Overdue thrift haul share

As I mentioned in my last post, I'm not sure where I should be sharing my thrift shares. Nevertheless, it's been 1 million years since I last shared my thrift; here are some things for which to look at.

Two little sewing boxes in contrasting colors and in great shape! F yeah, they're for sale on Etsy. I'm not sure why I chose to start this blog post with thread caddies, when I've got big stuff to show and exciting thrift news.

In the last few months, I've finally made it to the Goodwill outlet store a few cities over. That's my exciting thrift news, btw. This is where I found this.

This old suitcase is awesome, but you sure as hell wouldn't know because the damn thing refuses to be photogenic.

It's really retro looking and has a great old timey logo. Listed.
The outlet is a place where you dig through large, messy bins and buy by the pound. So you end up tossing stuff into your cart, like "this doesn't even weigh a pound, it practically costs nothing!" I can't wait to go back.

I found a nice pair of interlocking shelves. By that I mean I found two squares that fit together to create that one shelf in the picture. For some reason, I've had a problem with people being confused when I sell pairs of things. It's one awesome wall shelf!

I grabbed five old, wooden clothes hangers with old clothing company names on them. Here, look closer if so desired.

I brought home those huge wire bins...I don't know what they were once used for and I can't say for sure that they're useful now. Here's one all staged up:

Crates that are essentially metal frames...put your stuff in them! I just marked them down...
Some of my other recent finds, not necessarily salvaged from the outlets include:

This awesome breadbox! It kicks ass so much because I covered the rusty roll top thing with faux bois contact paper. Check it out, there's a story and a "before" pic.

I picked up this lovely lamp which was apparently made by some fancy lighting company. I still can't move it. I have this green number and many other lamps piled up. That's lame, I used to sell lamps all the time.
One more thing, because I'm hungry and want to stop blogging now.

 

This lovely set of Kromex canisters...lovely set of three. What don't you see? Here's a hint:

Where's the coffee?! Nothing grinds my gears like a set with one missing piece. Did the donating party decide they should keep coffee? Did some jerk only buy coffee, leaving this set incomplete?!
Here's my set of three, if anyone is sitting there with a lone coffee canister and needs the rest.



Plenty more stuff to show. My finds are bountiful. Next week, I do an office supply theme.

This used to be my playground

Settle in, folks. I've got a whole ramble to do before eventually getting to the dress.
It starts back in 1998. I'm just messin' with you, I won't go back that far. A couple weeks ago, I received word that WAW, the small, low budget wrestling promotion I once considered my pride and joy would be disbanded. The shows took place in a local gym which we rented out on Saturdays. The gym owner was in financial trouble and would most likely be losing her building, leaving WAW homeless.

"artistic" photo of the ring apron

There are times in recent years where I cursed vengeance upon those in this group. I dreamed about riding into the gym on horseback, and slaying the current regime placing their heads on each ring post to take back my throne. (I have an active imagination and I'm obsessed with Game of Thrones.) But, news of WAW's demise was not good news for me.

another artsy-ass pic which shows me in WAW's corner

In the week that followed, the most beautiful thing happened. My former WAWers, past and current members took to social media to share our love and memories and shit. Using the tags #wawmemories, and #farewelltothedojo or #savethedojo, we shared our highlights and stories from olden days. We changed our Facebook profile pictures to photos of ourselves in costumes or in the ring.
It was announced that there would be a show on the upcoming Saturday, possibly the last. Of course I would attend.
Here's where I talk about my outfit. For most of my career in WAW I played Ms. Moody Starr, company president. My look was usually a cross business lady and dominatrix. I thought I should give a nod to my executive era with something a little like that.
Here's the dress;

I feel like I'm doing this wrong. That dress already looks pretty decent and my bewbs are on full display and that wasn't intentional. I just put this on over my pants to grab the quick "before" picture. It's a pinstriped thing I got for $5 at Savers. It's by Ann Taylor. I'm not sure if that's a fancy name or not.
This isn't a refashion. My end result is basically the same dress with a bunch of accessories. I did some altering.

I took it in from the back. That's what it looked like pinned before I sewed. This made the low cut top fit a little strange. So, I made it lower because I planned on layering.

I just folded down a little of the material on each side in the front like that. It worked. My next step was choosing all the cool crap to go with it. I still have all my costumes in one of those hated plastic bins.
It was decided that I would act as the manager to two of my former clients, one of them being a former boyfriend. We had worked together in 2008-2009 and had a successful "stable" (group of wrestlers banding together like a team, ex.WWE's Degeneration X) called "The Dynasty." Our colors were for the most part black and silver, sometimes gold.

On the left, a sparkly silver gown for a special event; on the right a publicity shot from the Dynasty era. Not shown are my metallic silver leggings that I used to wear under short dresses. Sadly, they had lost a lot of their shine. I wore those, my patent high heel boots, my silver sequin bra, a silver accented belt, and a faux fur boa thing. A bit of an overkill? Too much?

Yes

It looks a little over the top, which is good for wrestling shows, I think.

The necklace is just a black chain with one of those big pins attached. No need to be flashy. Bring on the narcissistic photo shoot!

The leggings used to fit better.

I will probably come back to this, but to wrap it up, the show went well, JOHN showed up and performed, and there might be more life in WAW. 

Where is everyone?

 ...and where am I, this post is all over the place. Proceed.
I'm aware that it's been awhile since my last post, but you know, better late than never. It seems like some of the personal blogs I visit have been abandoned lately, and I find it worrisome. For instance, a living space which was a popular thrift/craft/decorating blog suddenly came to a halt in September with no notice/goodbye post. Another favorite blog, Sir Thrift A Lot has not been active since February 2. What happened? Are these bloggers ok? What made them up and abandon their blogs?!
My reasons for concern are actually a little more selfish. Sir Thrift A Lot used to post at least once a week, and always did a "thrift share" post, where other bloggers could share links showing off our weekly thrift scores. I needed those to get traffic to my blog as well as to my etsy shop.

 click here for clown lamps!

So, let's begin with the excuses. I read on another favorite thrift blog that there's no excuse for neglecting your blog. I'm gonna have to disagree. Life; it's unpredictable. My priority has to be the things that help me pay the bills, so attending my day job and working on that aforementioned etsy shop have to come first. Next, I have to take care of myself; accessing/consuming food, proper sleep, and occasionally seeing other people are important.
Also surprises happen. I did another WAW show, possibly the last. Stories to follow.
 Sadly, working on Craft, Thrift, or Die often takes a backseat. Lame. So, here is a list of what I hope to do on the blog when time allows:
-Finish my Falcon story.
-Write about last week's show, and maybe begin "My WAW Story).
-A tutorial and some narrative on my "minimalist collages."
-A massive thrift share post to show off my many recent scores (and links to their etsy listings. I'm a sales lady.)
I am way behind. Hey, did you see those clown lamps up there? Aren't they awesome and/or terrifying? That pair is one of my favorite recent scores, bought at Goodwill. I'm asking a fortune for them, because they are seriously rare (well, I can't find any proof of them existing anywhere else on the Internet) and because they're freakin' awesome! Items priced according to awesomeness.
While I'm here, how about a quick refashion?

The way I do refashions and the way I list items for sale is like a triage: I remake the easiest and most likely to wear clothing first, leaving other garments in a pile. I list the items expected to sell quickly, or make the most money before other items that regardless of what has been acquired first.
This dress had a lot going for it. Obviously not in that condition, but check out these stats: beautiful blue/teal color, thick material for the cold we had last month, $0.75, and an easy to use fabric for a simple idea that I had. I wanted to make a tunic-like sweatshirt.

It was a big medium with a long bodice as usual. Don't care; I only wanted the lower half. Here's what I did:

Seam ripper? NOPE. That material was thick and made well. It would've taken me years to rip seams. Slice with scissors!

Then I did that. (Ignore the color variations, I do a lot of this at night and end up having to edit the shit out of my pics to make them work.) I laid the skirt part out flat and traced a slouchy top on it. Don't forget to cut out sleeve holes.
See those things on the shoulders? Those are the dress's pockets. I just went ahead with my project, hoping they wouldn't be an issue.

They tore right off, barely needed the seam ripper. Look at all the dust in the depths of those pockets.

The dress's original hem is the bottom. Hopefully you can see the those little black lines I added which indicate where to sew. Around the sides and across the top, leaving a neck hole. I wanted to go with a high neckline that was also wide.
I had to play around with it a little, but this project was pretty much easy. Here it is:

 

It works. The big sleeves don't work as well with this sweatshirt-y material as they do on lightweight stuff like the shirt I traced. 

I love those jeggings. I see that they're not doing my thighs any favors. In conclusion, I will do this style again, but with a lighter material. Still gonna wear those thigh enhancing jeggings, too.