Recent Thrift Store and Estate Sale Finds

06/20/2012

Jason and I are currently refinishing this chair pair we picked up at a thrift store. I’m excited to show you an “after” picture when we’re all finished. It may be hard to tell in the picture but they’re covered in a sticky, stinky old vinyl. Apparently they’re made by the Dearborn Company in Chicago. One of the chairs—I named them Douglas and Davy, by the way—had this tag on the bottom:

I spotted a couple boxes of Shiny Brites at an estate sale that I couldn’t resist. ( I have a modest collection from my granny.)

This cart is very similar to the black one I found a few weeks ago. I’m planning to spray paint them both a matching color.

I’m not sure what to use this little table for but I thought it was cute.

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Mack the square chair and Sarah the lamp

06/12/2012

I’ve decided to start naming vintage furnishings when we buy them. For fun, ya know, to give them a little more personality! We did a little thrift store shopping recently and found Mack, this boxy upholstered arm chair. I’m teaching myself to reupholster furniture (with books and YouTube vidoes) and I think this will be my first official furniture job. I want to tackle the 3 piece sectional (now named Sylvester) but it’s intimidating. If I can do this chair, I can repeat the same process three times on the sofa.

I think Mack would benefit from a set of brand new 6″ wooden cone legs after it has some new upholstery. It’s lightweight, quite comfortable and in great condition.

We also scored this lamp, Sarah, for $2 (half-off day at Goodwill—woohoo!), which happens to be very similar to this lamp we already own. With matching shades, they’ll look like sisters.

Sarah’s long lost sister…

Cara.

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Annual TN-52 Yard Sale Finds 2012

06/04/2012

This year my mom and Precious and I hit up the TN-52 yard sale for a couple of hours. Nothing compared to the all morning adventure a couple years ago where we found a ton of great stuff. But, I did walk away with a few great pieces and a bag full of stuff for Precious, all for less than $20. For the mid-century modern lovers, this:

It’s a solid wood (walnut?) night stand or end table. The top needs to be refinished, or else the whole thing needs painted. I haven’t decided yet.

The rest of the finds are for Precious except for some necklaces I got for myself (costume jewelry, 3 for $0.50). I’m pretty excited about this handmade wooden play oven. It’s needs a little TLC but for $7, it will be worth it.

These suede Baby Gap apple boots are size 7 and Precious is just barely fitting a size 3 now. But… they were $0.25. I couldn’t resist. The Etnies sneakers are way too big too. They’ll either fit in a couple years or they’ll be for a future foster daughter.

A fall jacket for Precious and a warm winter coat that should fit her this year. It would work well for a boy or a girl. Not the cutest thing in the world, but again with the $0.25. I’m a sucker for a good deal.

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Recent Estate Sale Finds

05/29/2012

It’s estate sale and yard sale time of year and we’ve been hitting the streets hard looking for treasures. It’s interesting how sales are so hit or miss. A few weeks ago I saw a listing for an estate sale about 30 minutes from our house. It was a huge house with tons of mid-century modern furniture items. We actually went out on a Thursday at lunch time. Usually sales run Thursday – Saturday and we just go on Saturday when everything is half price. By noon, all of the good stuff was already sold – couches and tables still sitting there with “SOLD” signs, mocking us. All we got were a few glasses and a metal wall shelf. On our way home we stopped at an estate sale we spotted a sign for, just a few streets away from our house. We ended up finding a ton of great stuff there! (Everything else pictured below.)

These juice glasses looked really grungy but they look brand new after a pass through the dishwasher.

I envision this metal shelf spray painted and hanging in the bathroom, or above a dresser in a kids room, or in the mudroom.

Jason is a lamp guy. I walked right past this one several times and didn’t even see it. It’s actually a very nice color (in our opinion). I like the shade but Jason thinks it’s ugly. It’s pretty dirty so we’ll probably replace it eventually.

An organizer for nuts and bolts and screws, just the way my Papa used to label and store. And an empty red metal tool box.

I’m not sure what we’ll do with this metal magazine rack table but it could benefit from a fresh coat of paint, too.

This handy little cart will be nice in my office or to store toys in the playroom. I’m hoping to find a minty seafoam green like this cart from IKEA.

I was super excited about this tin Marx toys dollhouse and I probably overpaid for it a little bit. It’s missing one wall (on the second story between the master bedroom and the terrace). If you look closely, you may notice I have a couple of the first story walls in upside down.

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Cincinnati Trip – April 2012

05/02/2012

It keeps happening. I intend to document an event, a trip, a visit with friends and I come home with a camera full of pictures of my daughter. I don’t know how it happens…

A couple weeks ago we took a weekend trip up to Cincinnati to visit our dear friends Sean and Renata and their kiddos. It was rainy and cold on Saturday so we went to the aquarium.

They don’t allow strollers in the aquarium. I thought that was the dumbest thing until I realized how packed it was in there. It was hard enough just to move around all of the standing people. Our very heavy little girl needed to take a nap anyway, and Daddy’s shoulder is the perfect spot.

I call Precious Ali-gator all the time as nickname for her real name (does that make any sense?) so I thought it was pretty awesome to get a picture of the gator under a Gator Alley sign.

She’s not really anything like an alligator. This guy was massive!

There was a trippy and very relaxing room full of neon lights and various kinds of jelly fish. I could have watched them for hours.

We caught a brief penguin show, too. This sweet family will be welcoming a new baby boy on Precious’ birthday in July!

Precious is a wonderful traveler. Look, all she needs is a shoe to chew on…

Sean and Renata have a beautiful, comfortable mid-century modern home. We love visiting them!

We even worked in a little time for antique store browsing this trip. We didn’t come home with anything but I enjoyed seeing these Curtis Jeré (real and/or imitation) metal wall sculptures.

I might regret that we didn’t buy this to put on our yet-to-exist fireplace.

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Heads Up

03/27/2012

Since there weren’t any good estate sales posted this weekend, Jason and I stopped by a few of our favorite vintage stores. We bought a headboard and a footboard. Sadly, no side beams so we’ll be on the look out for something that will work, or we’ll just build a frame. We’ve been searching for a queen size MCM bed frame for a while. They’re pretty hard to come by. A whole matching bedroom set? Even more rare unless you’re willing to pay a lot. And we’re not. We got this set for $45. Now we’ll be hunting for walnut nightstands to match and perhaps a chest of drawers, too. (This guy will move into one of the kid’s rooms in the new house.)

It’s definitely mid-century style and looks like walnut veneer, though there is no maker mark on it. It was a bit tricky to photograph because it was rainy on Saturday but here it is. I’ll get some better photos once we have it assembled into a bed, which honestly may not happen until we move into our yet-to-be-built house. The unmade bed and green carpet I’m attempting to blur out is our room at my parents’ house where we’re staying until then.

Also at Pre to Post Modern, where we found the bed, I spotted these roller skates and I had a moment. I used to have a pair just like this when I was little! I remember learning to skate in our unfinished basement, making laps around and around the staircase. Man, I wish these had been my size…

I took this photo for a friend who was looking for a retro yellow dining table. Turns out they already found one. If anyone in Nashville is looking for one, this was around $265 at Pre to Post Modern.

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Mid-Century Sectional Sofa

03/19/2012

Jason and I got a tip from my co-worker about an estate sale in a 1960s ranch. We went on Saturday when everything was half off and I was surprised to see that the couch I had spotted in the online preview was still sitting in the living room.

The sofa was covered with junk but we loved the shape and decided to go for it. It was marked $200 so we got it for $100. It was set up in the living room as a straight couch without the rounded corner piece, and we might end up using it that way in our new house. It’s in desperate need of new upholstery and new foam for the seat cushions which were…crunchy, dry-rotted. Gross. One end of the sofa doesn’t have an arm rest, like a chaise, which is pretty sweet. We set it up in the loading bay of our storage facility for a quick photo shoot before we packed it away.

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Mushroom Shakers

02/27/2012

Look what Jason brought me back from his journeys around the country—thrifted vintage salt and pepper shakers shaped like mushrooms. And they’re green! Carved on the bottom is “Pat ’76.” There is nothing in the photo for a good size references; they’re about 5 inches tall. I love them.

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Phone Photo Friday

11/11/2011

Happy 11-11-11! We’re selling three of these chairs. $15 a pop. Let me know if you want ’em. (Email me at martina [at] lighthanddesign [dot] com.) The legs are metal and the seat bases are off-white plastic. They’re Eames-ish but not the real deal. Pretty good shape. They’ll get up on craigslist as soon as I get around to it.

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Chair Pair

11/09/2011

Let’s pretend for a day that my thoughts are not completely consumed with thoughts about Precious’ situation…

On our most recent thrifting excursion Jason fell in love with 2 mid-century chairs. I like them, I just don’t love them… After a bit of haggling, Jason was toting them down the street to the silver bullet while Precious and I were following along. We ended up paying $40 for the pair. One of them has 2 small rips but sometimes it’s still worth it. We may reupholster them eventually. They’re now crowning the heads of our dining table.

What do you think? I do have to admit they’re more comfortable than our IKEA Gilbert chairs.

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