Monday, May 16, 2011

Vintage Fabric Score of the Century!

 

So last Friday morning I was driving home from a friend’s house, and I stumbled across a beat up old yard sale sign…I quickly figured out that it was a place I had been to about 5 years ago when I lived in that area of town. The woman who lived there had been 85 when I first went, and her name was Lula Mae. She was a lifetime sewer and crafter; plus being a hoarder, she kept a few things over the years.

Turns out that Lula is now 90 and sadly blind with dementia, and her daughter who was running the sale remembered me buying a ton of vintage fabric and patterns from her five years ago, and was very happy to see me. We arranged for me to come the next day, Saturday, and shop. So I did…..for 4 hours. There was a shed full of nothing BUT FABRIC. I shopped as long as I could, but I had to stop because my 11 year old could only take so much, and we needed to go! So here is what’s for sale:

Hoard1

All 40s-70s cottons! Novelty prints, florals, geometrics, border prints….all in lovely untouched stacks. I usually have a pretty good poker face but I lost my mind! Here is what I am keeping so far:

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Goodness, I love vintage cotton. Almost as much as I love vintage rayon!

Here are some other goodies, and keep in mind that it is just a fraction of what I came home with. I have a thing for vintage rickrack, especially with Lurex in it! I am just showing an example of the colors-there are multiples! Hooray! I always buy ONLY 100% cotton rickrack because I like the colors and how it lays much better than polyester. And vintage sewing tools! Love them! They are fabulous! And sometimes I even use them! LOL

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Yup, that whole box is nothing but rickrack. We won’t even talk about the seam binding and bias tape. The Gutterman thread was a nice score-that stuff is expensive!

So, the daughter of Lula, Pam, let me come back this past Saturday and I spent 6 1/2 hours there routing out what I think is the rest of the fabric, and then I started in on the craft stuff. It’s going to take a few more times before I am done, I think. I found this insanely huge box of nothing but vintage bump chenille, yards and yards of it. It’s going to be sold because I just can’t keep it all! The colors are wonderful, and it’s just so much better than what you can buy today. I’ll show the box in another post. It is truly a crafter’s dream!! I walked out of there with 7 huge boxes and so now instead of my poor old minivan being the traveling vintage clothing store, it is now the traveling vintage sewing shop. But, that’s ok, I can still see out the back, and I keep it organized pretty well.

I want to sew SOOOOOOOOOO bad right now, but I have to work, darn it! I can’t keep it all, even though I want to. This fabric needs to be out there and get used! It is too fabulous to be kept hidden away!

To end, here are shots of two fabrics I can NOT let go of. I am sure you can understand….they will be skirts for me, and the blue and pink is dated 1956. Sigh….

1956-11956-2Cancan1Cancan2

6 comments:

  1. I love hearing about a good find like that. Although I'm not addicted to fabric -- I can actually leave it behind at most sales -- I still appreciate it. This looks like an absolutely glorious stash of good stuff, congratulations to you and may the eBay gods smile down upon you and give you many bids. Patty

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  2. Wait a minute.....you didn't call me???? I need to see this for myself. Can you set something up? I promise I won't buy much....cuz I'm poor, but I sure would love to see it all. Let me know if you can hook me up.

    Hugs,
    Meri

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  3. oh my gosh!! You had to have been doing the happy dance for days!! That is so awesome and so glad you got it all!

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  4. Oh Sweetie...
    What a gorgeous bunch of goodies. I would have loved to have shopped as well. Okay where is this sale? You need to share the wealth here.

    Can't wait to see what you have to share next. WOW what a deal. I love sewing and I can think of so many things I could make with some of these goodies. What part of the city sweet friend?

    Many hugs and much love, Sherry

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  5. If anyone wants to come shop, email me here at jkuller2@gmail.com. I would be happy to set something up with ya'll! And Denise-I am still happily dancing....:-)

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  6. I'm ridiculously hideaously jealous of all this amazing fabric!!! x

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