Saturday, November 26, 2011

Day after Thanksgiving tradition

Went to the tree farm yesterday to get our Christmas tree. There is the best Christmas tree farm just a few miles from our house (Tall Timbers Tree Farm). Love this place! They have acres and acres of trees. You can go on wagon rides out into the trees and pick your fresh tree, cut it yourself or you can buy a tree off the lot.
You can see we are lazy and pick a pre cut one from the lot.
We bought a beautiful live fresh wreath too.

Even managed to drag Caleb with us. He said he enjoyed it except for the family photo I made him pose for. Can't you just see the joy on his face... lol.


Tried something totally different this year.... Our living room is soooo small and the Christmas takes up so much room that I decided to put the tree on the front porch. We put it right in front of the living room widow so we can enjoy it as well as people passing by. I'm very happy with the end result.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Thrift Store Finds

People who know me know what a thrift store junkie I am. It's a great day when I can jump in the car and head for a day of thrift store shopping. I am never disappointed and it's always so much fun to see what I will come home with for hardly any money at all. I enjoy it most when I am by myself.
Recently I've been looking at Christmas items. I got this Oneida Christmas coffee cup for $1. It's huge which is how I love my coffee cups. It will hold a good 5 cups of coffee. And I fell in love with this framed embossed snowman. Got him for a whole 50 cents!
And check out this watch I found. The photo doesn't do it justice. I picked it up for $1. It didn't work but I took my chances that all it needed was a battery. I bought a $2 battery for it and it works and keeps time perfect. I LOVE it.
And here's one of my latest purchases that I'm most proud of. We got a new desktop computer and the monitor wouldn't fit into our old computer desk. I always disliked our old computer desk. It was huge and had a tall back on it that covered the wall. With our new computer I was determined to find a flat top computer desk. Didn't take me long. I found this desk at Goodwill for $38. It was exactly what I was looking for!!! Whoo Hoo $38!! It had a little white paint on the top which I was able to remove.
I also wanted a file cabinet that would serve as a file, and have drawers for storage as well. I wanted to be able to use it as a spot for the printer too. I went to the office supply stores and I found nothing under $200 and they weren't even what I wanted. So again, I started to scour the thrift store. I was not disappointed. I found exactly what I wanted. It was heavy industrial and the top two drawers were storage drawers, the bottom was a file. The only problem was that it had no top on it. You could look right down inside the top drawer. I figured my Dad could make me a top of wood and router the top edges and then I could finish and varnish it. Which is exactly what we did. It's PERFECT. You can see from the photo that I haven't finished the top yet. And the best part...... it was $5!!! I was so proud of myself... a whole new office for 43 bucks.

Thrift store shopping has ruined me for shopping at regular stores. I simply cannot go into a store and look at clothes, or much of anything and not think to myself what a waste of money it is to buy new when I can get things I love at thrift stores for a fraction of the money. And I find great quality name brand things all the time!

The other day I was in the check out line at Target and this young college age girl was checking out in front of me. She had 5 sweaters and her bill was $70. I so bad wanted to tell her that she was wasting her money and didn't she know she could go to Goodwill and find much better nicer quality sweaters for $3 each? Of course I had to laugh at myself for feeling that way and I never would ever really tell someone such a thing but I did think it.

Oh well, that's my thing and I have a lot of fun with it. It's the trill of the hunt that I love.....

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

It's the simple things I love

Seeing the first Christmas lights of the season.
Listening to Pandora on my way to and from work.
Morning coffee at the office with sugar free vanilla creamer.
Hosting Thanksgiving and planning the menu.
Counting the red tail hawks along I-94 (easy with no leaves now).
Spotting my first junco of the season yesterday.
Scouring the thrift stores for new (to me) Christmas decor.
Looking through all of last years photos and reminiscing.
Deciding what homemade Christmas gifts I want to make this year.
Getting back into the fall/winter routine of feeding the birds and squirrels.
Sugar cookie scented candles permeating the house.
The anticipation of Jordan coming home for 5 days next week.

It's the season to be Thankful.... my heart is happy.
Photos from our trip to the UP in July.