My Minimalism Journey, Thrift Shop Adventures

Shameless Thrifting, Part II

tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

Yesterday’s post featured a completed quilt to convince you that this is still a Quilter’s Blog, so now I am free today to post about some other non-quilting random topic!

This is post is a sort of follow up or continuation of my post from August 2016, Shameless Thrifting. In my “Shameless Thrifting” post I share how I overcame my aversion to thrift stores as part of my Minimalism Journey. I also share a secret obsession from my childhood discovered during an afternoon of thrifting.

Got Outfit?

In yesterday’s post (in which I try to convince you I am a quilter again), The Wedding Gift Quilt, I mention that I recent returned from a trip to Fort Worth, Texas for a family wedding.

Preparing for the trip I realized I did not have many nice warm weather outfits for Texas (90+ degrees F and high humidity).

I live in the Pacific NW and in general we dress fairly casual; and I am a telecommuter and I can work in sweat pants and a T-shirt all day. I used to have a lot of dressy clothes from when I worked in an office, but I donated most of them to thrift shops as I discussed in my series of posts on My Minimalism Journey (My Minimalism Journey).

I could not stand the idea of going out and buying NEW clothes. Anytime I think about buying new clothes, I think about an article I read last year on how “Fast Fashion” is creating environmental issues. This is not the exact article but it has the same message: Newsweek’s FAST FASHION IS CREATING AN ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS

Several times I started to get into the car and go to the local Macy*s or J. Jill, or even Old Navy to see if I could find any cute outfits for the trip. I also thought of our local boutique shops and although I would like to patronize small businesses I was not sure if I wanted to pay their prices and I noticed many of their clothes are made in overseas.

Let’s Try Local Thrift Shops!

Thank goodness due to the influence of my sister, a very creative “thrifter”, I can proudly and shamelessly, go thrift shop shopping for clothes! There are many wonderful “gently used” fashionable clothes at thrift shops.

After visiting several thrift shops, I was able to put together a couple outfits for the trip I was very pleased with. Here is an example  of one of those outfits (note I already had the shoes – they are are Dankso dress clogs with ankle straps I’ve had for many years and they surprisingly matched perfectly):

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How much for the entire outfit including the jewelry (not including the shoes) – $9.

Yes $9 for the whole outfit: the $5 dress is a J. Crew dress, the $3 jacket is a boutique brand type item, and the coordinating necklace was $1. I received compliments on the outfit while on my trip!

And when I get tired of my “new” thrift shop summer travel wardrobe, I will just donate it back to the thrift shops!

Postscript

The Capsule Wardrobe

Speaking of clothing, a vlogger (video blogger), Casually Matthew, has a beautifully produced short video on how to create a Capsule Wardrobe:

I love the idea of a “Capsule Wardrobe” and first heard about this concept when I started following The Minimalists a couple years ago. I was going to add a link to provide more background on Capsule Wardrobes, but you can google this phrase and find many wonderful guides.

Essentially a Capsule Wardrobe is a way to declutter and minimize your closet while curating your clothing into a coordinated collection of clothing you really love; and is flexible in its ability to “mix and match”.

I have a fairly casual Capsule Wardrobe for my telecommuter/Pacific NW lifestyle but I would like to evolve it to be a tad more stylish and plan to use thrift shop finds to achieve my goal!

Feature photo credit: Roger Kirby, free images.com

Published by tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

Quilter, crafter, obsessive tea drinker and lover of all furry creatures (especially dogs and cats) - join me on my tierneycreates blog as I share stories from "A Crafter's Life".

22 thoughts on “Shameless Thrifting, Part II”

  1. Your post is timely! My closet is a total disaster and I still can’t find anything to wear that I think is stylish! I have driven by some new thrift stores in the area…it’s high time I venture in and save $$. I can use my wardrobe savings to buy quilting fabric. No worries, your post really does apply to quilting!

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    1. Thanks for the laugh! I am so glad I am helping you save money on clothing to buy more fabric! Truthfully I would always choose to buy used clothing and save money for high quality new fabric instead!!!

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  2. I love thrift stores, both for shopping and donating and I love your find. I also have tons of dressy clothes left over from my pre-retirement life that are just hanging in my closet. My daughter told me I should get rid of them but I said I may need them for funerals, etc. (I’m from the South and funerals are ‘events’) My very outspoken daughter advised me that I couldn’t possibly attend THAT many funerals. So I guess it is time that they go. 😦

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    1. Your daughter is awesome! I hope you don’t attend that many and it would be okay to wear the same outfit, hopefully people don’t spend a lot of time critiquing the outfits of others at memorials! Thanks for your comments 😀

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  7. I’ll bet you looked great. 🙂 I don’t shop at thrifts for clothes. I could make a lot of excuses why, and they’re factual, but the biggest reasons are that a) I don’t buy many clothes now, so I want to love the things I do buy; and b) I grew up wearing used and hand-me-down clothes, and I just plain don’t want to now. So instead I buy things that I’ll use for a long time. While that’s not always successful, I do pretty well with it. I could go through my closet (which is more empty than full) and tell you how old most of my things are. It would be pretty impressive, I expect.

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    1. Well that is very environmentally friendly too – buying high quality items that are in classic styles and last a long time! Nice!

      I always had new clothes and when I worked in management in an office, I think over the years I bought a new car’s worth of business suits. So this change is working for me 🙂

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  8. Haha! I love thrift store clothes! I was in a friend’s wedding a few years ago and the bride said, “just wear something purple” to all the bridesmaids! I got a purple cocktail dress at my local consignment shop and then sold it on consignment after the wedding! Weddings are one of the biggest wastes of money for many people, so I was very pleased 😄

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    1. Oh that is perfect – it was like you rented the dress! Brilliant!

      Speaking of dress renting, at the wedding, the bridesmaids actually all rented their dresses through a dress rental company online!

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  9. Love the thrift shop bargains – esp the jacket! You could dress it down too with a white tshirt and jeans – very versatile. I too used to be a teleworker – you get into the habit of wearing scruffies all the time and ignore the better ‘work’ clothes you used to wear. I am a big fan of thrift shopping as my shape and size differs – nothing worse than spending a fortune on clothes in stores and then not being able to wear them too often, or indeed ever again!

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    1. Thanks for your comments! Yes as a teleworker I at least make myself dress each morning, I have heard of teleworkers who staying in their PJs all day! I like your idea of options with the jacket – I discovered it also worked well with a gray dressy t-shirt and gray linen skirt I found while thrifting too!

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  10. We found a thrift store outlet shop. It is a big name thrift store and when they turn over merchandise in each smaller store they ship left overs to the outlet and you can purchase anything except furniture for 89 cents a pound. I find all kinds of great things, even fabrics for my quilts.

    You found some really nice things.

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    1. There is a bit of a time commitment and patience to wander the thrift stores which are not as nicely organized as retail stores, nor do they have the selections in every size, but if you are in the mood for it – it is fun 🙂

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