I'm a thrift shopper. My husband and I love the hunt, and we find great stuff regularly. Today I spent 25 cents on a bag of wood pieces to use in crafting, and got an oak frame out of the free box.
After dinner, we went "real" shopping... the kind where you walk into a retail store and purchase new items. My main mission was to purchase patterns for $1.99 at Hancock's fabrics, and look if anything else in the store shouted "buy me!" I have some baby patterns already, but none for the stretch cotton pants I want to make for my almost 6 month old granddaughter. I knew it would be easy to find a lovely pattern for the pants, and probably other things as well.
Not so. I really tried to find patterns I wanted to buy... but each one I saw was so ho hum, and I can draft a ho hum pattern by myself. I'm not a new crafter or sewer, and didn't need (or crave) anything else at Hancock's. All I spent in the store was some time.
A bit sulkily, I told my husband I did not want to go home... and maybe wanted to get some baby clothes at the mall. He suggested the Ellenton Outlet Mall, which has some great baby stores. We went in Baby Gap, Gymboree, Carter's, Oshkosh, The Children's Place, VF, and Hartstrings. I contemplated many items. Again, I bought nothing. I kept picturing all the great clothes I have found, from these same labels, for 50 cents, or a dollar, or $3 for a bagful, at the thrift stores I go to, quite a few of which I got "new with tags!"
The pants the baby needs? I'm going to make them, using fabric I already have, after drafting a pattern to fit her cloth diapered butt.
I did buy myself some underwear. Shoes and underwear are items I buy new.
Is this a symptom of overdosing on thrift shopping?
Maybe I don't want a cure.
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2 comments:
There's nothing wrong with thrift shopping! You sound like a ton of fun to go out with. Unfortunately we only have one thrift store around and it always seems to be closed! Yuck. Oh well, that's yet another thing to miss about being in a more highly populated area.... but certainly not enough to move back! I loved your post.
I find that I do this often as well. Ultimately we wind up saving a lot of money and it means that we are just as happy, and get to enjoy *more* because we choose not to pay high end prices. Rock on with the frugality. ;)
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