Our Hopeful Home: Thrill of the Hunt #28

Hello friends! Can you say pop-up estate sale? It's that time again - time for thrill of the hunt. And I have to say that I am very excited about my recent thrifty purchases and absolutely can not wait to share them with you!

There's a local mom and pop store that went out of business a few years ago. Since then, no one has moved into the shop. That is, no one except the lady that uses the space for pop-up estate sales 2-3 times a year! To say that I love her would probably be an understatement. I found out about the most recent one by happenstance, and was thrilled to be able to be there at 9:00 a.m. on opening day.

The first thing that caught my eye was this lovely china tea cup and saucer.

It cost me all of 50 cents.

Years ago I collected tea cups, and I just couldn't resist this one.

All my tea cups are in the pink family, so this is my first tea cup,

ever, with a blue pattern on it.

The bottom was unmarked.. The price tag said "Germany?" on it, so who knows? I absolutely loved the detail on the bottom of the cup as evidenced by this photo.

The next lovely find was another china tea cup. Cost: $1.50.

The mark on the bottom said Fine Bone Roslyn China Made in England.

Here I've placed the display on some lovely floral fabric that I thought complimented the tea cup beautifully.

The fabric is actually a pillow case from Salvation Army! I got two for $2.00.

I'm not sure if it was the floral pattern or the ruffle that got me.

Either way, as soon as I saw them, I knew I had to have them.

For some reason I've been drawn to florals more these days. I used to love shabby chic floral prints on everything, but over the years my tastes have changed. Now I'm getting books out of the library by Cath Kidston (floral fabric designer extraordinaire) and Rachel Ashwell of Shabby Chic fame, taking me back to my early days of flea market fabric finds.

I can see these as some sort of skirt, probably around my teen daughter's salvaged 1950's

vanity table that I revamped with white paint a few years ago.

Here's the vintage vanity table, although it's hiding behind a fluffy pouf in this picture. I believe these tables were meant to have a skirt around them, so I thought the feminine, floral pillow cases would make the perfect skirt.

The fabric was also a great backdrop for my next thrill of the hunt find. This porcelain bowl was sitting right next to the tea cups for $3.00. It's not a large bowl by any means, just 9 inches long and it's quite shallow. But something about the pattern spoke to me.

While the pattern is called Garden Bouquet by Johnson Bros. England, it reminded me of Portmeirion botanical print china.

Can you see the resemblance in the patterns? I've always loved Portmeiron.

I found it selling on eBay for a Buy It Now price of $24.99. She's definitely a keeper.

And here are two things I love. Vintage books and vintage wooden foldable carpenter yardsticks. I got the book at Salvation Army for under one dollar. The yardstick is from the estate sale for a couple bucks.

I loved the color of the book, copyrighted 1948. It's actually a neat story written by one of the first women sea voyagers to the North Pole region, Miriam MacMillan. It's entitled, "Green Seas and White Ice."