Second Hand Store Finds

I may be addicted to deals which would include shopping at thrift, second hand, and consignment stores. We may have gone to a few Goodwills on our honeymoon for instance. My regular list of places I treasure hunt at include Value Village, Goodwill, Half Price Books, Forget-Me-Not Consignment, and Treetop Consignment.

I hope to blog about some of my finds. Today I am featuring wall hangings from the kid's room. Admittedly, I am not much of an interior designer. My childhood room by design had the iconic picture of Seinfeld's Kramer on teal green walls with metallic foil vintage butterflies flying out of it.

One thing I love about thrifting is you often find out of print materials. I am in love with maps and will buy about any book that has interesting maps in them. At the Bellevue Goodwill, I found this over sized (3' by 2') cardboard Atlas of all the countries of the world called, It's a Big Big World Atlas. It goes for $42 new on Amazon or $12 used and I snagged it for 99 cents in the kid's book section. It is easy to hang and flip on a daily basis. I like to keep it on the map of area we praying for from the Operation World book that day. April has been focused on regions of China, so Asia has been the focus lately.

We are doing some rearranging in preparation for baby boy Houtz. We got a twin bed for Zoraida to free up the crib. Coincidentally, Zoraida climbed out of her crib for the first time on Sunday announcing when we opened the rattling door "I got out!". She now is now able to reach my alphabet prints from Graeme Base's book Animalia, another reason to have cheap art in a kid's room! I found an extra copy of this book at Value Village for 69 cents. Not only are their children's books super cheap, they are buy 4 get 1 free. I cut the pages out and mounted them on free foam core I recycled (took out of the trash) from the architecture firm downstairs.

Black and white are the only colors babies can focus on for about the first 2 months. I read about these Wee Gallery Flash Cards for babies in a recent baby magazine. They retail for $13, so I was surprised to find them on clearance at Half Price Books for $1. I doubt if I will ever be using them as flash cards for a 2 month old, but they make a great temporary gallery installment.

Click on any of the pictures for a closer view and happy hunting!