A Little Trip and Some Goodies I’ve Found

The family and I decided to take advantage of Spring Break and head out of town. Since I didn’t take any pictures of our trip, I thought I would just tell a little about what we did and show some pictures of some of my recent finds.  So, just to be clear, the pictures in this post have nothing to do with our trip.  Just saying.

We started off on Friday with a visit to “Duck Days” at the University of Oregon Campus.  My daughter, who is a junior, is very interested in going there for college, much to her parents dismay.  Let me explain, we are both Beavers.  In case you are unfamiliar, what that means is that we both graduated from Oregon State University, U of O’s rival.  It was a little difficult walking around the beautiful U of O campus.  We kind of felt like traders, but this visit wasn’t about us, it was about her.  We are excited that she is excited about continuing her education at such a great school only a mere 2 hour drive from home.

 

After that, we headed south, driving through some really stormy weather.  Both rain and snow and I mean, a lot of snow.  We ended up in Vallejo, CA to spend the day at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom.  That was the plan, but when we woke up and looked out our hotel window at the soggy day, we decided to make a “Plan B” and that was to head over to the Jelly Belly factory for a tour.  This turned out to be a lot of fun and I would highly recommend it to folks of all ages.  By the time we were done with the tour, the rain had let up and we headed to the park where there were absolutely no lines.  We went on rides first and saw dolphin and whale shows.  I was surprised how large and varied the park was.  Kind of a combination amusement park, zoo and aquarium all in one. We all had a really good day.

The next day we drove even further south down to San Francisco and spent the day on the Wharf and did the Alcatraz Island tour.  It was probably one of my favorite things we did on our trip.  The boat ride, tour and just the island itself was so interesting and the story behind it, just fascinating. What I found the most interesting was how tiny the cells were.  If you are ever in the San Francisco area, I definitely recommend this tour.

Day two in San Francisco was spent site seeing.  We drove over the Golden Gate Bridge.  Explored Golden Gate Park. Spent some time checking out the shops on Haight Street.  My kids loved this amazing record store there.  I on the other hand, loved looking at several vintage clothing stores.  The stores and their merchandise were wonderful; the prices, not so much.  Very high.  After the Haight area, we drove back to the wharf,  caught a cable car to China Town, had a yummy lunch, wandered through China Town which was so cool, then walked back to the wharf.  We then stopped at Ghirardelli Square for a little dessert before heading back to our hotel. It was a really fun day.

The next day we headed for home, stopping in Medford, Oregon to spend the night and break up all that driving.  By Thursday afternoon, we were home and as always, I was so happy to sleep in my own bed.  Since then, I have been Miss Lazy, watching Netflix, doing a bit of laundry and a tiny bit of house work.  Kids have Monday off and I’ll be heading over to check out my mall spaces, but I really need to get my rear in gear and work on some serious projects I have planned for Farm Chicks.  I’m getting super excited about my fourth year being a vendor at this show.  If you are even remotely considering coming, I would strongly suggest you do.  It is so worth it. But then again, I am only a little bit prejudice about it.

I hope you enjoyed hearing about our little trip and seeing some of my recent finds.  I’ll be back on Wednesday with a White Wednesday post on a couple really cool white finds.  See you then.

Dreamy

It has taken me a long time to post about the fabulous weekend that was “Dream Girls 2.” Once again, it’s hard to express how truly lovely this event was. You really have to experience it to understand. So much love, creativity, support, friendship. Almost too much for this rose loving girl to take. Let’s just say, there were tears and laughs a plenty. I want to publicly thank Tiffany the gorgeous (okay, maybe not so much Friday night), hostess of this spectacular event. Again, I took no pictures as there were so many professional photographers capturing the feel of the weekend and I knew that they would do so much better at it than I. I also want to thank Terri Brush who always comes up with the best projects. I only did the Saturday project which was a soldered birdcage with a crown inside. It was so much fun seeing how everyone interpreted the project to make it their own. Here’s how mine came out.

And a close up of the crown.

I wanted to keep it very simple. I didn’t have a bird for my cage, but that’s alright. The crowns were a bit challenging at first, but now I want to make a whole bunch more.

I want to do a little shout out to some of my favorite peeps that I was lucky enough to spend time with. Miss Kimberly, you know I love you and wish we weren’t 4 hours apart. Jeanne, you are a total nut and I so love that about you. Getting to see you only once a year is just not enough, we need to plan something and soon! Any luck with that move to the PNW you were talking about? Lisa, it was so great getting to spend more time with you this year. I feel like we are kindred spirits in so many more ways than just our name. Patricia, even though we only got a few minutes Friday night to chat, I think you are awesome! Beth, it was so lovely spending time with you. I felt like we were instant friends and I hope we can hang out again soon. Robin, Joy, Cindy, Natalie and all the other dream girls, thank you for making this such a memorable weekend for me. And lastly, I can’t forget my partner in crime, Isabel, the best road tripping buddy ever.

I got some great vintage goodies to share with you so I’ll be back soon with pics. Hope you’re having an awesome week!

Finds

I’ve already showed you some amazing stores that I visited down in Southern California.  What I didn’t tell you about is the fact that I also made visits at several thrift stores and the fabulous Long Beach Flea Market.  Unfortunately, I didn’t find much at the thrift stores.  Just a few vintage nighties which were great as they didn’t take up that much space in my luggage.  But the LB flea was another story.  I found lots of my favorite things and ran into some friends which I’ll tell you more about later because I know what you really want is to see the stuff.

Okay, here it is.

Vintage bling is always a great find.

Misc. metal tags and a couple keys.

Lots of great vintage buttons.

A cute little lock with key that someone glued some vintage jewelry to and an adorable little petite point coin purse.

Sweet crochet hangers and crochet doily trivets.

Sweetest crochet picture.

Lovely vintage cotton hankies.

Gorgeous vintage slips.

Beautiful floral fabric remnants.

I also got a couple vintage crinolines and as I mentioned above,and a few cute vintage nightgowns. But my favorite find is one that wouldn’t fit into my suitcase.  It was a little black cabinet with four drawers which had to be shipped home.  After a little a little sanding and a couple new knobs it has now landed in my Stars mall booth.  If you’ve been reading my blog awhile, you know how fond I am of little cabinets with drawers.  Here is my LB flea find.

It’s kind of hard to see as the lighting wasn’t great.  Here is another little cabinet that I recently scored on craigslist that is also now at Stars.

I got it and another larger cabinet from the same guy.  The other larger cabinet is super cool and will be making its first appearance at Farm Chicks.  Ooh, I can’t wait!

Back to the LB Flea.  I was so busy shopping and enjoying the sunshine to bother getting my camera out, but I did  happen to see a few people I know including Brent and Darwin, the owners of Stars Malls (where I have one of my booths).  They were vacationing in Palm Springs and decided to do a little junking.  I also saw Tim and Lisa of Blue Canoe Reloaded.  They were first time vendors at Farm Chicks last year and had the most amazing stuff for sale.  You can see Tim and one of his awesome large bird houses in the latest issue of Flea Market Style magazine. I was also lucky enough to run into the adorable Trisha of Vintage Bliss. I had met her on a previous visit to the Urban Barn where she was a guest vendor at their Street Faire. And finally, I can’t be sure, but I’m almost positive that I saw Tori Spelling at the flea.  Last time I was there, which was a year and a half ago, there was a celebrity siting of Simon Baker.  I didn’t see him, but a few of the vendors were talking about it.

Okay, back to reality.  Oh wait, I am headed up to Tiffany’s house for a fun girl weekend of giggling, crafting and eating.  Maybe even another visit to the Yella Beak.  This time I will try to behave myself.  Have a fun weekend!

More Eye Candy~Vintage Begonia & Urban Barn

I’m back with more pictures of my fun trip down South. I was super excited to visit a new shop that I heard about on Sheila’s blog. The fact that it is located in Temecula, CA was an extra bonus as that’s where my Dad lives. I’m talking about Vintage Begonia.

I didn’t think I would get the chance to visit the lovely Urban Barn, but was tickled pink to find out that they had changed their hours and are now open Tuesday – Sunday. I want to thank Linda for letting me take some pictures of the beautiful displays.

I instantly fell in love with this amazing cabinet. So wish I could have brought it home with me.

This chair was the perfect pink. There were two of them. Still too big to fit in my luggage.

Adorable baby dress form.

Love this peachy pink velvet settee.

This little desk/cabinet was adorable and so unique.

This rusty, crusty little cabinet was awesome!

And finally, I took a picture of my Dad hanging out behind the store, sitting in this cool gypsy wagon.

That’s it for now. I promise I’ll be back soon with stories from the flea market and my cool vintage finds. Have a great Thursday!