You know, I got to thinking…  I don’t think we’ve bought much of anything “NEW” lately.  Just food and feed, mostly.  Because I don’t know of any “thrift” stores for those kind of things.

But when it comes to “things”, we always look to garage sales, thrift stores, eBay and Craigs’ List…  And yes, the occasional thing on the side of the road or in a dumpster…  We just save a ton of money that way.  Some hardware things we don’t have much choice on…  nails, screws, etc.  But even a lot of our wood and such is found, donated or bought on the cheap.  I really don’t mind at all.  It’s always fun to be on the hunt and when you get a great deal, you just feel good.

Like yesterday…  it was our town day and I had many hours to spare for some reason.  No practice, mostly.  And we had done our big egg run on Friday, so no eggs etc.   So I made a beeline for a couple of the good thrift stores in town that I haven’t been to for awhile.   And caught a garage sale in the travels as well!

I really needed a new pair of shoes.  I have my WONDERFUL half boots from Lands End.  (Now to be fair, I did buy those new about 2 years ago.  Best investment I’ve made in a long time!  Those mocs are DREAMY….)  But they are farm boots and are oft to have chicken poop and straw incrusted in the tread and goat milk slobber and other unidentifiable stains on the lovely light brown suede tops.   (Note to self…  see if they have black whenever these ever wear out…)

Now I do have a pair of  black leather slip ons, my “fancy” shoes.  My girly shoes.  Go to church, weddings or the occasional bluegrass gig, shoes.  And of course, my black cowboy boots…  which are ONLY for bluegrass gigs…  And kind of hurts my one toe since I broke it about 3 years ago and it healed up a little funny.  So I don’t wear them day in and day out.  Without a bandaid.  On the funny toe.

Oh yeah, and I have a pair of rubber farm boots with roosters on them.  But they don’t have much in the way of a sole and frankly, are only for those days when you want to consider building an ark or the yard is flooded up past your calves.  On your legs.

So, you can see… I need another pair of shoes.  Go to town shoes.   Not wear in the muck shoes.  LIke tennis shoes, though I don’t play.  Tennis, that is.  And they have to be good support shoes, because, well, my feet are a little sensitive, that whole diabetes thing.  I try to be careful.  I usually end up buying some nasty sandals for the summer, which I love, but always end up hurting my feet by the end.  I hope not to do that this year.  So I was so pleased to find these lovely, once-expensive, hiking tennis shoes.  Good soles, look brand new!  The tread was pristine as was the shoe and the insides looked like no one has ever really worn them!  Yeah!  And the $9 price tag was superb!

I don’t normally shop for shoes in the thrift… just always feel a little funny about it.  I hear my mother’s voice ringing in my ears about used shoes destroying your feet, or giving you foot cooties or what have you.  But gosh, these were like untouched by human soles…  And I’m getting over that whole cooties thing.  I gave them a little shot of Fabreeze…  and was ready to go!

Now, I was also in the market for a new pair of go-to-town jeans.  Because, farms are tough on jeans.  Even little farms.  And all my jeans are way too big.  Baggy.  Ill-fitting.  I’ve tried to alter a few, but after loosing 75 pounds…  (yeah me!)  Im afraid my old jeans really look pretty awful on me.  Or so say the goats.  (They notice things like that…)  So when I stumbled upon a pair of perfect new size, decent new looking jeans for a measly $6?  Well, those came home with me too.  If they had had a friend, I would have got them too, but no, alas…. just one.  But that’s okay.  One is better than none.

And then, at the garage sale, I found two awesome books!  In beautiful shape for $1 each.  Storey’s guide to draft horses and mules…  hardcover and beautiful…  and Horse, Follow Closely…  an interesting book on native American horsemanship with a DVD… still in the pouch!  Sweet!   I wonder if it will work on Cody Pony?  I can just see me shooting arrows while ducking behind him as a equine shield.  Can’t you?  Ah…  well…  we’ll see about that.  If anything, the pictures are beautiful in the book and I just love to read anything about horsemanship.  Even ponymanship.

Well, those were my little treats for my searching efforts.  I’ll post later about the cool things we found in the big item trash day scouting mission.  I need to take a few pictures first.  I just love hunting down awesome deals at the thrift stores and garage sales.  It’s really amazing what people buy and then don’t use or just give away at a fraction of the original cost.  And I’m kind of picky…  you don’t have to be scraping the bottom of the barrel to find really nice stuff.  I know, I remember the days of mindless shopping and spending dumb money on things only to have them sit around and collect dust.  Just a phase I think we all go through at some point and some never leave!  And folks like us reap the benefits!  Yah!  And it’s just nice that this stuff gets some decent use out of before going off to a landfill somewhere.  I like that too.