Game On

Earlier this month I won a large lot of vintage games at an auction. It was a veritable game bonanza I tell you.

So far I've sold the stadium checkers, used scrabble letters for a holiday project in my daughter's class, used more of the letters for a craft junque project and counted many, many, many game parts!
I am a total sucker for the vintage graphics on games. Love discovering the parts inside and every time we open one up my husband wishes out loud, "Please let there be money inside, please let there be money inside..."!

See those Masterpiece games? Have you ever played it? An absolutely fabulous game - simply one of our favorites! I think I've had at least a dozen of these games (three different versions) and sold them all. We do keep one to play but the addition of these two means I currently have three on hand to sell. A bit excessive don't you think?

Holiday Wishes

Wishing all of you a most wonderful holiday season!

Enjoy the sights, sounds, and tastes.

May there be a wealth of junque for you to find.

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve is gingerbread house day around here. The kids are off school and we're looking to kill time until the Big Man arrives (or does he?!).

Supplies are gathered on festive holiday plates. This year the house came pre-assembled. Score!

Ta-da! Much fun was had by all. Hope you are all enjoying the anticipation and time flies quickly!

Christmas on the Porch

A few more shots from the porch this holiday season.

Vintage Santa tins from an auction.
My found grate thing-a-ma-bob (why yes, that is the technical term) gets yet another make-over.

My auction candelabra that you can read about here hangs out with a vintage Empire Blow-Mold Santa.

Linking up to:

Rednesday at It's A Very Cherry World

Weekend Find

One of my faves this past weekend!

A bit of Friday night thrifting yielded this (and a slew of other things) nifty candle holder. She's black metal and she folds up completely flat. My inner age detector appears to be on the fritz because I am completely uncertain as to whether or not this is a vintage piece.
Usually I know right away. The metal is much heavier than one normally finds now and certainly the shape leads me to believe it has real potential to be older. I'm on the fence and had to share. So what say you - old or newer?

Linking up to:

Nifty Thrifty Tuesday

Split Personality

I do on occasion wonder if I have a bit of a multiple personality disorder. Or should I say multiple design interest disorder? While I really do like vintage as seen here or evidenced here I am also a huge fan of...

Mid Century Modern Design
So Christmas around here is a bit of both. I like to think it works. At the very least it makes sense to someone with a personality like mine. I'm not alone in this, am I?!!

Simple Snowman

A super simple holiday snowman decoration. I've got so many ideas running through my mind as I find new bits and bobs here and there. Today I decided to put one together.
This is an awfully easy marriage of a vintage silver plate bud vase (bought as a pair from an auction), a bottle brush wreath Snowman head (from a church rummage sale), and a glittered snowflake which I'm fairly certain was part of a package from (GASP) Walmart clearance at the end of last year. Simple and cute.
Now he's going in to a box where he can be the first of many Junque Magnet crafted treasures I'll sell during the holidays next year!
Linking up to:

Thrifty Thursday
Vintage Inspiration Friday

Junkin Finds Friday

Deck the Halls Friday

Christmas on the Porch

Sharing a bit of porch decor today...

Looking at the steps you might get the idea we are avid winter sport fans here. Hah! Not so much (ahem...not at all) but skis, sleds and ice skates make for great decorations!
The vintage cross country skis and red Flexible Flyer sled were thrift store finds (in the summer of course!). The ice skates came from a church rummage sale.

The shutters were yard sale and auction purchases. I made the stocking using vintage tablecloth and bedspread materials and that letter box is getting a major repurpose once the season is over!

I'll share more in another post. Thanks for stopping!

Linking up to:

Rednesday at It's A Very Cherry World

Proud Mama

It's a silly little thing but I must admit I am busting with pride. Two years ago my 8 year old saw this building toy set at a church rummage sale. He really wanted it. His Dad is an architect and my son likes to build things to show off. It was close to Christmas and my son has a history of playing with items once or twice and leaving them for the dust fairy to keep clean (i.e. MOI)!

I told him if he wanted it he had to use his own money. Of course it wasn't priced so he plucked up the courage to ask the ladies running the sale. Their reply, "that's pretty old. It would be $10". I was somewhat irritated by their price but did figure the kid could probably get his money back on it later. He thought long and hard and "went with his gut".

Naturally he played with it for all of four or five days and then told me I could sell it for him on Ebay. Time and life got in the way. I finally got it on last week and it just ended for $33! Is it wrong that I am over the moon that my boy inherited his mom's "junque magnet" genes? He already knows how to pick a winner.

Well done Captain America. Well done.

Vintage Ornament Tree

In case it has gone unnoticed, unmentioned or unexplained I have a bit of thing for vintage ornaments... I realize that may be shocking in light of my most recent posts but I did want to put it out there!
Currently some of them are displayed on this reproduction feather tree in the entry where they make me silly happy.

Plastic candy canes and icicle prisms finish it off.

Found the bells at a church rummage sale a few years back and I'm always trying to figure out how to use them.

I won a few more boxes in an auction last week so I'll be adding more to the branches later today. Must stop. Must stop. At some point this poor tree is going to give up and fall over!

Thrifty Thursday Decorating

A quick trip to the Goodwill gave me another decorating idea. As if I needed more!

My purchase was a very large glass jar with interesting molded pattern. Once home I pulled out two boxes of vintage Christmas balls (purchased at yard sales) and mixed them with some Pottery Barn "frosted" pine cones (purchased at a church thrift store for $1 which was WAY better than the PB price listed of $24.99)

Filled up the jar. Added a few to a vintage ironstone piece I picked up at an auction and the display was done.

Linking up to the Thrifty Thursday party at Bloggeritaville.

White Wednesday Christmas

Linking up to White Wednesday over at Faded Charm today. This is my first "white post".
Picked the reindeer up as one of a pair last week at the thrift store. They had HORRIFIC bows tied around their neck (honestly, I thought I might need to call animal protective services for crimes against nature!). Snipped them off, washed them up and now they reside in majestic beauty on the window ledge of my basement landing.
I loved how once I took the junk (notice I wrote junk NOT junque) off them their simplicity reminded me of Jonathan Adler pieces (which I drool over on a frequent basis). The Taiwan sticker on the bottom tells me they were current to my childhood so I suppose that explains the appeal.
What are you thrifting this holiday season?

Linking up with:

Deck the Halls Friday at Tinsel & Co.

So Close...

Every year I get rid of Christmas stuff. Really, I do. I swear there were two bins last year that I cleared out and sold at shows. So, um, how is it seven days later and I'm STILL decorating?!

Do I have an accumulation problem? Well I'm in the home stretch now and one way or another those bins are going back to the basement tonight. Surely I'll do better about not acquiring so much next year. Right?!

NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What's In Your Suitcase?

I've been having fun at the auctions again. Lots of fun. Suitcases full! Isn't this vintage leather suitcase fabulous?! What could be hiding inside?

Oh my! Vintage Christmas. Boxes and boxes.
Be still my beating heart. I didn't win every lot I bid on but I did get quite a few. Big ones, tiny ones, huge ones...
Naturally I am also in love with the old boxes.
Finally I managed to find some mercury glass bead sprays. Yippee!!!! There were a bunch of Xmas corsages as well.

Oh what fun! The suitcase itself totally rocked but filled as it is makes it an even better treat. Would you believe this isn't all I picked up? There are still boxes and bags to unwrap but I really did need to spend some time setting up the holiday decorations in the house. Of course now I have a bunch more ornaments to use...
Linking up to:

Vintage Inspiration Friday

CSN Givewaway Winner

I enlisted the help of my young Princess to pick the winning name in the CSN Giveaway. The lucky recipient is Carol from Old Glory Cottage. Drop me a line Carol and I'll get you the info for your $55 CSN gift certificate.

Thrift Your Art & CSN Giveaway Reminder

This is another painting in my "thrift your art" series. Truth be told this was a yard sale find for $4. Each Fall I make it part of my front porch display and hope the wind doesn't take it away! It actually came pretty darn close to flying off this year but that metal lantern did a good job of slowing it down.

Time to pack it all up and get those Xmas decorations out. If only this head cold would go away so I could make some headway in that arena! Don't forget, my CSN Giveaway ends tomorrow so get those entries in.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Wishing you and yours a Happy Thanksgiving! Turkey on...

Weekend Finds

Although we had an unseasonably warm weekend, yard sale season is pretty much over. Time to head indoors and wander the aisles of the local thrift stores. These are a few of my "finds":

Vintage Strawberry Metal Tray

Beistle 3D Snowflakes in their original, unopened package

Vintage Halloween Owl Candleholder - made in Japan

Vintage "Space-Saver" metal bowl/tray - you can slide the sections to make it bigger as the need arises - the bolt that you tighten to adjust size is marked "Space Saver" - how clever is this? I love the whole industrial feel of the pierced hole pattern in the metal.

Green pottery planter - I never leave these behind.

Religious figure plaques - I've been finding religious items interesting of late. Is it wrong that I want to add some glitter to these (not much - just a tasteful spruce up)?!

Vintage Infant of Prague Planter - made in Japan. See how the religious theme keeps popping up.

Vintage Electronic Milton game - oh if you could hear the phrases this game says. Too funny for words.

All in all a fruitful weekend. Eventually all of this will be for sale whether on Ebay, Etsy or at shows in the spring. Well, ok, not all of it. That owl is MINE, MINE, MINE!

What did you thrift this weekend?