Randomly Purposeful…or was that Purposely Random?

I used both approaches to garaging this weekend: the planned-out and the random. On Friday (after enjoy quite a few spectacular fireworks from the comfort of our upper deck on the 4th) my SIL Linda, niece Kelsey and I headed out, destinations programmed into the GPS. Kelsey is moving to a new apartment soon and had her list of needed stuff, and did quite well. I admit to envying the cushy new bathmat she scored for a buck! We thoroughly enjoyed each other’s company, and the conversations we had along the way. At one sale I picked up a copy of one of my favorite movies.

We already had a copy…but it wasn’t wide-screen. And when you watch movies on a ten-foot wide movie screen, you WANT that wide-screen version! And there it was. I thought the price was a tad high, so offered a lower one, and the lady said let me ask my husband. He said sure – and then we started swapping our favorite lines from the film. (I love the bit when they first fly the alien craft out of the underground bunker and Will Smith exclaims, “I gotta get me one of these!” It’s become one of our family catchphrases.) The conversation wound on, and by the time we left we knew all about their daughter who has just moved back home while her husband of six months is in basic training.

At our next stop, this vintage Co-ed magazine caught my eye.

The lady selling it laughed and told me she has no idea how she came by it. It’s from 1958, so I suspect she was probably in high school around then. Had to have it for my 1957 house. And it’s just full of interesting and informative articles and ads. First, its sub-header:

Yup, even in 1958 women were expected to do it all! And I have to wonder if perhaps I saw this at an impressionable age, since the featured career is the one I chose.

Yes, the pleasures of being a children’s librarian! I’ve done all these things, even if not on a bookmobile.

Then there were the food articles.

Mmmmm…don’t you just love a cute midcentury menu!

The 1964 Better Homes & Gardens came from a later stop. More midcentury eye candy in there! At the same place I picked up this group of…I’m not sure what to call them. Crystal picks?

Each piece is 11” long total, with about 8” of wire below the beads. The beads feel like Lucite to me, and I’m guessing they’re vintage, maybe Sixties or Seventies. I’m hoping to find some good spot in the yard for them, having been inspired by these beaded garden art thingies. 

  

This sale was at a cute Thirties house, and there was a dog inside who wanted to come out and help us shop. Her whining sounded exactly like our Zoe; it was all I could do not to go in and check on her!

Didn’t run across a whole lot of hats this week, but there was one, which Linda graciously donned (since our usual hat model Judy wasn’t with us).

That might have been the sale where I picked up this vintage Homer Laughlin plate in the Golden Roses pattern. It’s been a long time since I added a dessert plate to our random collection.

 

Or maybe that was where I found this canning funnel.

I was making raspberry freezer jam the other day and struggling a bit to pour it into containers, and the hubs commented, “You should keep an eye out for one of those funnel thingies.” And I did, and there it was, and the price was fifty cents, and life is good. Or, as it said on a friend’s ancient, faded tee shirt: Life is Goo.  Which is appropriate for jam making.

Our last stop of the day was a sale by a family with a bunch o’ little kids. We were out of steam by then, and so was this small fry.

Those were the days, when you could just drop off to sleep anywhere. Oh wait, I still can.

So that was our purposeful Friday. Saturday morning I was feeling a little…perhaps slow is the word. Didn’t have much energy for mapping out sales, and being a holiday weekend there weren’t a ton of them anyway. I decided I’d had plenty of fun on Friday and that would do me. But on the way back from the dog park with Edward and Zoe, I made a little detour past a couple of nearby sales. At the first I scored another vintage plate.

 

Going to have to bake something yummy soon to serve on my new dessert dishes! A few blocks away was a sale that had started quite early and looked pretty picked over, but there I found something to love – a big planter in a wrought iron stand.

Besides just liking its looks, it’s relatively light weight, which is a plus for something you put on an upper deck. I was so excited about it that after breakfast (mine and the hungry dogs’) I headed out for the big-box store that always has a big selection of sale plants. When their stock starts getting a little past it, they mark them half price, and I’ve gotten some great plants there this summer. Everything I’ve bought has perked up with a little pruning, a little love, and getting out of their tiny containers. I ‘m quite happy with what I found on Saturday – a blue oat grass for the center, some Wave petunias that should cascade down nicely, a nemesia for a little scent, and some white lobelias.

Heading home with my plants I spied a big green sign that said “Carport Sale” so I headed down that street. Biggest danged carport I’ve ever seen; I think someone may have built boats there or something. It was late in the morning by now and I didn’t think there was anything left to find, but I did! Two small trough planters that hang from the deck railing, to supplement the two I found last year (those are growing herbs for me this summer).

At a buck each I couldn’t leave them there. Of course it’s too bad I didn’t find them BEFORE I bought plants, but now I have an excuse to go back and check out the sale plants again.

Life is goo!