Decorating the walls

In our old house, before we made all the improvements prior to selling, we had lots and lots of oversized thrift-store prints on the walls.

While they were chosen because we like old-fashioned rural-themed prints, their real purpose was to hide the 11-foot-high walls, which were very ugly. That's why we had nothing short of a gallery of oversized prints.

Naturally all these prints were packed up and put in storage during the two years it took us to fix up the house, sell it, and move to our new place.

A few weeks ago when we opened the box truck after emptying the storage units in our old town, the prints were among the first things to come out. What fun it was to see them again! Like seeing a bunch of old friends.

But we also knew we couldn't use them all. Our new home is much smaller, nor do we have 11-foot ceilings in the living room as in our old place. Bottom line, it was time to assess our prints and determine which ones to keep.

So we wiped them down to remove the dust, and spread  them all over the house to get an idea of which ones we wanted to keep.

For a little while, our place resembled an art gallery.

Complete with canine art critic.

Eventually we got everything sorted, and Don installed hooks on the walls for hanging. We each selected a print to hang over our respective desks...

...and other prints are scattered around.

Eventually (probably over the winter) we're going to remove the upper kitchen cabinets (since they're too high for me to reach anyway) and that will allow room for artwork on the kitchen walls. So we stacked some of the prints aside for this purpose.

Other prints will eventually get hung on the bedroom walls.

We have one large print that will get hung in the larger bathroom...

...and we put a smaller print in the smaller bathroom.

With the exception of a signed print by the wildlife artist Sir John Seerey-Lester that I bought long before Don and I even met (probably worth about $250)...

...not one of our wall hangings has any value whatever. We just like them.

It's the little things that make a house a home, y'know? Including pictures on the walls.

For the love of thrift stores

Younger Daughter has been sorting through some clothes recently, selecting some to give away. In one of those "one thing leads to another" conversations, we both agreed on the superior quality of thrift store clothing.

Oddly enough, despite its reputation, thift-store clothing is usually of higher quality than that found in new-clothing stores. Why? Because it's withstood the test of time. It's been through the wringer already, and is still tough enough to be sold as usable. With judicious selection for style and fashion, thrift-store clothing can last many years.

People donate clothes to thrift stores for a wide variety of reasons. They may have outgrown the garment, or it no longer suits their taste, or they're just discarding older clothes to make room in their closet. But the one thing you seldom see in thrift stores are clothes that are worn, torn, or stained beyond redemption.

That's because thrift store employees are smart. They weed out the garments too battered to resell. As a result, the clothes displayed on the racks, while perhaps not up in the latest fashion, are not worn out.

Of course, this assumes you're not bitten by the "fast fashion" bug, wherein you must always wear the latest style. (That is SO not me.) Besides, "vintage" clothing is now fashionable, right?

But thrift stores supply so much more than clothes, of course. I remember one time I was in need of laundry baskets. (I prefer the wicker ones.) I kept my eyes peeled and, sure enough, hit the jackpot a few weeks later with a bunch of wicker laundry baskets in excellent condition for pennies on the dollar.

(This photo, for example, was taken from a website selling the basket -- new -- for $59.99. Ouch.)

Aside from such benefits as cheap prices and minimal packaging, thrift stores provide variety. So much of what we use every day, everything from laptop cases to pots and pans to couch throw pillows to canning jars to books, come from thrift stores (or other thrifty options such as yard sales). In fact, true story, I believe the only new furniture we have in our home is our couch/loveseat set we bought in 2004. Everything else came second-hand or was built by Don.

Older Daughter, now working as a live-in nanny in upscale suburban New Jersey, has discovered green living. Having grown up in a "green" home where we "disposed of disposables" years ago, where we compost and recycle and re-purpose and shop in thrift stores, at first she relished the novelty of new stuff. While she is diligently saving an enormous portion of her paycheck, she splashed out and had some fun with her income, buying clothes and books and things she enjoyed. This is perfectly normal and understandable. When you're raised on a tight budget and then suddenly earn enough money to play, you go a little crazy.

But now the novelty is fading, and Older Daughter is looking around at the wasteful habits of the suburban neighborhood around her and becoming appalled. She's learning that green living (without the requisite militant green attitude, of course) is frugal, thrifty, and sensible. She's exploring a zero-waste lifestyle. It's kind of fun to watch her grow in this area.

Raising kids with a thrift-store lifestyle has beneficial long-term repercussions when kids become adults. Essentially, Older Daughter is returning to her green roots, though she's limited in what she can do in an urban environment (i.e. garden, raise livestock, etc. -- even composting is not permitted in her suburb) or with a family addicted to prepackaged snacks and meals. While she may not be able to influence the wasteful habits of her live-in family, she can at least adjust her own actions.

So her legacy of bulk buying, scratch cooking, and of course thrift stores will serve Older Daughter well in her adult life.

Yep, thank God for thrift stores -- the truly "green" way to purchase household necessities.

Dig down and find those shopping genes

As a Christmas bonus, Older Daughter's employers gave her a prepaid debit card in a generous amount to be spent on whatever she wants. (No, this isn't a photo of her actual card.)

Since she didn't have a package under the tree for her sister, Older Daughter decided to take Younger Daughter shopping after Christmas. I thought this was very sweet.

So one day, off went both girls with plans to paint the town red ("town" being Coeur d'Alene, an hour's drive away). They came back smiling, many hours later, having looped through Spokane as well.

I expected to see two young women staggering in laden with packages and bags. But no, they were virtually empty-handed.

"So where did you go?" I asked.

Older Daughter started ticking off stops on her fingers. "First, we went to All Things Irish."

(This is a favorite store to walk through, but it's fairly expensive so we never buy anything. The week before, Older Daughter and I had stepped inside and she'd tried on a darling but pricey capelet.)

"Did you buy the capelet?" I asked.

"No. It's pretty, but not that pretty -- for the price. But I bought a Christmas ornament on sale, and some tea."

After this, Older Daughter related, they poked through a number of favored thrift stores and Older Daughter purchased Younger Daughter a second-hand purse and some trendy "army" boots.

Then they drove into Spokane because Older Daughter wanted to treat Younger Daughter to a brand-new outfit from an establishment called Forever 21, which evidently has become one of Older Daughter's favorite clothing stores (apparently it specializes in stylish but inexpensive garments). Younger Daughter was outfitted in a brand-new blouse, skirt, and warm leggings. (We realized later this was one of a handful of new clothing Younger Daughter has ever worn, sock and underwear excluded. The other new outfits were also gifts from relatives.)

"And then where did you go?" I asked.

"Nowhere. We came home."

I gave a snort of laughter. "I definitely raised a couple of girls who aren’t into shopping."

"But I am, really," Older Daughter contradicted.

"But a lot of girls could have spent that entire debit card in, oh, ten minutes."

"Well, I’m into cheap shopping," Older Daughter amended.

And there you have it. Despite having a debit card with a generous amount of money burning a hole in her pocket, Older Daughter spent a total of about $50 on their grand day out.

This is what happens when you raise kids exclusively on thrift stores.

Ahem. They may also have inherited my shopping genes.

Sign of the times

The girls and I were in a thrift store a few weeks ago. As usual, I checked the glass aisles for any spare kerosene lamp chimneys. While doing so I spotted this bin, which stopped me in my tracks.

So now there's a market for used incandescent light bulbs. Hmmm, how much longer before there's a black market for them?

Confessions of a thriftaholic

Last week when I spoke to the English woman about the casting call for Blast Films, our discussion centered quite a bit on how so many rural people are generally thrifty, and how it helps to be immune from fashion if you're going to live in the country. I told her that we never, EVER recreationally shop. Ever. I also said that ALL of our clothing purchases, with the exception of sock and underwear, occur in thrift stores.

This concept seemed to boggle her. "Don't your daughters ever long for shopping experiences in new shops?" she asked. "Don't they ever want to buy a new pair of designer jeans?"

I laughed heartily at this concept. "My older daughter is our little fashionista," I told her. "She loves nice clothes. But we're so used to thrift store prices and the ability to buy anything we want for a fraction of the cost, that whenever we go into a retail store and look at their clothes, the kids come away with sticker shock."

You see, this woman was operating under the identical premise that so many people (especially women) have, to wit: shopping is fun.

Fortunately our girls got their shopping genes from me, and here's my take on the subject: I hate shopping.

I really do. I never long to waft through a mall, fingering garments, trying things on just for fun, blowing a wad of cash. I get bored just typing about it.

Have you ever read Confessions of a Shopoholic? It's a light-hearted amusing book, and it was successful enough that the author wrote a bunch of spin-offs (Shopoholic Takes Manhatten, Shopoholic Ties the Knot, etc.) One of the spinoffs was called Shopoholic and Sister, in which the main character (Becky) tries to forge a relationship with a newly-discovered half-sister named Jessica. The best bonding experience Becky can imagine is shopping together, so they go off for a day-long outing in stores. Trouble is, Jessica was raised to be thrifty and she finds shopping to be a total bore.

I enjoyed that book because I am Jessica.

Thankfully, so are my daughters. When I told Older Daughter about my conversation with this lady from London, about whether she ever longs for shopping experiences, Older Daughter had a good laugh. "I can blow a wad of cash at a thrift store and emerge with a mountain of clothes," she said, "versus a single pair of designer jeans bought new at a retail store."

Our favorite thrift store is Value Village, which has a wide selection of clothing, books, household items, kitchen items, etc. I estimate that 95% of our shopping is done at VV.

We were in Value Village this week, and Older Daughter found a skirt she particularly liked for $5. I'm guessing it would be in the realm of $50 or so in a retail establishment. As we paid for it, she exclaimed, "I just LOVE thrift stores!"

So no, I'd say she never longs for shopping experiences. (Except at thrift stores, of course.) We're at minimum an hour's drive from the nearest retail stores, so none of us can ever impulse-shop anyway.

Which, now that I think about it, may be one of the "keys" for people who live self-sufficient lives -- we're indifferent to fashion or other trendy issues and just prefer to live as frugally as possible, immune to the lures of advertising, cultural peer pressure, and trends.

Something to think about.

HR 4040 - Proof that it's Stupid

Some of you may remember my rant on HR 4040, the Consumer Product Safety "Improvement" Act, which would impose such absurd testing requirements on all children's products that hundreds of thousands of businesses would be forced to close.

In belated recognition that the whole idea is STUPID, the gommit exempted thrift and consignment stores. Now it looks like they're giving a year's reprieve for manufacturers and importers of children's products. While this does NOT mean businesses are off the hook, at least it gives a year's breathing room to figure out how to overthrow this STUPID law.

Don't let up the pressure, folks. Follow the suggestions at the end of my column and rattle a few cages.