That's What She Said #1: I Like Taking Pictures

Welcome to the inaugural post (well, half of it, anyway) of a new joint series by The Snug Bungalow and myself! For those of you who don't know/haven't read my blog/have memories as bad as mine, @thesnugbungalow (otherwise known as Sarah) has been my partner-in-crime for many years (*cough cough decades*) and can be blamed for many of my activities. Sarah decided we were going to write a joint book together in high school featuring the two of us as fantasy characters (no, you can't read it). I'm reasonably sure our college-years lip-synched music videos were her fault (although the website with Windows 95 themes*  dedicated to things we were obsessed with was totally me). She talked me into starting this blog. I didn't need any encouragement to be obsessed with dresses, but she talked me into turning that obsession into an Etsy store. She made me venture past thrift stores into estate sales.

We do a lot of estate sales/church sales/neighborhood sales together in the summers. And while I'm looking for vintage dresses, she's looking for... well, everything else. We have decided to share our treasure hunting adventures with you this summer, and you're going to get to read about each joint adventure from both of our somewhat unique perspectives. Anytime you see a post titled "That's What She Said: (fill in the blank)", please be sure to check for the partner post at her blog!

My school year doesn't end until this Friday, but as there were some great sales in the area, I decided to join Sarah this last weekend. We started out at a church sale that she went to last year without me.

I hear that line was even longer last year! It was actually in motion by the time I got my camera out and ready, so some people were already inside. I feel like it's a good sign when people are lined up, and it turned out to be true!

I followed the arrow to "Adult Clothes", and Sarah obviously followed the one that said "Everything Else".

I had to walk through another room full of clothes/purses to get to the room in that obviously housed the dresses, so the volume was promising, and it didn't disappoint! Right away I found a dress by a designer you might have heard of:

Just a Lilly Pulitzer strapless. NBD.

I will henceforth be referring to this dress as "my new favorite dress of my ENTIRE LIFE". Those chevron rainbows are BRIGHT. It's vintage, it seems unworn, and it's MINE.

My bag was stuffed to the brim just from the dresses rack!

I always have to hit the dresses first (because, as you might have read in past blogs, I win at dresses), and then I can take a more leisurely approach to everything else. I joined Sarah in the "everything else" room and followed her around, snapping pictures as I went. For instance, of this:

That is one scary doll. And then there was this:

I just really liked the spelling of "fishey". And then it was really necessary to get pictures of all the enthusiasm:

This little owl is apparently on her most-wanted list. Apparently there was a honeycomb of this same guy she found. I have to admit, he's pretty cute, but I can not keep track of all of the honeycomb that she has found. And I don't understand how she locates it. I mean, it's usually all flattened out. How does she recognize it? Dresses are so much easier to locate.

I found these beauties. They were neon and summery. We're not quite sure how the elephants are to be used (maybe they perch on the edge of the glass? but then I think they're upside down?) but obviously they needed to come home with us.

We left and decided to go to a nearby estate sale before leaving the area. Here in Rochester, last summer was hot and dry and we had a drought. Apparently we saved up all of last summer's rain and added it to this year's supply, so this is what their lawn looked like:

That's not a pond. That's their yard. And we've had a few torrential storms since then so I don't imagine that's gotten any smaller.

We didn't buy anything at this sale, but we did find some interesting items, from the baffling (this was actually for sale):

...to the historically interesting....

...to historically traumatic...

...to terrifying (why does that keep reminding me of my 1st grade picture?)...

(I mean, amirite?)

1st Grade Me is Not Impressed

...to the item I didn't want my husband to know about because we don't need ANY MORE COOKING SUPPLIES (although I sure do like his cooking)....

....to nostalgic (and I have the human adult version of that Peaches 'n Cream Barbie dress in my shop right now)...

...to the regional name brand. Apparently Kodak made everything once upon a time.

For our last stop of the day, we went to a sale for an Animal Rescue. While Sarah was looking at some stand thing for her mom, I was looking at this adorableness:

I love Animal Rescues! #rescuedismyfavoritebreed

We had struck out with jewelry so far that day, but this sale was determined to make up for it!

I made out like a bandit, as you can see. Some great stuff for me and some great stuff for my Etsy shop (including those yellow/green/orange beads, which are actually a vintage pop bead necklace and earrings!):

What I did not take home with me was this guy and his totally boss shirt:

They also had more Kodak memorabilia:

We closed out our day with lunch and a quick photo shoot of my totally awesome outfit.

If you've read my blog or followed me on Instagram, you might have heard how I feel about 70s dresses. LOVE. Expect to see more of these!

Not a bad haul for my pre-summer-break sale day!

We discovered something about our unique treasure-hunting styles through our first joint-blog adventure. I think we already knew this, but it really made it clear. I like to take pictures. I like to have my phone in my hand, ready to document, ready to look something up. I will knock you down if you're between me and the dresses (which no one usually is, but watch out if you are because I WIN AT DRESSES) but otherwise I can relax. Take pictures. Google the fun/weird/awesome stuff that's for sale. Watch the spectacle.

Unlike someone else I know, who has stress dreams leading up to sale days. Who is obsessed with bracelets but can't wear them to go saling because they "get in the way of grabbing stuff". Taking pictures is really going to slow that someone down. So I think you're going to see a series written by a cut-throat treasure hunter and her dress-loving paparazzi.

I can't wait.

Read Sarah's post here: That's What She Said #1: I'm Not Great At This


*That website still exists because I lost the login with which to take it down over a decade ago. And I'm not sure I want to.

Magic School Year: Every Day Vintage

I haven't been blogging much, for months on end. There's a really good reason why, and it's these people:

It's been a good year, and as I think you can see, my job is truly a labor of love. I love these kids. I love hearing them sing, watching them dance, making them work hard, laughing with them, and seeing them grow into people I am proud to call friends. I am really, really lucky in my choice of vocation.

It does have a side-effect of leaving me with no time or gumption to blog. It does, fortunately, leave me the time for the occasional thrift store run, the ability to go to estate sales over vacations, and plenty of time to start upgrading my wardrobe.

My original dress collection (which you can read about here) started in college and was really for costuming, playing dress-up, and just to have and think about how pretty they were. It was really never something I thought about doing out in the real world, as, well, clothes.  As I started to turn my hobby into a business, and started following more fellow vintage-lovers on Instagram, it seemed like more and more of a normal idea. I started off easy, with this Spenser Jeremy silk sarong-style 80s dress that I wore during a weekend in the Thousand Islands: 

I felt so summery and magical that it was obviously (see my blog/Instagram/Etsy shop name) a great experience. I decided to break out the big guns and wear this to my husband's cousin's wedding a few weeks later:

Ah, yes. Perfection. If you took a moment to read my original Dress Collection blog, you might recognize it. This was part of my Neponset-years thrifting!

As school began, I repeated the Spenser Jeremy dress. Then it was homecoming and we had a "retro" day. Most people took this as an opportunity to dress as a hippie or wear leg warmers and headbands (apparently that's what we wore all the time in the 80s), but I took it as an invitation to wear this:

Oh yes, that's a petticoat peeking out underneath. I wore the whole shebang to school and it was a hit. So I got even more adventurous, and on a day that wasn't a costume day at all, I wore this 60s number:

It even has pockets!! I felt so fabulous. Before it got too cold, I broke out this 60s dress in a very different style:

Over the winter, I mostly wore modern sweater dresses, but I found this gorgeous 50s dress while wearing a vintage plaid skirt (my new favorite skirts ever). 

Sometimes I didn't wear entirely vintage outfits, but just blinged up a modern dress with a gorgeous vintage necklace:

And sometimes I added a vintage slip with the vintage jewelry:

I started discovering my love of 70s dresses (why had I never realized how great they are??) and wore this sheer floral print dress to a wine dinner at a local restaurant:

As spring approached, I started wearing more and more of the dresses I'd collected over the winter, and started realizing I needed to post these on my Instagram. Which meant trying to figure out how to take decent pictures without the use of my jewelry mirror....

Which I did with obviously varying levels of success. I think I'm getting better at it. I'm a musician, not a photographer. Obviously. Sometimes I gave up and just went right back to the mirror, though:

This one's one of my favorites. And not just because it has pockets. But mostly because it has pockets.

Learning to integrate vintage into my daily wardrobe was a challenge, but a worthwhile one, and I imagine it's only going to snowball from here. I have some great 70s sundresses just waiting to get worn this summer! If you're interested in seeing some of them, be sure to follow me at @magicsummervintage on Instagram!

My magic summer starts in exactly one week, so more blog posts will be sure to follow, including a special treat with my friend at The Snug Bungalow! Stay tuned!

And don't forget to check out my Etsy shop, which is 30% off with coupon code SUMMER17 until 6/23/17!