Over the rainbow, not exactly over the moon

You know yard sale season has arrived when the shelves of thrift stores start getting a bit empty. Last Saturday all the glassware was clear, all the dishes were boring, and even my favorite store with its perpetual Saturday-40%-off-bric-a-brac sale was a dud. Total dud. How is that even possible?

So I hit all the off-the-beaten-track stores run by hospitals, nonprofits and nuns. They’re the only local stores that carry old sewing stuff–fabric, notions, patterns. That’s where I found an assortment of little goodies.

A rainbow of vintage trims. Fancy some pink piping on a pillow? Kelly rick rack on an apron? So many possibilities!

At this stop the woman at the checkout in front of me had three laundry baskets full of toys. Expensive toys. The nun asked if she ran a day care. Nope. She was buying them all for her cockatoo! I wanted to see her house so bad. Can’t you just imagine mountains of plastic stuff with a bored bird perched on top?

Another shop had bins of wool yarn balls. I bought a few to repair my Granny Square afghans. That makes me one step closer to learning how to crochet. They also have someone obsessive on staff who neatly separates white and colored buttons and puts them into recycled jelly jars. (I have this idea of covering something with a zillion buttons. I just don’t know what yet.)

For once–a juicy bunch of buttons all in color. No white! I’ll leave that to the Sunkist reamer.

These remnants of kitchen fabric were too pretty to leave behind. No idea what I’ll do with them. Yet.

Just enough vintage fabric to make a cafe curtain. Or a small stack of napkins. Or a couple clothespin bags. Or…

I really wished I’d had this linen table topper for Easter! I love that the fabric is dark green instead of the usual white. How often do you see that? Like, never.

Singing birdies with sheet music–adorable embroidery on a card table topper.

Okay, this tote isn’t even remotely vintage but the colors were yelling, “HEY! YOU! You need another tote!” Kaffe Fassett would approve and probably wear something plaid with it. I’m not that flamboyant.

Loud and lovely! (Do those two things go together?) At any rate, lots of delicious color clashing.

I even brought home pastels. Sort of.

Pepto-Bismol pink shoe trees and aqua Japanese placemats.

And a cheesy hand-painted vase that’s just the right size for holding pencils. It’s stamped “Made in Italy”. Why wasn’t it glazed instead of painted? (Why do I even think of questions like this?)

Yes, it’s gauche, but it goes along with my love of jadeite and green. And it was too cheap to pass by.

And finally, a few red plastic kitchen doodads.

It’ll be cute on my red and white enamel kitchen table. Now to find some fun colored paper napkins!

When’s the last time you used a flour sifter? Um, I can’t remember, either.

Including a never-used set of Christmas cookie cutters.

Mary, Joseph, baby, star–the entire Nativity is here. The baggie even had the original sheet of cookie recipes!

Hope your weekend shopping was fun, too!