole five bucks this weekend, and that included a piece of furniture. Besides the pillow, I came home with a handsome mug

which is just like one I managed to break within seconds of bringing it into the house;

and a cute addition to my collection of silicone spatulas.

Now the gingerbread man spatula can hang out with the snowman spatula.

Also found a spiffy candy thermometer.

Since it was the hottest day of the year so far, a vintage wool blanket was obviously a must-have.

This bark-covered birdhouse will live somewhere in the yard. I doubt that it will ever harbor any baby birds, but I like it.

And I found a couple of MCM items. I really like the lines of this coffee table, though the finish is pretty beat up.

 

I grabbed a piece of sandpaper and did a little rubbing to see how it came out. I’m hopeful that going at it with the finishing sander will erase most of the damage. If not, I won’t feel bad about painting this piece. When you buy a table for one buck, you buy the right to paint if necessary.

And at my last stop, I picked up this mid-century ram figurine. Bitossi style, but most likely not the real thing.

 

Still, he really has a Sixties look about him. And (don’t tell anyone) I can never resist a really cute butt, can you?