Friend Promotion Friday: Fresh to Death Vintage

Hello and welcome to Friend Promotion Friday!

Self-promotion may be hard and awkward, but friend promotion is easy and fun.  

It is with great confidence and joy that I recommend my friend Stephanie Biagioni and her vintage shop Fresh to Death Vintage. 

Imagine Jerry and Elaine had a baby and raised her on Salt n Pepa videos - that would be Stephanie. She is hilarious and whip smart and has excellent taste in clothing and housewares and music.

Go Trailer, Go First Class vintage patch, anyone? 

Future Harley Rider Maternity tee?

Stephanie cares and hustles and will do everything possible to ensure customer satisfaction. She will probably wrap your purchase in some cute vintage thing and may even put surprises in the box.

Check out her reviews on Etsy:  Fresh to Death Vintage reviews.

Check her out all over the interwebs: 
                         Etsy shop: Fresh to Death Vintage
                    Wanelo shop: Fresh to Death Vintage 
                        Instagram: Fresh to Death Vintage
                           Pinterest: Fresh to Death Vintage

Check her out in a couple of SHV original What the Flock t-shirts (which she commissioned): 

I love peanut butter. 

And garbage!

I told you she was cool! Now head over to her shop and buy something(s) equally cool!

Please keep in mind the vast majority of these friends are hustling to pay for their own health insurance. Supporting their businesses helps in many far-reaching positive ways! 

Friend Promotion Friday: Robin Egg Surprise Vintage

Hello and welcome to Second edition of Friend Promotion Friday!

Self-promotion may be hard and awkward, but friend promotion is easy and fun. 

My friend Allison Griswold sells vintage clothing, toys, and paper ephemera on Etsy at Robin Egg Surprise. 

It's easy to recommend Allison's shop because I have known her for several years and she is extremely kind and thoughtful, and will work with any customer before or after the sale to make sure they are happy. 

She is based in Indiana, has a great eye for vintage, and finds some wonderfully fun things.

How cute is this toddler fire chief t-shirt? 

She has an amazing collection of (cheap) old photos. 

Check out her gushing reviews from customers. Nothing but 5 stars all day long!

I do not have any photos of Allison in my t-shirts, but her 4 year old son wears t-shirts and hoodies from me, and I do have a photo of her with Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings after she gave them a bunch of vintage clothing, which they loved and immediately wore on stage for the rest of the tour. 

So if you like vintage things, head on over to Robin Egg Surprise on Etsy and buy something, or buy two things from Allison, you will not be disappointed! 

She also has a twitter if you're into that: Robin Egg Surprise twitter. 

Easy Funny Vintage Halloween Costumes

The world does not need another Sexy Black Cat this Halloween. Be different! Be funny! Be comfortable!

1. Be a Physics Team Coach. (wear goggles, carry magnets).

2.  Be Owner of the World's Cutest Cat. (carry stuffed animal, or real animal, or photo album).

3. Be a Chop Stix Express Delivery Person. (wear an Asian hat and carry a box of chow mein).

4. Be Michael Jackson from "Beat It"  (no one wants to be defeated).

5. Be a Brand New Grandma.

6. Be a Beauty Pageant Contestant. (wear a big wig and a tiara, carry a dozen carnations).

7. Be a Senior Olympian - Elderly athlete in the Haywood County Senior Games: (green) 

and/or red for a two person cosutme:

8. Be a Concessions Monitor (check/take everybody's drinks).

9. Be an Oscar Mayer Hot Dog salesperson. (carry a bag of buns).

10. Be a Mall Walker (Wear wind pants and wrist weights). (Another one available here for a funny 2 person costume).

11. Be a Football Quarterback.

12. Be the Captain and Admiral of the "Breezy" yacht. Easy funny Two Person Halloween Costume:

These costumes are easy, quick, cheap, comfortable, and reusable, and it won't take you 10 minutes to remove them to take a piss.

Happy Halloween!

WTF Wednesday - 3.0

And just like that, it's WTF Wednesday again - time to look at some bizarre things and wonder.

First we have an interesting "get rich from home" scheme that is better than herbalife:

Raising earthworms for profit!  A multi-million dollar market. published in 1959, this book will show you how to grow a 4 pound parsnip and a 6 pound carrot.

Next we have a member of the species jackass americanus. Girls? Not even Asian women? Girls? Honk if you're a racist misogynist!

Last but not least, speaking of jackasses, no garden is complete without a burro garden planter - lifelike features with a saddlebag planter!

For only 5 books of S&H green stamps in 1975, this burro could've been yours. I like his spiked feet. 

WTF?

As with all wtf wednesdays, there are no answers, only questions leading to more questions.

For more vintage wtf wonders (for sale), click here: vintage wtf

WTF wednesday

welcome to your first ever installment of WTF wednesday!

that day reserved for scratching your head at the wide variety of whackadoo things human beings have created.

i come across some weird, bizarre, crazy shit in my travels as a vintage hound, and will share some of them here.

 

here is a charming 70's cross stitch wall hanging. meant for a children's bathroom. why is the boy holding a sling shot. no really, WHY?

who wants to boogie board on a confederate flag? how about a confederate flag with a pitbull in a chain collar? sometimes i'd like to kick america in the jimmy.

 here's a sweet and loving 70's wooden plaque from bryson city, NC. the only non-vice expense in his budget is dog food.  (kevin hung this one up at his law office - asheville bankruptcy lawyer.)

even the handi-men in hawaii wear aloha shirts.  

we went to look at our 'dream house' on town mountain. the internet said it had a pool. the location was perfect. the view divine.

the house had been completely washed away by water. sad trombone.

as with all wtf wednesdays, there are no answers, only questions leading to more questions.

for more vintage wtf wonders (for sale), click here: vintage wtf

the best i've ever seen 'em

these 5 different trees have made themselves into a little family. from afar they look like 1 tree.

update on the oil pulling - went to the dentist yesterday and the very sweet hygienist i've been going to since 2007 said my teeth were 'the best i've ever seen 'em.' i haven't had any head cold symptoms in 4 months now. i am keeping it up! 

i've been spending a huge amount of time the past 2 months getting a skippyhaha.com website together where i can sell my vintage clothing.  it will take me months plural for me to load all 1200 items into the new site, but slowly but surely i am getting there and i hope to have it done by june. the site is live now and open for business, but i want to get everything up there before really publicizing it. but i like how it turned out and it is getting there!

hola 2014

2013 was a good year for me. and for skippy haha vintage! i really enjoy selling on etsy, it is user friendly and the seller fees are reasonable. everything continues to move in the right direction as time goes by - more views, favorites, and sales. 

a few major highlights of the last year: 

i opened a skippy haha vintage t-shirt shop on defunkd.com vintage t-shirt collective. dozens of sellers post hundreds of authentic vintage t-shirts all in one convenient location.  jimmy j does a fantastic job of keeping the site fresh and functional. there's a funny, informative blog and an interactive forum - lovers of true vintage t-shirts can get lost for hours on this site.

in 2013 i taught myself to sew. more accurately, i reacquainted myself with the sewing i learned in mrs mcdonald's 7th grade home ec class. though that was sewing with a machine, and now i've been sewing like betsy ross.  seams. buttons. burnholes. a 2 foot dog nail rip in a duvet cover. it has opened up a whole new world of vintage for me! instead of passing on things, or reducing prices for missing buttons, i repair them and sell for full price. win-win!

last but not least, i mentored a sweet, funny, kind woman in etsy selling. she went from being a young mother/goodwill junkie/semi-hoarder to a professional 20+ etsy seller in a couple short months.  after hundreds of emails and text messages back and forth about shipping and keywords and photos and customer service, check her out: robin egg surprise - i am totally proud of helping allison get her wings!


i hope everybody is off to a great start in 2014 - can't wait to see what treasures the next 12 months bring!

reading is FUNdamental

i have always loved reading. i remember being 3 and reading about a gem-encrusted crown in the childcraft encyclopedia. i read all the nancy drew books before 3rd grade. i would check out the maximum allowed on my library card and my mom's at the same time and chain-read them until i was done. same with anne of green gables, the baby sitter's club, and sweet valley high.

the textbooks in school when i was growing up had incredible covers. they inspired curiosity!  compared to the bland computer-generated covers of today, they are vibrant and interesting. all hand done.

these are all houghton mifflin reading book covers from the late 70's. my earliest classroom shelves were full of these. i was transfixed!

 this 'secrets' one i particularly remember because they were left over on a back shelf from an earlier year and i had to ask my teacher if i could take one home with me and read it. she said yes. i mean who wouldn't want to read 'secrets' with a cover like that?!

all this started when i saw this "windchimes" book at a second-hand store today and my mind was awash in a flood of cedar hill elementary school book covers.

the covers today do not hold a candle.

From Houghton Mifflin

the shutters of leisure mountain road

there's a road in north asheville/weaverville with the craziest cutest funkiest shutters i've ever seen assembled in one place.

the road is called leisure mountain road.

without further ado, behold the shutters:

we have circles:



we have diamond paddles:



we have traditional paddles:



we have leaves:



we have star trek arrows:



we have stars:



we have primary shapes:



we have slightly unusual shapes:



we have tulips:



we have white diamonds:



we have red diamonds:



last but not least, my personal favorite, we have pine tree moons:



about 3/4 of the houses on the street are currently participating in this ongoing shutterfest.

i bet when they were first built in the 70's they ALL had fun shutters.

way to keep it funky, leisure mountain road!