My Vintage Spoof

When we were in Europe this summer, I had days that were set aside to vintage shop, and then there were also random moments of shopping madness. You see, we were there as a family on this trip, so my time was split between family time and work (shopping) time. One afternoon we were driving back to our “home” in Germany and we passed one of my favorite little vintage shops. The kids were fast asleep in the back of the car, so my husband stopped at this particular shop to let me do a quick “mad dash” through the store alone! I quickly filled my arms (several times!) with treasures and was in and out of the store within 15 minutes (let me add, that I did PAY for my items on the way out). I was elated that I had this little unexpected moment of shop time and couldn’t wait to show my friend Angela (my silent business partner!) our new finds. When we got to the house, I excitedly told Angela about my quick run though the shop and she began helping me unwrap it all so we could take a good look. There was one particular set of vintage serve ware that I couldn’t wait to show her – two mixing bowls and a serving tray. The colors were an adorable retro red and yellow and they had just the right amount of “wear” on them to make them the perfect vintage find. Angela loved them and then flipped one over to see if there was a maker’s mark. There was. Anyone out there want to guess who this famous vintage maker was?... IKEA!!!! We both laughed so hard at this. So much for being an incredible VINTAGE find! That’s what I get for shopping too quickly. Most of the time I’m very careful to check details, but I guess I was overly anxious on my quick blitz through the store. This spoof has worked out just fine for me though – I now have this adorable red and yellow “vintage” trio sitting in MY kitchen!

Ok, So I’m Not Much of a Blogger…

I had these great intentions of blogging through our entire summer buying trip (across the pond!), but I guess I will not be known for my blogging skills. I’m okay with that because my buying skills are REALLY good! To be honest, as soon as we landed Stateside again, we packed up everything and moved to our new home/location in Colorado! Things have been a whirlwind (tornado???) ever since as we are in the midst of not only unpacking our home, but also trying to uncover all of our fun finds from Europe!
So…stay tuned. Hopefully within a few short days we will have our inventory rolling again…I cannot wait to post the new stuff. And as always, it’s hard to part with! In the meantime, here are a few more pics of our trip and some of the new inventory to come….
Tcheuss!

Let the Buying Begin!!

Guten Tag! We are currently in Germany and our search for fun and funky vintage has commenced! We arrived on the 18th and took a few days to devour some German bread, drink a few Latte Macchiatos and get our sleep somewhat regulated.

Yesterday our quest officially started when we ran across some fun kitschy items and today was a linens day. Linens, linens, linens...when I see those neatly stacked piles of them all lined up just waiting for me to peruse...oh my! I met the most precious Oma today who gave me a great deal on her linens - it turns out that she was quite the linen junkie growing up and now she's attempting to downsize a little. I guess that could be me some day...

I've posted some pics of what we've found so far....her's what's coming from...across the pond! On Tuesday we hit France...stay tuned for more!

Everyone Has A Dream

As I've said before, I've always been a junkie for the old stuff. I also have a background in retail. Remember on FRIENDS how Rachel was an assistant buyer to that psycho buyer at Ralph Lauren? Well, I too was an assistant buyer for a psycho buyer, but not at Ralph Lauren, and it also wasn't televised - but it should have been. It was always very entertaining... So anyway, I've got antiques in my blood and retail as well, but ironically I've never had an itch to have my own store. Back in the 80's, my Mom had her own precious little gift shop that I worked in quite often. I loved it and so did she, but we found out that very similar to the restaurant business, if you own it, you live there. I now have two precious monkeys (2 yr old Rowdy and 4 yr old Lena) and I like being home with them. In fact, I feel truly blessed to be home with them. So, the thought of having a store that I have to basically live at just doesn't appeal to me. But, I do have a dream...

Back in January I was talking to my husband about this new venture, Sweet European Dreams, and told him that my dream for the company would be to periodically have a barn sale. I thought that it would be great fun to collect items for several months and then when my collection was nice and plump, I would find a fun barn to rent for the weekend, fill it with my groovy finds and sell, sell, sell! To me, it's the best of both worlds. Well then just about a month ago I was flipping through the pages of Country Living and saw that they had an article on just that - a barn sale!
http://www.countryliving.com/women/Spare-Time-0405?click=main_sr

I guess there are others out there that are living my dream and loving it. We'll get there - just not today! Let's give it about a year, and if you're in the Colorado Springs area and you get word on an amazing one-of-a-kind barn sale, come on out - it may just be Me and Sweet European Dreams!

Aufregend! Passionnant! Exciting!

Where do I start? I guess as my four year old says, 'let’s start at the very beginning'! I’ve always had a “thing” for antiques, but not so much the Louis the XIV kind of antiques . I’d say more like the find a piece of random history and make it fun again kind of antiques – that’s me!

My passion for the past really got a fire under it after moving overseas (aka “across the pond”) a few years back. I was floored to find out that many Europeans can’t stand the old stuff, so their trash soon became my treasure! In fact, to my husband’s dismay, my garage is still quite full of this “treasure”. ..

Upon moving back stateside, I decided to dive-in and start my own vintage venture, bringing back quirky finds for Americans to love and cherish. Initially this started with friends coming by to dig through my garage, then progressed to selling at local artsy-type markets, and has now blossomed into a full-on website! For now you can check out www.sweeteuropeandreams.etsy.com, but in about 10 days from now, hop online and check out www.sweeteuropeandreams.com
Aufregend! Passionnant! Exciting!