tropical barkcloth, oh my!

i've been M.I.A. the past few weeks due to a busy schedule and a nasty cold. i have been hopped up on pseudophed for days now and still feel super stuffy! today was flea market day but i skipped it due to two doctors appointments and i spent some time with mike's brother, nick. however i did go last week and the week before. as previously mentioned i have been trying hard to stay within a budget for vintage non-necessities. within the past few weeks i picked up what i thought was to be a piece of midcentury tropical barkcloth but actually turned out to be a curtain. it was a great surprise! i was going to re-sew it as the print is upside down when hanging but then realized it would shorten it's length. so for now i will keep this semi-annoying upside down curtain. i also picked up a (midcentury of course) telephone stand and an orange box label for the kitchen. when i'm not feeling so miserable i will get around to taking pictures. i also went to my friend courtney's house in santa clarita last week and had a fun girls night in while her boyfriend jay pin striped a few goodies for me. i had him pin stripe a wallet for aubry's birthday, my digital picture frame (which i had him do in pink and turquoise. in hind sight it was a good idea but it came out looking a little too native american from the 80s for my liking. whoops!) and my new toaster that mike bought. boy, you know you're old when you get excited about getting gifts like toasters! alas, it is the thought that counts, right?!

ventura county fairgrounds swap meet

r.g. canning, the folks who do the rose bowl flea market in pasadena put on a flea market every other month or so at the fairgrounds here in ventura on sundays. it's no surprise that living in southern california is ridiculously overpriced. often times with the cost of parking and admission ($15 or so per person) i find it a waste of my time and my money if i'm not set out to spend 100+ dollars and to be honest, the rose bowl flea market is usually much better. that of course then leads me to spend an additional $20 or so on gas as pasadena is about 80 miles away from here. it's a snow ball effect you see.

the good part about being an RN with a "normal" hospital job is only working 3 days a week, however the bad part is that unless i'm fixing to work every weekend, one of my work days usually lands on a wednesday. this is unfortunate for me because right here in ventura we have a FREE swap meet on wednesdays also at the fairgrounds. yes that's right, free parking and free admission! i was skeptical as usually a "swap meet" around here means 50,000 mexicans (before you get offended, i too am one of them!) cramming into the community college parking lot trying to buy and sell a bunch of ugly knock off disney princess blankets, ranchero belt buckles, and fruits... but i was wrong! it was fabulous. i had attempted to go the week before but i guess due to the rain it was canceled so last wednesday, the weather was perfect and i drug aubry out of the apartment to go have a looksee.

we got a late start as coaxing an eight year old out of bed early on her winter vacation was no easy feat but we struck vintage gold none the less. the swap meet had a lot of different things going on but to my surprise i had no problem finding 1000 things i wanted to buy. okay, that's really no surprise but my pocketbook was telling me otherwise. i kept myself on a strict $25 budget and here are some things that caught my eye:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

i of course am a sucker for anything mid-century and ended up taking that little sewing chair in the fourth photo home for $15. a lot of the things i saw there i didn't bother asking about pricing because they weren't things that quite fit into my tiny little tiki apartment but i sure wanted it all! look how cute those little clocks are! i'm guessing they're from about the 1940s? i always love researching the things i come across - you never know when you'll find a great score (like the kromex kitchen canister set i came across for $5 years ago) and to me that's one of the best parts about antiquing!