Serendipity and Vintage Fisher Price

On Friday, I took my two boys to an estate sale. I was worried about how the outing would go -my 12-year old was not too keen on the idea when I first suggested it, and, well, with the 3-year old, you just never know.

It turned out that both boys had a blast. For a treasure hunter and collector like my 12-year old, the estate sale turned out to be a wonderland. The woman who owned the house was a collector, too. There were bags and bags of beautiful shells and sea glass she had collected throughout her years of travel. Old urns, pieces of fences, and architectural pieces greeted us at every turn. My son went home with a PS2 game system, 14 games, and a ziploc bag full of "rare" blue sea glass.

My 3-year old amused himself by playing with the house dog and old toys, talking to everybody who crossed his path, and running through every room of the rambling house.

As for me, when I saw a tub full of vintage Fisher Price toys, I knew I had to buy them. I had recently read on Sarah's blog that she buys vintage Fisher Price toys for her children. I loved the idea of buying some vintage FP, and searched for some on ebay. I really wanted the amusement park series, but all of the toys offered on ebay were either too expensive or in poor condition. Now, right in front of me, in a plastic tub on a dirty basement floor, were the toys I had been lusting after on ebay, in perfect condition and for less money. Serendipity.

I bought a merry-go-round:


A circus train:


Seven little people:

And a ferris wheel.

The cost for everything was $25. Watching my boys play with their treasures for hours after we returned home - priceless.

It was a great day.

Love, 40

Souvenir Foto School Photo #1

Sneaky Baby, originally uploaded by susan736.

I am participating in Tristan's Souvenir Foto School this session. This time, the theme is food. The students will be posting their pictures to the Flickr group FOOD+FOTO by midnight Sunday of each week. This picture is my first submission. Head over to Tristan's blog, or Flickr see all of the great pictures that have been entered.

Love, 40

I must be getting old

I should have titled this post- "No really, I'm serious". I love this! I can't stop listening. Honestly, how about that Julio? I mean, Willie has always been Willie and he's great. When we were young, our dad certainly went through his Willie Nelson phases. We even saw him at the State Fair once. But I am developing a new fascination for Julio. I actually think that this is the only song I have every heard by him. But I am thinking I need to invest in some more of his music. I want to have a dinner party and play only Julio. For real. I'm not kidding. And anyway, I had to distance myself from all that Christmas talk, I can't take it this early in the season.

-35

P.S. Who doesn't love some good old fashioned cheesy pin-ups? Your welcome.

Or take the lazy route

You can get this wreath here, at Anthropologie for $148. A bit pricey, yes. But I find being lazy always costs more in the end. And actually, I must say it is still not as pretty as the one with the felted balls. But even if you don't love the wreath, it is worth a peek at their website just to see the animated ornament catalog. So cute it makes me want to puke.
And with that, maybe I'll throw down a challenge to 40: in the next few weeks, let's try to make the cheap pom pom wreath. After all, surely ours will be beautiful!
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More Cute and Easy DIY Christmas Wreaths

Here is a cheaper, though not quite as cute, version of the pompom wreath I posted earlier:

Instuctions for making it can be found here: http://www.cozylittlecave.com/2009/12/diy-pom-pom-wreath.html.

This wreath is also really cute. And it would be very cheap, fast, and easy to make. I would replace the flowers with some cute buttons or large pompoms. (The other kind, not the kind on the wreath above.)

Instructions on making this wreath can be found here http://calebdanielle.blogspot.com/2010/10/diy-yarn-wreath-with-felt-flowers.html.

Love, 40

Pretty DIY Christmas Wreaths

I am thinking about making this wreath for Christmas:

image via Pickles

Instructions on how to make it can be found here http://http//www.pickles.no/wonderful-wreath/.

quote of the day

"Till there was rock, you only had god."

I always loved this one.

Well, 40 and I were talking the today and we said, "hey, whatever happened to our blog? Is it still out there??". Sure enough, here it is.

Okay, fine, we're slackers. We never denied that. We were very upfront about it, actually. We're always honest, atleast. But we might just give this a whirl once again. Watch out world.

We're back.

-35