Faux Go

At the Goodwill in south county, I have always loved this sofa. I would love a nice chocolate brown leather 3-seater. Where you don't have to do any of the breaking in, where parts of it, like the headrest are so deep and dark in color, that you know its had years of love.

I at one other time have come across a Faux Go, at an estate sale, in a off white leather, priced at $250, but it was a much larger sofa than the one shown.

This sofa got my attention, but once I started to look it over, I just felt cheap. $50. Not a bad price, but some things you pay more for to get the quality you were expecting. This sad, dirty sofa only made me feel the same as it looked.

Rearranging

I like to rearrange the furniture. Tossing the tree frees up space, and gets me thinking about moving stuff around.

When we went to replace the laptops that were stolen we decided to go with a refurbished desktop instead. So, that meant finding a desk. I love when we need a piece of furniture, because normally, I just shop in our basement or garage. But, I have been trying to sell more and hold onto less, and that had left us without a desk. When we were passing through Rolla MO, we stopped at the Salvation Army and found a great old tanker desk for $20, fitting it in the car proved to be quite a task. My determined husband made it fit, and we've been happy with purchase ever since. We were using a cool Goodform clerical chair, but it didn't prove to be the long term comfort I was looking for.

Christmas day, at my parents I noticed a new-to-them black leather executive chair and immediately began to question where it came from, and why I hadn't seen it before. I'm not even sure that my mom offered it to me, but we brought it home that day. (the last thing my husband wanted to do that day was move more furniture) but you have to strike while the iron is hot, or before your parents decide they don't want you rolling their new chair out the the front door.

These pictures were taken this afternoon with my new Christmas tripod, still trying to figure out the best way to shoot interior photos.

The tree is down. The only sign that Christmas was ever here is the pile of toys in our living room.The first picture is all of the needles that were left after the tree was taken out of the house. When I was sweeping I noticed a little collection of ornaments under our fireplace that the kitten had been hoarding, and a small ball of tape.

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!

Christmas at my house

We've had our tree up now for a couple of weeks and is it bad to say I'm ready to take it down? The first couple of days its so nice to have a beautiful glowing tree to get you in the Christmas spirit, and then slowly, the tree starts to lose needles everywhere, the lights start to sag a little, the playful new kitten has removed all of the ornaments from the bottom of the tree, the skirt has already been put away since the kitten likes to move it around the house.

I will keep the tree up until the big day, but after that all bets are off. Last year our tree went out the day after Christmas.

But anyway, I took these pics the day it was decorated, and the newest addition to the tree this year are the vintage birds. Cardinals and doves. My great Aunt let me bring home some of her ornaments since she is unable to put a tree up any more, and as soon as I saw the birds I knew they would be happy at my place.

Growing up our tree topper was a white dove, wings spread. The funny thing about our childhood white dove was that, when we moved to St. Louis and were able to get a tall beautiful tree, we weren't really able to reach the top of the tree to gently place the dove in its highest resting spot. So every year we would take different approaches to get him up there, we would just throw him up there and hope that he would hold on for dear life, we would use a yard stick to try to gently coax him to the top. We would try to take the youngest member of the family and hold him up, and hope he could reach the top. After all of these attempts over the years, that poor dove became a little worse for the wear, and eventually lost a beak. So, instead of retiring that bird, my creative mom took a dried navy bean and put it where a beak use to be, and we lived with that bird for quite some time. I don't believe that dove is still around, but when I spotted the birds at my Aunts house, it brought all of those memories back, and now we have doves on our tree.

Thrift Scores

Here are a few things that have been brought home lately. Some are staying and some are already on their way out.

The first photo is of a industrial swivel arm wall mount work light I purchased at an estate sale today. Its beautiful, and if it were easier to mount things to our plaster walls, and get them to stay, I would mount this at our bed side opposite the other one I just sold on ebay. But since hanging anything more that a picture on our walls makes huge holes that no anchor will stay put, this cutie is already listed on ebay awaiting a new home.

The next photo is of a huge beautiful rug I found at a thrift store, a little on the expensive side, so I waited until customer appreciation day, and then the extra 25% off really helped. Its has made the couch extra cosy.

The picture after that is of a partially done hooked rug, that now hangs on my kitchen wall. I first spotted in an estate sale photo, and thought it was an abstract photo. Once I arrived to the sale I found that is was actually a work in progress, started quite a few years ago, and was still on the stretcher/stand used to make rugs. All I wanted was the rug itself, so at $45, I had to pass, since that price was mostly for the stand. Two weeks later, they reopened the sale one last time, and when I dropped by I was able to bring it all home for $10. I took it off the stand, and Baby J helped be drive some upholstery tacks through it and stretch it over a wooden canvas stretcher.
The next photo is from a couple different thrift stores, a couple of nice big teak square plates, Two turned walnut bowls, and a beautiful , HEAVY, pair of brass candle sticks. The antlers I've had for awhile, borrowed from my parents home.

And last, but not least this sweet little dala horse napkin holder, marked, made by Nils Olsson. This little guy is also listed on ebay, waiting to be centerpiece of someones Christmas dinner table.
So just when I start thinking there are no good deals left at the thrift stores or estate sales, all of these beautiful things were found.

Mew is new...

Mew is our newest addition. We went to a Christmas expo, and left with a kitten. We must have had "sucker" written on our foreheads. But she is the coolest kitten and everyone is in love with her(with an exception of the dogs). Baby J carries her around the house all day and she doesn't seem to mind!