Finders Keepers: Vintage Mirror

Since starting this little frugality project, my shopping problem hasn't so much gone away as its gone the way of thrift stores. So, since I'm making less money, at least regularly, I guess I'm failing, big time.

If I hadn't quit my job, it probably wouldn't be an issue, but I'm probably still spending the same percentage of my income on shopping. Not everything I buy is for my own personal pleasure, of course, but I'd be lying if I said some of the thrift store shopping I've been doing lately wasn't for me. I mean, most of it is either for food styling props or my vintage Etsy shop, but some of it is definitely for me.

My little second-hand shopping problem was worsened — or made better, depending on how you want to look at it — by the fact that I discovered my new secret favorite thrift shop after my nephew's 16th birthday party in the suburbs a few weeks ago. It was packed with amazing housewares, including multiple vintage dish sets.

Exhibit A (which is available in parts in my Etsy shop):

Exhibit B (which will soon be available in my Etsy shop):

The only reason these beautiful mustard dishes aren't listed yet is because I want them all for myself. In fact, we've been using them as our primary dishes for about two weeks now. It's the first time I've ever wanted matching dishes. But at some point I made the stupid mistake of bragging to Kyle that the plates were going for $10 a piece on eBay, and he reminded me (again) that my eye for great vintage won't do us much good if I keep everything for myself.

Ugh. Fine. He's right. Again.

So, today, I swapped these back out for my mismatched stoneware. I hope that when I do list them, that they go to a good home. Maybe even to someone who will have me over for dinner. (Please serve pork. In tacos. With lots of hot sauce. And many margaritas.)

But I'm not parting with everything.

You see, I have a thing for vintage mirrors. And since our trip to Chicago, I've been on the lookout for a mirror similar to the one in our room at Longman & Eagle in Logan Square. I even took a picture so I'd remember it.

I'd been looking online, and hadn't found anything I liked for less than about $150. But on my second trip to the second of many locations of my new secret favorite thrift store, I found this beauty for $15:

I don't exactly know where it will go — especially because it's really heavy and I've already had one vintage mirror fall off the wall here — but I want it to be someplace I'll see it every day. For now, it's on this ledge in our bedroom, which is great since it's covering one of the glue traps I put out for those shithead spideymonsters.

This is definitely one of my favorite thrift store finds, ever. Finders keepers this time.

Vintage of the Day: 1950s Fire King Milk Glass with Gold Trim Creamer and Divided Tray

I'm really into gold tones lately, so I've been picking up "new" gold vintage stock. I've also been listing some I've had for a while, including these two pieces of 1950s milk glass from Fire King by Anchor Hocking.

They're new in the shop today and the creamer is only $6.50 and the dish is $14.

[pyrexandpennies.etsy.com]

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Vintage of the Day: Pink Flamingo Pyrex Cup and Saucer Sets

More mugs today! Well, technically, I think they're tea cups. And the pattern is called either Pink Flamingo or Flamingo Pink. I've heard it both ways. (Tomato, tomato.)

I hate to let these pretties go, especially because they're in such great condition, but they should be enjoyed by someone who doesn't need her caffeine in 32-ounce servings. Find them in the Pyrex & Pennies vintage housewares Etsy shop today.

Set of 2 vintage Pyrex Pink Flamingo pattern cups and saucers: $22.

[pyrexandpennies.etsy.com]

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Vintage of the Day: Colorful Fire King Mugs from Anchor Hocking

Here's what's new in the Pyrex & Pennies vintage housewares Etsy shop today: Colorful vintage Fire King by Anchor Hocking coffee mugs. Each is listed individually, so whether you want orange, blue, green, yellow, or the flower (it's called Daybreaker) pattern, you can pick and choose. I'll gladly combine shipping if you want more than one. Prices range from $5.50 to $8 each. I hate to let go of these, but I'm pretty good at finding them.

[pyrexandpennies.etsy.com]

Vintage of the Day: Gold Glam Glassware

Here's what's new in the Pyrex & Pennies vintage housewares Etsy shop today (these will come a little earlier from now on).

I'm featuring two of my favorite finds today: a beautiful seven-piece vintage martini or cocktail set with lots of gold trim and gold handles, and a selection of 24-karat gold Stetson vintage china. 

Seven-piece gilded martini or cocktail set. Six of these beautiful glasses, plus a tall pitcher: $90 [pyrexandpennies.etsy.com]



Dinner/luncheon plates, appetizer/bread plates, and saucers/small plates in the Stetson 24-karat gold Greek Key & Shields pattern: $4–$40 [pyrexandpennies.etsy.com]

These plates need a good home and should never go in the dishwasher or have a Magic Eraser or abrasive cleaner taken to them. If I didn't already have my husband's family's china, I would have tried to fill out this lot to make an entire set for myself. This is the most beautiful China I've ever encountered.

Find these items and more at the Pyrex & Pennies Etsy shop: pyrexandpennies.etsy.com. "New" vintage items added daily. And if you're looking for something in particular, let me know, I love hunting with a mission.

Thanks for looking.

-Emily

Introducing the Pryex & Pennies Vintage Etsy Shop

After talking about it for ages, then opening and quickly closing a not-so-successful booth at a nearby shop, I have finally started my very own vintage Etsy housewares shop, Pyrex & Pennies (of course).

I won't say I was forced into it, but the fact that I was quickly learning the difference between revenue and income lit a fire under my ass. Money is tighter than I hoped it would be right now (though once the freelance checks start rolling in, I should be just fine). And it got scary for a minute. After going through our bills and accounts a few weeks ago, I was just about to hit the pavement to look for a serving job when Kyle asked, "Don't you have anything of value you can sell? You have all of this vintage stuff you claim is so great."

My vintage stuff is great. So I am selling it. At least some of it.

I'm even slowly and somewhat painfully parting with bits and pieces of my vintage Pyrex collection. Not my most loved or rare pieces, or anything that I've been gifted by someone I love. But I'm ready to part with the pieces I picked up along the way just because I was collecting vintage Pyrex. And I'm acquiring "new" vintage Pyrex pieces to list, too. I must admit, though, I'm having the most fun finding and sharing all kinds of other great vintage housewares, like this amazing cocktail set, and these robin's-egg-blue TWA in-flight service trays.

I launched the Pyrex & Pennies vintage shop August 26, but really only populated it late last week. Since then, I've made three sales. My very first one — a set of tiny Ball jar salt-and-pepper shakers — was the most exciting $9 I've ever made in my life. This week, I've sold two vintage cake stands.

To stay relevant in search results and actually have the potential to make some real money, I've decided to list new items every day. I'm sure some days it will feel like a drag, but I am still Emily Farris, so this also gives me an excuse to shop regularly... and responsibly. My total bill for this morning's quick trip to the thrift store was the same amount as the cake plate I sold yesterday. Listing daily also keeps me from having to hide out for a week or so every month to photograph and measure everything. (Though I'd be lying if I said this whole thing wasn't a time suck. It is, but I love all of it.)

The best part? I'll be posting to this blog daily, because I want to post the day's vintage finds for everyone, but I promise it won't be the only thing I post. Pinky swear to the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

For now, though, I hope you'll go browse the Pyrex & Pennies Vintage Etsy shop, and maybe even follow the example of Old Emily and spend, spend, spend!

I'm off to do what I am perhaps worst at: mail stuff on time. 

Carrots and Critters

Apologies for yet another extended period of silence. We are still waiting on Google Fiber to install and set up Internet in our area, so I'm without it at home. It's making me a little (okay, a lot) crazy. Since most of the work I do happens over the web, and I just learned it will be another month until we're all set up, I'm about to break down and get a hotspot to hold us over. It may not be the most frugal thing in the world, but I'm going to start losing money soon if I can't get online when I need to, and driving to the studio at midnight to send quick edits for a copywriting project is perhaps a little more frugal than I'm willing to be. Plus, that wastes gas money. (So there?)

Moving and going back to freelance is a lot to do at one time, and I've been neglecting more than this blog. I hate to admit it, but I also sort of abandoned our community garden. It wasn't purposeful, I've just been so behind on everything I hadn't really made it back to the old neighborhood to tend to it. Yesterday, I finally stopped by. It was overgrown in a pretty sad way, and we lost most of our beans, some kale and some Japanese eggplant. I wouldn't feel so terrible about all of that, had I not recently thrown out some of my CSA veggies because we didn't cook them in time. I have excuses — it took about two weeks to get the kitchen fully unpacked, and the move was exhausting — but I hate wasting food.

On the bright side, I was able to get some herbs to transplant to our extra lot, and I made a very happy discovery: we have carrots. Real, full-grown carrots.

I also made a not-so-happy discovery earlier in the week: Brown recluse spiders. In our basement. Where our new bedroom is. I am FREAKING OUT.

For the two or so weeks we've been in the new house, we'd been sleeping an old queen-size bed in what will be the guest room on the main floor. Our king-size bed was delivered this week, so we finally moved into our new "master suite" which was built, but never finished, in the basement. It's a very cool space, with an old fireplace, a bathroom vanity made of reclaimed wood, and a Kyle-size shower that makes me feel like I'm at a spa. But it needs light covers, trim, and caulk in a bad way.

While cleaning the room in preparation for the bed delivery Tuesday, I discovered that we have a brown recluse spider issue. The issue being: we have them. I never saw them upstairs, but they're in the basement. It doesn't seem to be a crazy infestation or anything, but one is one too many. And I've definitely seen more than one. I've put together a natural repellent that I think is working, and I'm finally a little less frazzled than I've been for the last few days, so I'm not going to work myself into a frenzy right before the weekend. So, more on the spideymonsters later. Probably much more.

For now, here are some images of life lately. Well, at least the non-creepy parts.

Work has been pretty great and I've been able to do a lot of food styling. (Don't worry, these pictures aren't the final product, just process. I'm the stylist, not the photographer... and do you really think I'd leave an ice cube on the table like that?)

My partner Jeff takes the real photos.

At home, we finally unpacked the last of the kitchen stuff and got back to cooking. I was able to prepare two weeks' worth of colorful CSA potatoes for dinner on Wednesday (with enough for leftovers last night), and Kyle grilled beer can chickens. (Yes, that's Bud Light you see up their butts; it's surplus from our wedding.)

I'm also in the process of building my closet in a corner of the basement (though that's on hold for obvious reasons) and I've managed to disassemble, clean and reassemble our fans. All three were having issues and making noises, and now they all purr like kittens. They look nice, too.

Jack is not at all bothered by sleeping the basement, but he chases bunnies into the bushes in the dark and eats his own poop, so I'm not that surprised. I just hope he doesn't get a brown recluse bite down there on the floor.

That's all for now. Hopefully I'll get a hotspot this weekend and get back to regular posting next week. Unless, of course, I end up in the hospital from a brown recluse spider bite — which would be really terrible considering I'm currently uninsured. 

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Saying Goodbye to the Old House

I've had a pretty insanely busy month. We closed on a house, I quit my job, and we went to Chicago for a week. Then, as soon as we got back, I was scrounging up freelance work and painting the living room, kitchen, and dining room of the new house. That took me a week and then some, and I was there until 2 am many nights. About a week later, we started moving in. Though we hired movers for the furniture, the move was its own special kind of hell, and it took us a week to get completely moved out of the rental house we'd lived in since December 2010.

As I finally — finally! — loaded the last of our stuff into my car, I started to get a little sad. I wasn't attached to the house so much as the memories that we created in it. It's the first place Kyle and I picked out together, it's where we lived when we got engaged, and where we lived when we got married. It's where we hosted our first Christmas for both of our families, and countless cookouts, dinner parties, and accidental dance parties with friends. It's where just the two of us had a drunken pots-and-pans jamboree on Kyle's thirty-somethingth birthday, and where I woke up the next morning to find my underwear on the stove. It's where we lived when we loved each other so much we couldn't stand it, and where we lived when we wanted to strangle each other.

Plus, it's just a cool old house. So, I decided to document some of what I will miss, like the old door handles that I'm pretty sure date back to when the house was built in 1913.

The remnants of beautiful wallpaper in the two (tiny) upstairs closets.

The old heating vents.

The sunroom off of the master bedroom I didn't use often enough (or really at all, for anything other than storage, sadly).

The farmhouse sink in the kitchen — a kitchen that was open to the dining room.

And the exposed brick flue, that I know also exists in our new old house. I just need to expose it.

Of course, in addition to the tiny closets, there are other things I won't miss, like the bathroom floor that was impossible to keep clean. No combination of Bon Ami, Mrs. Meyer's, and elbow grease could brighten those once-white tiles.

Speaking of the bathroom, it was a construction site for the last year or so. (And while I'm complaining about the bathroom, I am thrilled that we will have more than one in the new house. Not only will Kyle and I not have to wait for the other to be done in the bathroom every morning, I can have a guest bathroom that I keep clean and nice, and a private bathroom that I will try to keep clean and nice but I know will get trashed with dirty clothes and toothpaste splatters on the mirror from time to time.)

I also won't miss the fact that while the house had central air and heat, the second floor was a swamp in the summer time (requiring a window unit to stay cool at night) and freezing in the winter (so we had to use a space heater on the coldest nights). The old, possibly original, single-paned windows also made for shockingly-high utility bills.

Overall, it was a wonderful place for us to live for two-and-a-half years. I'm glad I was able to snap a few pictures before I left for good, and I'm so excited to make memories, messes, and eventually a couple of babies in the new house.

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