When you're in the junk business, amazing finds are filtering through your life all the time. We constantly get asked where we find everything, and how we decide what to keep, if anything!
We usually answer that the junk just finds us! We've been doing this so long that we get phone calls from old friends asking if we're still interested in old stuff...oh yeah! We're also always on the lookout...estate sales, auctions, side of the road piles. To keep the store stocked, we need to constantly be hunting. Honestly, there's not too many finds that we don't sell, but every once in awhile...we get a keeper!
This last year, I actually decided there were a few finds that just had to stay at my house. Usually it's the other way around...a cool piece that I spent a lot of time and energy on just isn't selling, and I decide it needs to come home...but the "store rejects" blog is a whole different post! Looking around my living room, I realized a couple pieces have found their new home this year!
An old friend, from our old church, in our old town called and asked if I'd like the chance to pre-shop before her and her sister held their parents estate sale. She is in her 70's, and I knew from our old VBS days that she was a saver. She told me her parents had never had garbage pick up service...so you can imagine the lifetime of finds! I purchased a whole van load that day, and then proceded to head back there a month later, after 2 sale weekends and they still had more stuff! I went back with Mr. Fix-it months later to help them empty out the garage rafters and load the dumpster. I find that my job is always a combination of helping and providing service in a difficult time, and also finding great stuff at a great deal for our shoppers.
This antique, roll-up map was wedged in the garage rafters, along with the old 1900's patterned linoleum that I so badly wanted to save! Unfortunately, the linoleum fell apart in cracked pieces as we pulled it down, but when I opened this old schoolteacher's wall map...I knew this treasure was staying at my house! The sepia tones of the parchment-like paper, with the old-style font, combined with the subtle pastels, all outlined in black...sheer beauty! And it's big! The kids have enjoyed looking at how the world landscape has changed since that time. I love how it looks with my blush-colored ceiling and my butter yellow walls!
Right next to it is the globe I picked up at an estate sale. I had full intention of selling it, but after seeing it on my kitchen counter for a couple weeks, I realized the aqua and green tones and the butter yellow on it was perfect for my house!
Happy Girl and I hit 4 estate sales one day, and the last one was in the basement of someone's home. This medical/dental side table made by the W.G. Holmes Company of Mpls was supposed to be heading to the store too, but...
The perfectly patinaed legs, along with the white, stone top looked so well with our white-stitched, fake leather sofas. And I realized I am kind of starting a collection of pieces made by old Minneapolis companies!
This big square piece hanging in my dining room is made by the Wabash Screen Door Co., Minneapolis. My dad found it in his century-old barn. With a little google search, I learned that this is actually a stove cover. It has stamped metal on the other side and was used underneath a stove, so the ashes would not hit the wood floor and catch the house on fire. And I thought it had something to do with screen doors...learn something new every day! Notice how well all these pastel-colored Reader's Digests, and the painting coordinate with my new, old map!
The last 2 items hanging in my living room that just had to stay this year, were two wall baskets that a friend of a friend was clearing out as she went through a traumatic divorce. She said they had hung on either side of her cabin front door, so they had that great, weathered look to them already. I decided they filled up the wall space on either side of the big T.V. and gave me a seasonal canvas:
They started out with apple blossoms when I got them last March, transitioned to white, chartreuse and yellow gerber daisys for summer, sunflowers for late summer into fall, and ended the year with sticks, winter greens and lights for Christmas. Right now, they're just sticks and little white rice lights that give us that winter glow at night. Pretty soon, I'll be pulling those apple blossoms back out!
So...that's what I kept this year and you never got a chance to buy at the store! Guess we've got to have some perks... we don't get free lunches and convention-type trips...!
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