Thrift and Yard Sale Finds

On July 31st, I found some great deals when my sister and I went to Grass Valley to visit a friend, and managed to hit some of the thrift shops on their half-price day! We hit an estate sale before we left town, and I found these:And a couple of the items in this picture:
This Ransburg set is, of course, missing the grease jar lid, but I was still tickled to find it!
And these orange juice glasses were half price:

I found some pretty great stuff that day. We also were so happy to just barely make it into Clocksmith Antiques right before they closed, and we got to meet Karla and Kristi from Polka Dot Rose! They even gave us sweet little gift bags - how nice was that? They are the very first fellow bloggers I have met, and we were all very happy to have had the opportunity to say hello! It was such a pleasure, ladies!

Summer Fun - Hair "Care"

From 1968 - products to lighten your hair in the sun, from Summer Blonde:
to Midnight Sun:

But this is the one that my sister and I used - I used it for YEARS:
And then, you could always clean your hair with Psssssst, the Instant Shampoo. I will never forget their little jingle in the commercials: "Clairol freshens your hair instantly- with Psssssst!"
Mini-Mist? Don't remember that one! Sorry - they must not have made a memorable commercial!

They did have an awfully cute blonde in their ad, though. Love her hair and the sunglasses.

My "I Love Lucy" Books

I realized the other day that I guess I also have a "collection" of books about "I Love Lucy"! I bought this one in 1976:

The others below were found more recently. I just thought I would share them with you:

Some of them were gifts,
And some were thrift store finds.
So, that's a little collection, right?
I am absolutely one of the MANY fans who can honestly say "I Love Lucy"!

Then And Now #44 Paper Mate Pens

"Then" is 1968: Check out this ad for PaperMate's Ops'n Pops pens - great graphics and colors! I'd love to have them today. And I just plain love the look of the advertisement, too:
And "Now" - I just picked these up at the supermarket. The colors and patterns caught my eye - and I wanted them. (I know - isn't that what impulse buying is all about?) After all, they WERE designed to appeal to us - and they appealed to me! I'd rather use a pretty pen than a plain pen any day.
When I saw that 1968 advertisement in my Seventeen magazine, it occurred to me that this was a perfect example for one of my "Then and Now" posts. My new purchase is today's answer to the colorful and unique pens from back then. And the best part is that they are all different colors of ink. Thanks, Paper Mate - I like them very much!

The Haunted Mansion

The Haunted Mansion attraction opened at Disneyland 40 years ago today.
It's scarier at night!
Coincidentally, I just found this original LP jacket from the same year at a thrift store exactly one week ago:
Unfortunately, the album was missing (I knew that when I bought it - it was only a quarter) , but it did have the booklet intact inside with great pictures like this:
And this old guy:

Happy 40th birthday to the 999 happy haunts, the hitchhiking and grim grinning ghosts, and every "body" else! Just like everything at Disneyland, I love it!

What's Penny Wearing? #7

Today, Penny is modeling one of my favorite vintage dresses. It has black glass buttons, so I added my black glass bead necklace, a black belt and a vintage handbag to accessorize it.
I love the detailing on the sleeves!
It's a silky sort of a rayon or something, the kind of fabric that just feels good when you have it on, you know?

School Book Illustrations

Don't you just love the illustrations in vintage school books?
I do.
The kids all look so innocent and sweet.


Hey - Patsy - come on! Let's go for a walk and visit the library (or a book store!), and then after that we'll head over to that bakery!!

15th Anniversary

It's our anniversary today - and I decided to share with you this cute Hallmark card that was given to my mother-in-law (in the 60's or 70's, I think):


I love how her pink dresses go from plain, to polka dots, to paisley - perfect!
(If you click on them, you can read the writing.)
Cute, huh?

Vintage Bathing Suits

Well, at least I THINK this pretty pin-up has on a bathing suit! Anyway, she's cute and sexy and I wanted to include her.
From a 1936 Esquire magazine:
Betty Grable, 1940's:
A trio of Catalina suits from 1944:

Nice Catalina suit! From 1950:

This one is from a 1956 Holiday magazine. The text with the picture reads: "Waikiki Beach is the warm and suitable setting for this charming, strapless suit which derives it's bold, exciting pattern from Pacific islanders native tapa cloth designs. The accompanying beachcoat has become almost a necessity, due to longer hours spent on the beaches today" (I have written about tapa cloth before, in this post.)
And the text with this one (from the same magazine) reads: "On the startling semicircle of Copacabana beach, Rio de Janeiro, a blond Brazilian wears this fitted, elasticized suit in bold, colorful checks, accompanied by a useful matching beach stole - stylish combination for a stylish figure on a stylish beach."
The next two are from Seventeen magazine, circa 1968. That's Colleen Corby on the left- she's another one of the models that I always liked so much- and she was EVERYWHERE back in the 60's and 70's. Sorry I don't know the other model!
And Colleen on the left again here, with another Sorry-I-don't-know-her-name:

That's it for today!

Summer Fun - Refreshment

Summer fun isn't very MUCH fun without some ice cold refreshment, right? You could keep cool with a nice tall glass of "America's own discovery", iced tea:
Or, perhaps lemonade is more to your liking?
You can get some ice out of your old-fashioned trays:
Or maybe you would rather have a good old classic American soda pop - like a Coke?
Or a 7-Up?
Or - Come Alive! With a Pepsi!
Whichever - you choose.

Then And Now # 43 Spiral Notebooks

I'm a list-maker, note-taker, and record-keeper from way back. It's, well, just part of who I am, what I DO. I have used a LOT of notebooks over the years, and yes, you guessed it - I have kept them. But this first Spiral notebook, below wasn't mine. It was packed away with things that my mother-in-law had saved from when she was attending college at UC Berkeley in the 1930's. It certainly is the oldest one I have ever seen:
And this next one is mine. It is from either the late 60's or very early 70's, and I wrote down all kinds of things inside. A lot of it was about how I wanted my room to be. Even then, I was really into having beautiful surroundings, and in love with the idea of decorating, even though I didn't have the money to fulfill my dreams. This orange one is my absolute favorite. Why can't they still make them this pretty? Am I the only person who would buy them?
I also love this daisy one from the same time period:
The small notebooks at the top in the picture below were what I was using in the mid 70's to keep track of my work schedule, how many hours I worked and how much I made in tips each day. Also, little snippets about what I did that day - what movie my boyfriend took me to see, where my girlfriend and I went to lunch, stuff like that.
The two at the bottom (Mead's Fat Lil' Notebooks) are what I use now. I track my Weight Watchers points inside , what I eat each day - and, I'm proud to say, my ongoing weight loss! I have found these notebooks to extremely useful over the years.
I like 'em.

Vintage Decals

I love vintage decals. I've had these for a long time:And I just got these recently:
I love adding them to painted shelves or furniture. I need to find some more...

What's Penny Wearing? #6

Today, Penny is modeling an outfit that I wore to the California State Fair in August of 1982:


Cool and comfortable for a HOT summer day of fun at the fair.
"Get yourself a corn dog, and a lemonade!"