Fabulous frugalling

Sometimes you just have to heed the call of the op shop: and yesterday I'm particularly glad I did.

A quick lunchtime dive through my fave Northside haunts netted me:

Seven Johnson Brothers fruit plates. Well eight actually but one had a large chip on it so was binned as soon as I got home.

I'd first seen these about a month ago as part of a tea set and tried to get them to sell me only the plates but as they had just arrived that morning they said no. I wasn't prepared to pay $35 to get my seven plates (and re donate the tea pot and cups and saucers) so said I'd be back in a couple of weeks and if they were still there we'd have a discussion.

So I did and we did and the plates were mine for $7*. I'm very happy as I only have 4 of this size, picked up from David Jones who told me at the time they were the last in the country. So now I have too many of them but having three spare is rather useful.

500g Caressa yarn (partly knitted), 250g 8ply wool (which must be quite new as the label declares real wool), 180g 12 ply Norspun yarn and a vintage 25g ball of Patonyle (that last one's for Taph): $7.50* the lot.

* 4 energy saving lightbulbs: $1 each

* And, finally, for 15 cents each, a selection of vintage Canberra postcards including my favorite:
The lack of a Playhouse Theatre dates this as before 1965 (and well before I suspect as in the same batch there is a postcard of the Shine Dome with no lake in the background which means they have to be pre 1963)

(*Guestimated as when I took the plates, the wool and an ornament up to the counter the woman looked at the pile and then at me and said "Fifteen dollars?")