Thrift Shopping In Delaware: a house log
Simply as we did over Memorial Day, we used the long Labor Day weekend to squeeze in a few days at my parents’ beach house near Bethany Beach, Delaware. It was another trip full of family, food, and lively-slash-weird finds. And you know we enjoy a good vacation/what-we-saw/what-we-picked up post. And we in fact picked up two fairly big items that we have been trying to find for a while.
Our weekend adventure in fact began in Maryland. Specifically, here:
It is the Ole Sale Barn in Denton, MD. We have passed it countless times on our treks to the beach and have consistently been fascinated by it. The stars at last aligned on this trip (i.e. weather, holiday schedules, baby nap schedule) to allow us to make the stop… at which point we were immediately greeted by Beyoncé. If you do not understand the reference, you must read this (warning: there is profanity, but it might be the funniest thing on the interweb).
The oddities did not stop at the over-sized metal chicken (which, we should note, was no longer there on our return trip – meaning someone likely picked up the thing). Clara was weirdly fascinated by all of the lawn jockeys. Perhaps she was simply glad to be taller than them? Find Clara. It is like Where’s Waldo.
There were in fact some cool finds amongst the smorgasbord as well. We think these were patio table tops or some sort of grate cover, but we thought they could make truly cool (albeit heavy) wall art.
I was obsessed – wait, correction – OBSESSED with these white and gold sign letters. The guy was selling them for $20 each and they were even wired to light up. Had any of the letters meant anything to us I would’ve taken them home without hesitation (I later realized an upside down L could’ve looked like a 7 – which is our go-to number – major bummer). Oh, and the owner told me that they were meant for a Dollar Tree store but “never made it to their destination.” Not sure what that meant (did they “fall off a truck?”) but I figured it was best not to pry.
Inside the barn was a bit more chaotic, but there was still plenty to dig through. The only thing that truly caught our eyes (besides a giant metal Shrek and a carnival water pistol game) was this trio of overlapping mirrors. It looked less odd in person (we could picture it painted charcoal or soft gray) so the photo does not truly do it justice. Now we are simply mesmerized by the creepy plastic mermaid bust in the reflection. Totally did not see that when we snapped the pic. Perhaps she’s a Mer-ghost.
In the end, we left the Ole Sale Barn without anything but an X next to “stop at that lively looking barn place” on our mental travel checklist. And of course now I live with deep regret that I did not buy one of those big letter L’s and flip it upside down to make it a 7. Sad clown.
One place that has its fair share of Xs on that same must-stop-by checklist is Beach Plum Antiques, one of our go-to stops in Bethany. It is overflowing with cool, beach-y finds and we have mentioned it here and here among other places. Do not let the “antiques” part of the name fool you, it is a good old fashioned thrift store and we have snagged plenty o’ deals there.
They had some of your usual beachy-cool objects, like these nautical glass buoys…
… and some more unique discoveries, like this crazy cool ship’s throttle. If only the darned thing were not $395. That put a fairly swift “stop” to our daydream about where it could live in our house. After poking around a while we (kind of surprisingly) left Beach Plum Antiques without any purchases either.
Shopping was not the only way we got our home-y fix over the long weekend. On Sunday we took a swift detour to visit the nearby home of some of my parents’ friends, Pam and Neil (Pam was in fact one of my bosses at my high school library job). They were putting the finishing touches on an above-garage addition that not only brought in two bedrooms and a bath, but also a second story. See the peak on the left side of the house with the double window?That is all new as of simply a few months ago.
A new second story meant they needed a set of stairs, which Pam and Neil had custom designed for a cool open & industrial feel. Since they greet you as soon as you open the door, they hoped to make them as visually unobtrusive as possible so your eye still continues through the hallway and into the living room behind it (hence the light colors and the thin wire sides). It is hard to tell from the photos, but the light wood was quite softly gray-washed, which looked truly airy yet still warm because the wood tone and grain showed through.
To make way for the stairs they also had to bump out their front door about 3 feet (so the last step was not right on the door frame). The only problem was that they did not have sufficient extra floor tile sitting around to fill the new space (they only had about 12 squares). So they made lemonade and designed this mosaic inset constructed entirely of new tiles, meaning the few large leftover ones could be used around the border so the whole thing looked intentional (as opposed to screaming “we ran out of tile”). It looked so much like an intentional choice, that we complimented their “tile welcome mat” even before hearing the story about the material-shortage dilemma.
They had another smart use of tile in the new bathroom upstairs, where Pam could not find any small tiles that she liked for the shower floor. Since she had already fallen in love with the larger tiles used in the rest of the bathroom, she had her builder cut the large tiles into a bunch of smaller squares for the shower floor. Certainly a bit more work, but it certainly took the guess work out of “will this tile coordinate with that tile?” and looked truly strong (and not too over-done with distinct tiling choices everywhere). It definite had that straightforward beach-house feeling.
But the weekend was not all simply inspiration. We did come home with a little somethin-somethin, thanks to this yard sale sign that Sherry spotted on our way back from the playground one morning.
We did our usual drive-by to see if it was worth stopping, and these night stand beauties immediately caught our eye. They are the real deal (from the 50s or 60s, made of solid wood, and even have excellent dovetailed joints). And you know we are desperately in need of some not-too-short nightstands with drawers (instead of the squat stand-in old living room side tables that we have used for the last nine months).
It was meant to be. Especially when the seller was willing to hand ’em over for simply $11 each (he was asking $30 for both, but Sherry pulled the “all I have is $22 cash” thing, which was in fact true). We worried they would not fit in our car (with a large baby seat, pack & play, and dog crate to work around) but we somehow got one in the trunk and one in the back seat. And seriously, can you beat $11 a piece?
Had our car been bigger, we also would’ve taken this guy home. But my sister (who has a larger car and a similar design taste) took one look at our pictures and high tailed it back to the same yard sale. She came back $30 poorer with this in her trunk. We think it is hilarious that we each own part of the same mid century bedroom set (we would have used the dresser as a cabinet/buffet in our dining room near the front door). My sister Emily’s not sure where she’s gonna put it yet, so we are secretly hoping we will inherit it eventually. We will even pay $30 for it. Haha. Fingers crossed.
But if you think all of our antique hopping, addition touring, and yard sale scoping got in the way of a “normal” little weekend trip, have no fear. Clara’s a beach diva, so there was no denying her some sand and surf (notice the nightstand seat-belted in next to her?).
The water was a bit chilly and the beach (well, what was left of it after Irene) was on the crowded side, but Clara was none the wiser and we all had a strong time.
She and her cousins partied with sand in their diapers and said a proper sayonara to summer (which some of you saw earlier this week over on the house Life). And of course there was some sea gull watching (and the occasional “birdieeee!” scream).
Is there anything better than a sunny day with my girls on the beach? Perhaps $11 night tables. Simply kidding. Kind of.
What did you folks buy/do/travel to see this weekend? It certainly was pleasant to get out of the house (and stop staring at the half-completed desk) for a few days. I think those breaks keep us coming back for more Hands-on madness (that counter might have killed me pre-break, but two days on the beach + low-cost nightstands = Refreshed John, who was ready to build). Do you have any other end-of-summer things on your agenda? We keep forgetting it is not still August. So when my aunt mentioned that Christmas was around fifteen weeks away our brains nearly exploded.
Psst- We announced this week’s giveaway winners. Click here to see if you are one of them.
