A Day in HOTLanta!

Larry and I drove up to Atlanta this morning to go to Scott Antique Market.  We'd been wanting to get up there for years and we finally made time and went!  We had the best time!  That place is huge.  So huge that they have shuttle buses to take you from the North building to the South building and then back again.  

Before we went to the antique market, though, we hit an estate sale over in the Virginia-Highland neighborhood, in a tiny little 1,200 square foot bungalow, built in 1935, in desperate need of some TLC, but is STILL selling for $555,000!  Location, location, location, I reckon.  I'm guessing by my HGTV-watching experience, that it'll take about $50,000 to fix it up and that's just the cosmetic stuff that I can see.  I have no idea what's behind the walls and under the floor.  Anyway, it was an adorable little house and we got some cool stuff there.  We got a whole basket full of stuff for FREE because Larry climbed up into the attic and pulled down an old WWII footlocker for them.  In that basket were 43 Keurig coffee, tea and hot chocolate cups, some diabetic testing strips, a bottle of Sun-Ripened Raspberry shower gel from Bath and Body Works, a 1981 kitchen tea towel calendar (I love those!), a small Pyrex flamingo pink casserole dish with the lid (!!) and a cute little striped glass pitcher just perfect for lemonade.  I got all that and Larry picked up a vintage Navy peacoat, an old Georgia flag and an old Army/Navy helmet.  Oh!  And we found an old General Electric clock radio, one like I've wanted forever.  That sale was definitely worth the stop!  The neighborhood was beautiful, everybody was walking their dogs and babies and there were little shops everywhere.  We joked that we need to live in a neighborhood like that, if for nothing else but the diversity.  $600-$700K houses, though?  Naaaah.

Here are all those Keurig cups!  It's really funny how God works sometimes.  I had JUST YESTERDAY said I was going to get some coffee cups and bring them to work for our Keurig in the office and then, boom, the Lord brings me to these. 43 for FREE. 

This is the peacoat.  Oh, Larry looks sooooo handsome in it.  It fits him perfectly and there were even two other ladies there eyeing him at the estate sale when he tried it on.  Down, girls.

How amazing is this old clock???  And it works!

 

Here's the helmet and Santana's very first album.  We picked it up at Scott's for $2.

We got to Scott's about noon and we went to the North building first, not knowing any better, bless our hearts.  Don't go to the North building.  It's full of expensive carpets and expensive art and stuff you can't afford.  It's all pretty to look at but you'll leave it there.  I promise. 

See, pretty to look at.  $2,500 to $4,000.  We left 'em there.

 Freddy-the-Frog Mercury, as Larry called him.  $395

We're always looking for globes for Ami.  We looked at this one.  

 

I really did LOVE this vintage counter and stool set, though!!  $4,800 and they coulda been MINE.  Sigh.  We don't have anywhere to put it anyway.  Sigh.

 

Thanks to my good buddy, Erika, who on Facebook told me to get the heck outta there and get down to the South building, we hopped a ride on the shuttle bus and went down there.

MUCH more our speed! 

We walked around outside until we were about to burn slap up (oh, Lordy, it was HOTTTTT) and then we walked around inside, where it was nice and air-conditioned and they had fried catfish.  I found a Pyrex Daisy bowl, some political pins and oh my goodness, two sets of clackers!!!  I've been looking for clackers everywhere.  I found 'em outside, in a box, just sitting there waiting for me.  The whole clacking thing came back to me immediately and I'm proud to say that I remain the reigning clacking queen!  Larry was quite impressed.  Kinda like he is when I recite the Preamble to the Constitution to him.  What can I say?  I am a child of the 70's and I loved me some Schoolhouse Rock.

Here are the three pins I got.  Michael Dukakis was the very first person I ever voted for, in 1988, when I was 21.  I was so proud.  Been votin' Democrat ever since.

Larry actually found a lot of stuff he liked today!  Patches and pins and helmets and peacoats.  He racked up!

Here are my Pyrex bowls and that sweet little pitcher. I already had the largest Daisy mixing bowl but not the one that's this size.  Larry said I was not leaving Scott's without a piece of Pyrex.  So I didn't.

And the best part about our day??

Atlanta has NO gnats.

Our latest finds!

Larry and I went back to Eastman to Browser's Flea Market last week and I found some really cool stuff!  We also met a sweet lady named Penny, who turned out to have a hippie heart like ours.  Hey, Penny!

Here's what I got!

 This girl is gorgeous!!  This picture doesn't do her justice.

A Hall pottery cookie jar without the lid.  Who needs a lid?  

It looks great holding our kitchen utensils!

 I fell in love with this little bud vase.  Wook at that cute little birdy!

 Two 1960's Loma Industries plastic chicken tumblers.  Squeeee!  Chickens!!

This is a sour cream glass!  I got it because I liked it but when I got home and researched it, I found out that these were sold with a pint of sour cream in them back in the 60's.  They are very cute.  And very collectible!  Uh oh.  :)

 1970's wall hanging that I just loved!! 

I added another baby planter to my collection, too!  

This one was too adorable to leave behind.

A ginger jar without a lid but we loved it.  

 

This little hippie girl had to come home with us!

I added Josef Originals Birthday Girl 7 and 8 to my collection of those. 

They had a set of nine for $22 so if anybody else wants to collect them, too, 

I have 1 through 6 and another 9 that I'll sell ya!   

My lady heads

I've stumbled up on a new obsession.  Vintage ceramic lady heads.  I saw a few at estate sales this year and I passed them up, always on the hunt for Pyrex.  I could kick myself square in the butt for that.  If I could get my foot up that high. 

I found a beautiful yellow one, they call her the French Thinker and she's from the 1940's, at the antique mall that Larry and I discovered shortly before Christmas.  She was marked $25 the first time we were there and I wouldn't pay that.  We went back last week and she was marked down to FIVE DOLLARS.  Now I will pay that!  I just love her sweet face.


 

My friend, Lynn, has a thrift store back home and she posted a picture on the store's Facebook page of a gorgeous one she had there and I got my mama to go pick it up for me.  Of course, Mama wouldn't let me pay her for it and she gave it to me for Christmas instead.  That mama of mine...   Some of the heads are planters, like this one, and some are just ceramic heads.  Lynn and I both tried to find out something about her but she remains a mystery.

 So now I have the two.  New year, new collection!  :)

On the hunt

Lately, I've developed an obsession with vintage Pyrex.  It all started with an innocent little Amish Butterprint that I got from Maw's house shortly after she passed away in 2011.  I got her cornbread pan, a Corning Country Festival Bluebird casserole dish and that sweet little Pyrex dish.  Since then I've been collecting pieces here and there.  I also lovelovelove FireKing coffee cups, too, and we've got seven of them now.  Lucky for me, The Big Peach in Byron is FULL of Pyrex, Corning and FireKing.

Larry and I went today for an early birthday trip and I loaded up!  I've been able to find two more pieces to match Maw's Bluebirds there!  I got the second one today and I was so excited to find it!

Larry also got me a rack for the kitchen to store them all on and I just love how they look there!  (Pay no attention to the green stuff in the small avocado green bowl, I made Larry some lime Jello in it and just sat it there for the picture!  Ha!)

I just adore this stuff!  Nothing on the market out there today even comes close to the quality.  You can take 'em straight from oven to table to refrigerator.  And they're so pretty, too!

I also got some vintage Tupperware today, too.  I absolutely detest plastic containers but I understand that for lunches and for the sake of being portable, you just about can't get away from them.  But I just don't want us to eat food microwaved in them so I thought why not get some old Tupperware to use instead?  Old Tupperware made in the 60's and 70's that didn't have all those chemicals in them?  I got several "leftover" style bowls, sandwich containers and serving bowls with lids.  Some were just $2 each!  

So there it is!  My growing little Pyrex collection.  I think I'm gonna need another rack.  :)

One man's junk...

Larry and I went yard saling yesterday!  We were on a mission with a list and maps and times and everything!  We left about 7:30 and finished up around 5:00, going to thirteen yard sales and one estate sale, where I teared up more than once.  Beautiful two-story, five bedroom house sitting on eleven acres with a huge workshop and several outbuildings.  Even had an RV parked under a carport.  Walking through that house made me cry, especially the kitchen, where I was looking for a pound cake pan.  This was somebody's house, somebody's life, and it was just so sad to me that their kids had to sell everything, including the house and RV, just to "settle the estate".  It seemed so cold to me, so not right, yet I know it has to be done at some point when they both are gone.  Rowley was their name and she was a labor and delivery nurse.  Mrs. Rowley, I will take good care of your muffin pan and those pretty little bowls I took from your kitchen.

We found one sale that had vintage sheets and pillowcases (my favorite!) and one sale that had this gorgeous afghan draped over a big screen TV with a $3 price tag on it!  Why hadn't somebody snatched this thing up already, I asked.  I sure did!!  And then I got some back story.  This afghan (that is big enough to fit the top of our queen-sized bed!) was made by a lady during her last few months of life.  She made this when she was dying.  Another tearjerker.  WHY wouldn't somebody in her family WANT IT??  Larry and I absolutely love it and it has a good home now.

One lady had potted begonias at her sale!  She was going on vacation and didn't want her little plants to die so she put them in her sale.  And I adopted one!  In a heart-shaped flower pot.

Here is one of the three pretty flower pots I found at another sale.

When I was a little girl, I had a tea set almost exactly like this one!  Mine had a kitty on it and I have one surviving piece, the sugar bowl.  I was so happy to find this set!

And how cool is this fish planter?

Larry got a Black and Decker 10-inch miter saw that brand new would have cost over a hundred dollars for $10.  The guy wanted $22.  He got a US Navy wool blanket and another pin for his hat.  And he got an ab lounger for $5!  

We hit one entire neighborhood that was having yard sales and we walked house to house.  That was so much fun!  And I found the most awesome thing at one of those sales!  Inside a freebie box (!), was a pink (!!) Robins Air Force Base 561st Maintenance Squadron t-shirt.  561st!  That's me!!  I couldn't believe it.  I'll be wearing it to work tomorrow.  :)

We got lots of really great stuff.  Everything we got we loved and will use.  Stuff that was discarded, unwanted and unloved by somebody else.  Another person's treasure, right?

Vintage lovelies!

There was just SO much to see at that little junk store Larry and I found on our way to the beach Saturday.  An absolute treasure trove.  Or Sanford and Son, however you want to look at it.  :)

Larry found some really cool patches and pins and I was all about the dishes!  I had just told him before we left not to let me buy any dishes on this trip because we have a cabinet slap full and we are running out of room.  He was no help whatsoever and actually encouraged the madness by picking out two plates himself.  I found an old green Pyrex mixing bowl and a FireKing casserole dish here along with the cutest little smiley face glass and then at Fish Art on Tybee Island, we found some plates (for 25 cents each!).  

The one I was most proud of was the Golden Meadow dinner plate by Sheffield that dates back to the 60's.  I was proud because Mama had some of these when I was a kid and when I saw it, I was immediately taken back to suppers at that little metal dinner table we had.

I just love it!  And I love that it was 25 cents and that Larry spotted it first, having no clue that I grew up eating off plates just like it.

I wasn't wrong when I called it nearly 26 years ago.  He is THE ONE.  :)