Road Trip for Rummage!

My friend Paula came for a visit last weekend, and since we successfully hit a number of local tourist hotspots on Friday, we had time on Saturday for a little thrifting fun! Yay! We headed off towards Salem to hit a "phenomenal" church rummage sale, at least according to Craigslist. It was HUGE! We were a couple of hours behind our original schedule so we were definitely not in the first wave of shoppers. I always get nervous when I see throngs of people leaving a sale like that carrying garbage bags full of goodies--what if all the good stuff is gone? However, I always leave with a few treasures and this day was no exception.

The china and glassware section was large but nothing caught my eye. I found a cute argyle cardigan for my daughter in the picked-over kids' clothing area but was starting to get discouraged when we stumbled into the Christmas room. It was a small room with many boxes of ornaments and decorations. I began pawing my way through one of the boxes and started to unearth vintage ornament after vintage ornament--things were looking up! I ended up with some cute finds:

a choir of angels and a creche angel

a wise man for my creche collection

three Dwarves...uh, oh, I smell a new collection coming on...

an adorable tennis racket

a skier

and a plastic nativity set to add to my growing collection.

In the arts and crafts section, I found a large bag of these wooden candlestick holders. I have been wanting some of these for our upcoming Pioneer Party. Aren't they cute, especially at 50 cents for the bag? They will be adorable additions to party favor bags.

And then we found the books. The sale was close to winding down, and the lady in charge of the book section wanted things to move. I assembled a large pile of books both vintage and new, and she asked for five bucks. Done! My favorite was this mint condition Family Christmas memory album. When I got home, I did a little googling and discovered that this edition, in unused condition, can go for over $300 on online used bookstores. Complete insanity! Can't decide if I want to keep it for myself or try to sell it. I am leaning towards keeping it. It is just too beautiful to let go.

In the groove now, we searched for more local thrift opportunities and found a small church thrift shop nearby. I walked through the main room of the shop and almost left, convinced there would be nothing of value to me in the shop. But then I noticed a boy in the shop wander down a hallway and disappear into another room. I followed. Things were much improved in the next room, and as I continued exploring, I found a room completely devoted to Christmas decor and dishware. I couldn't believe my luck in finding this set of holly wreath dishes and a set of Christmas/New Year glasses, both of which I had been specifically looking for! A friend had scored a box of the same holly dishes back in PA on a thrift excursion, and I had been so envious. They are the perfect holiday dishes. Not too fancy, not too overdone, just a beautiful simple pattern. Love them so much and now really can't wait until Christmas to use both them and the festive glasses. I already had a couple of the glasses but now I have a full set. What unbelievable luck! And to think, I almost walked out of the shop before even looking in the back. Lesson learned!

Merry Christmas, all!