Thursday, December 1, 2011

Thrifting with the Queen of Thrift

  Yesterday my Grandmother and I set out on a journey, our main destination was the Simply Scrumptious Tea Room in Eureka Springs. But, along the way we stopped at the many thrift stores and antique stores along the way.
It started off as a very interesting trip to say the least. Our first stop was a flea market on the Berryville Square. I was a little surprised to find the owner chain smoking the whole time we were in there... surprised in this day and age of non-smoking businesses... it was a little gross and unfortunate because they had some really cool furniture and quilts but I am sure it all smelled like cigarette smoke. 
Anyway, from there we stumbled into a thrift store and I immediately spotted these two Dooney and Bourke bags hanging on the wall. I picked them up because I thought they might be real but after conversing with the lady that worked at the store I learned that they weren't real. She actually schooled me! She pointed out that if it were a real D&B bag the zipper would be metal, the inner pockets wouldn't be lined in vinyl, and that the bag would be a lot heavier. After she pointed all that out it started making sense. To me they looked like bags from the early 1980's... they could have been. I ended up passing on them. They aren't really my style or taste I was hoping to make a few bucks on this one ;)


  After this thrift shop we continued on around the square and stumbled upon an antique store straight out of a nightmare. We stepped inside to find a barking dog and 4 cats staring us in the face and were overwhelmed by a horrid ammonia and cat pee smell and immediately had to leave. It was disgusting! The sad part is we really wanted to look around. Gram's and I just knew there were goodies in there. But, no sane person could spend more than 45 seconds in the place. I honestly don't know how/why the health department hasn't shut them down... perhaps they don't regulate antique stores???
  After that we were done with Berryville and headed out of town! 
We stopped at a couple more thrift shops but weren't having luck finding treasures so we headed to our lunch spot which was the Tea Room in Eureka.
Simply scrumptious is exactly what it was! We both chose the asparagus, bacon and cheddar quiche, salad and I got mushroom bisque and Gram's got the chilli. Everything was very fresh and delicious!
Lunch special. YUM!
We shared dessert which was a white cake with blackberry spread and butter cream frosting.
A beautiful pansy that came on our cake.
Me and my Grandmother.
  After lunch we shopped the antique store that was connected to the tea room. This was a fun stop, they had some beautiful primitive antiques... everything that was out my price range but really fun to look at. The man working the store was really  nice too. He pointed out a few other antique shops we might be interested in. So, after that we started the journey back home. We stopped at one last shop, it was one that my Grandparents used to stop at when they were still in the biz. It was in the back yard of a little country home between Eureka and Berryville. The woman that owned it was very interesting and helpful. She pulled out a bunch of junk jewelry for me and even had antique buttons for Grandma.
  Yesterday wasn't the most successful day of junking/thrifting but it was the most fun day because of the company I had!

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