recent thrift finds

Well hello there!
As you may have noticed, I have been absent here.  I've been unmotivated to blog lately partly because I've been busy scouting vintage treasures for my Etsy shop and also for Fab.com for the upcoming holiday season and also I felt like my 'thrift finds' posts has been redundant and I can't come up with fresh new topics to post, so instead of blogging here I have been instagramming my finds. I think I love it more for it's ease of use - I take a quick picture with my phone, add a cool filter and finish with a caption or one liner and done. Not much thinking or planning and over thinking whether to hit the publish button or not for everyone to see. So I've been loving instagram, and been posting my finds there lately. If you don't follow me there, the photos above are my recent finds in the last couple of weeks.  I will be using IG for now and will take a break from blogging so if you want to see what's happening you can follow there at @modishvintage of course.  Happy autumn everyone!

weekend finds

Being that my favorite auction place only holds a general auction once a month, I've been having serious withdrawal to find and buy stuff lately; this weekend I drag my whole family to a small antique mall to look around and pick stuff I can afford.  One booth has a big moving sale and I scored the items pictured above.  The blue fan works wonderful and surprisingly quiet, I used it all afternoon in my office yesterday.  The pig cookie jar was also a cute find and I just love the shape and the color of the creamer and sugar dishes.

Hubby is developing a keener eye for my mid century taste and spotted this beautiful teak coffee table that has a couple of spots on top greatly reduced from $100 to $30. We took it home, he sanded the top and refinished it, and now it looks like a million bucks - or more like 400 bucks :) .

A happy Monday indeed!

(Linking to ATG's post)

lost and found

Don't you just love it when you had forgotten about a Goodwill bag full of stuff you had thrifted weeks ago then it magically resurfaces under a pile of stuff under a desk while you're cleaning your office because you just bring way too much stuff that sometimes you just don't have time but pile them in a corner to be sorted and listed later and when you finally open the long lost plastic bag you're all WOW! these are so cute I've been looking for this! and felt like you just found a new treasure for free?

I just found these tiny little things in a bag under a pile of other stuff this morning and they will finally making their way into the shop.

dark finds

Dark and moody was certainly the theme of my antique shopping over the weekend. While I normally pick bright and colorful objects it was the black items I was drawn to from an antique shop I went to on Saturday.

So there’s this new shop I recently discovered who had a “haggle sale” over the weekend, and I went there on Saturday to haggle, or more like made small awkward talks to the dealers and let me just say that haggling should only be done via online (like make an offer on Ebay) where you are not to see the person’s facial expression, cause let me tell you haggling can make a very tricky and uncomfortable conversation.

I picked up a few things (pictured above) and only realized I had mostly black items when another customer commented if I am decorating a room and how interesting it will be with all the black items I am buying.

P.S. This post is linked to ATG's Thrift Share Monday.

let there be light...

Recently thrifted marble lamps. 

So we had a  snow storm last week; tree brances fell; snow and slush turned to ice; I was out of active yeast to make some bread; and the power went out for a day and a half-  it was ugly.  One funny conversation with my six year old.

Jovan:  mommy when is the light coming back?

me:  very soon son, very soon...

Jovan:   I'm bored!!!!!

me:  read a book, color.

him:  but I just did!

me:  take a nap.

Jovan:  mommy, am I having a nightmare?

me:  hahahahaha!

pressed flowers

thrifted a few weeks ago but can't seem to let them go yet. There's something very romantic about these pressed flowers. When I was in high school I remember getting very excited finding pressed leaves and flowers from books I used to borrow from the library. I collected them in a small tin box and eventually gave them away to a friend when I left home for college.

weekend find

Today I am starting a blogpost series I will call "weekend find/s" where I'll show you a favorite find from a thrift store in my area from previous weekend.  I love to go to auctions, but it's only being held once a month, so to relieve my need to go junking- I go to my local Deseret or Goodwill whenever I have time on weekends.

this past weekend I'm excited to find these set of four silverplated animal goblet from Goodwill.  At first glance I thought they were bells but they stand on their heads, how awesome is that! When I got home, I searched the internet and found similar ones on ebay for a grand?! Speaking of awesomeness, you know you got something really awesome in your shopping cart when a few shopper just can't help themselves but to stop on their tracks, gawked, touch and feel the items IN your cart. I don't mind the staring, but touching it?  "Um hello sir, you are invading my privacy by touching the items inside my cart, I am afterall holding the cart so you know it's mine right?"  ok I am probably overly sensitive but still, it's just strange.

They're cute little cups to sip champagne from and equally cute with some candy canes; sure to add some festive decor in any room.

beautiful mess

I'm loving the beautiful mess the colourful leaves creates on my driveway.  This morning I spent a couple of hours sorting, cleaning and polishing my recent finds.

+ + +

I changed my shop banner last night and I'm a little nervous about the change...but happy.

lacy afternoon

I only had an hour left before picking up the kids from school this afternoon and still had to do the usual errands; post office, library, grocery shopping so I told myself no stopping to the thrift shop today, besides I have been spending a lot on auctions lately. As I was approaching the thrift store on the way to the post office made the split second decision to stop in anyway, yeah I know I'm sick but I'm glad I did, I found a huge bag of vintage doilies, and not just junk doilies, many of them are really pretty and old. On the otherhand, were having mac n cheese and chicken nuggets for dinner, I'll do my grocery shopping tomorrow.

hoot! hoot!

It's been a busy week so far on the homefront, the kids are on spring break, lots of quality time to be had but amidst all the busyness I was able to sneak out for a quick run to the near thrift shop yesterday for my quick fix and I found these collection of owl figurines.



The small ones are only an inch tall... there are still a whole bunch that I left there, I just picked the cutest ones.



Aren't they owl-dorable? They will be in the shop tonight or tomorrow.

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P.S. Don't forget to enter my vintage giveaway here! Thanks!

new thrift finds: vintage clocks

Remember the stare incident I blogged about not too long ago? Well, just the other day, Tuesday to be exact, it happened again. There I am trying to be all sneaky and quiet, yup I’m one of those stealthy shoppers who can’t be bothered when I’m looking for stuff in the thrift shop. But I guess in this business sometimes you just have to be social when your finds are practically saying “WELL HELLO THERE, COME AND TALK TO ME!” to everyone that passes by.



I found a huge lot of vintage mantle clocks all sitting in one corner of my favorite thrift shop, undiscovered, so naturally I scooped them all up, all eleven of them and secured them in my cart (quick tip for newbie pickers, if you find something you like put them in your cart quickly and examine them later, sounds greedy huh, oh well…works for me) And then I went to the one corner of store to test the clocks and examine them a bit further. And you know how loud these old clocks are! VERY LOUD! So there I was standing and all these clocks were ticking, buzzing, and just plain ancient looking. There were Spanish and some Ukranian people speaking in their language pointing at my cart I just smiled at them, there’s a couple of seniors trying to be funny by asking me what time it is and everyone just want to say something about how old the clocks were, and what am I going to do with them, etc. etc.

So long story short it's all worth it and I'm not complaining one bit; here's a few of my favorite ones. Aren't they lovely?

mirror mirror

I don't have many mirrors in my home, in fact the only mirrors I have are the medicine cabinet mirrors in my bath and one full length mirror I use to check if my shoes matches before going out the door to run errands or do my thrifting and mail runs, pathetic huh?. But I know others love to decorate their home or their entire walls with nothing but mirrors. And it can be charming and very stylish, I've seen pictures, but I can't do that, I won't get anything done but stare on my wall all day.

I got these mirrors last weekend from Goodwill and will be listing them in the shop soon.

thank you Etsy for my new find

Prior to opening my Etsy shop, my photography skill was non-existent. The only time I use my point and shoot camera was when someone is celebrating their birthdays, the holidays or vacations, in other words I only photograph to commemorate a special occasion. And this may sound trite but taking photos of my vintage items as part of my daily routine I become more aware of the simplest beauty around me, all which I use to take for granted. The moss in my front yard, the neighbors chipped white fence, dried fallen leaves, even my shadow had all of a sudden become a thing of beauty.

Prior to Etsy, I would not have seen the potential of this worn out wooden box...



old, chipped, rusty, distressed was all the characteristics opposite to the things I particularly get drawn in...


it has changed since and yesterday when I saw this large army box in the corner of the thrift shop's furniture department, all I can think of was "perfection".


I'll be using it to store some blankets, maybe double it as a coffee table in my basement, and as a photo prop!

So, thank you Etsy because of you I've discovered both my love for photography and for the old and decrepit.

a little blue

Today I woke up late than usual a little headachy, prayed it wouldn't turned into a full blown migraine, felt a little off- not really sure why, perhaps the monthly visitor is coming soon. Fed the kids some Coco Puffs for breakfast; drove them to school went home and took a nap (such a waste of time). Was a few minutes late picking the kids up from school. No photos, no new listing...In other words, nothing was done today except sleeping... so I'm posting this photo of some favourite yellow finds I thrifted not too long ago to end this post on a cheerful note. Hope your Tuesday is better than mine :)