Vintage Inspiration From the Thrift Store

Every other week, I have a little tradition of stopping in to visit my grandmother at her nursing home and then driving three blocks down the street to explore my favorite thrift store.  It's certainly nothing fancy - just a little hole in the wall - but I love hunting for treasure there.  Besides my bi-weekly trips, my sister and I visit there for her birthday, which is a few weeks before Valentine's Day.  We make a long afternoon of it - having lunch at a local tearoom and then spending an hour or two perusing the store.  Most of our time is spent stuffed in the little corner where they house craft supplies - we like to dig through the ribbons and lace and all manner of paper ephemera to add to our Valentine-making box.

Anyway, I thought I'd share the treasures I found this week and, perhaps, provide you with a little vintage inspiration:

* Vintage clown cupcake decorations.  I think they look so sweet, and they make me happy.  (I promised Eli that I won't use them on his birthday cupcakes - he hates clowns for some reason!  I'm thinking I might add them to my upcoming summer birthday cake.)
* A Cuban sugar sack that someone cut the front panel out of and hemmed as a large tea towel.  My plan is to use it as one of the large towels I use to drape over warm bread, muffins, and cakes as they cool down on my wire rack.
* An edition of Rainbow on the Road by Esther Forbes, copyright 1954.  It's the story of a peddler who traveled the roads of New England in the early 1900's to sell his wagonload of portraits, all finished except for the faces.  The novel is described on the dust jacket as picturesque and nostaglic - right up my alley!
* A little vintage cream-colored watering can with a flower on the side to replace the boring, empty dish detergent bottle that I currently use to water my house plants.
* A bag of popsicle molds with handles that have the images of little animals cut into them.  I decided to make my own popsicles this summer with 100% juice instead of buying them.  A little less high fructose corn syrup in our diet is a good thing.
* And my best buy - a vintage Westinghouse electric roasting pan for only $9.50.  There just happened to be a half-price sale on small appliances - yippee!  I actually already own one - it used to be my mother-in-law's, but I wanted another one for when I  make applesauce in the fall.  That price is a steal - the new ones are expensive and don't work half as well as their vintage ancestors.

Definitely a successful week at the thrift store . . .