I’m a thrift whore: Here are My Favorite Second-Hand Finds

Hello, My Redonkulous Friends. This week is all about buying second-hand. If I don’t have to buy something full price then I am down. 100% for real not to. I find some amazing things at the thrift stores, flea markets, and discount stores. I want to share with you my prize possessions as of yet…These are my favorite second-hand finds so far.

The family and I could spend hours scouring through everything to find some treasures. We love to have a story about how we found this item and why it means so much to us. So, some weekends it’s all we do. Mike and I spent last weekend going to Goodwills in the surrounding Tampa Bay area. We must have visited 10 Goodwills in 2 days. We found some really cool stuff, but that’s not what this is about… this is about the BEST second-hand finds we have found so far.

In no particular order, but secretly kinda. LOL

Harry Potter Movies

We are obsessed with Harry Potter and one day at a Flea Market they were selling Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone for .50 cents. WHAT!! I will buy… TAKE MY MONEY! That right there started our obsession with finding all the movies. Between finding movies at the Flea Market/ Goodwill We spent less than 12 dollars finding all.

Here are the prices we paid for each:

(2001) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone – .50 cents
(2002) Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets – 1.00
(2004) Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban – 2.00
(2005) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire – 2.00
(2007) Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix – 1.00
(2009) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince – 1.00
(2010) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 – 2.00
(2011) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 – 2.00

OMG! While going to take a picture of my DVDs and I can’t find Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. I know we bought it, I will tear apart Mike’s bookshelf when he gets home to find it. We have 2 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix because we bought one and it didn’t work. So we had to buy another one.

*Update* We tore his room apart and couldn’t find it. We might have lost it during the move. I am sad now. I will have to find another one. 🙁

Harry Potter Books

Next, we moved on to the books because Mikayla loves to read and again we are obsessed with Harry Potter. We spent less than 25.00 to buy all 8 of them.

1- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone – 2.00
2- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets – 3.00
3- Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban – 2.00
4- Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire – 2.00
5- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix – 3.00
6- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince – 3.00
7- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – 5.00
8- Harry Potter and the Curse Child – 4.00

We also bought The Tales of Beetle and Bard for 1.00 from Fantastic Beasts. We are working on those books right now.

Rachel Hollis Books

If you have been reading my blog or following me on Instagram you know I stan for Rachel Hollis. (not anymore) I wanted her books, but couldn’t see myself buying them for full price. Not that I didn’t want to support a person I look up to and admire, but we were not in the best financial situation for me to buy them for roughly 20 bucks apiece. I found “Girl, Wash Your Face” at Goodwill for 3.68 and a few months later I found “Girl, Stop Apologizing” for again 3.68 at Goodwill. I was so excited. Right now, I am in the middle of reading Girl, Wash Your Face and it is fantastic. Everything I hoped it would be and more.

Now I am on the mission to find the books for my sister. I have already picked up another copy of Girl, Wash Your Face for 1.18 at Goodwill. I will recommend Rachel Hollis to anyone and everyone.

Movie Reels Decor

This is on this list because some of our family time is spent watching movies. We love spending the time watching a movie and discussing it after. Mike found this at Goodwill for 5.98. I had to buy it. It used to hang above our couch to represent the place where we watched movies, but now in the new house, it hangs in our Kitchen.

Kevin Smith Movies

Speaking of movies I found Mallrats, Dogma, Clerks, and Clerks II. I am a HUGE fan of Kevin Smith. So much so I want him to officiate my and Mike’s Wedding. I have even posted about it on Twitter.

Betsy Johnson Purse

When I first started working at the Hotel in 2012, I was in housekeeping. We had about 20 rooms available to rent out of about 150 rooms. That’s how run-down it was. It always bothered me that we had rooms upstairs to clean but would have to bring everything downstairs up to the second floor. Why didn’t we just have a cart upstairs to use? We had a room upstairs for housekeeping to store the cleaning cart why not just double all our products and leave them up there.

Fast forward my idea was approved by management and was told to clean out the room to make room for what we needed. I found a pair of black and pink Nike high-top sneakers in my size and then I also found this badass purse that had skulls and roses on it. I asked Management if I could have them. They said anything I find in there I could keep because they haven’t used that room in years and have no idea what was in there.

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Learn from my mistakes

Little did I know it was a Betsey Johnson purse I found that retailed for about 80 bucks. Now when I look it up people are selling it on Poshmark for 38.00. Had it for years, and used it every day. I found a new purse and started using that. I put Betsey Johnson under my bed and forgot about her.

Fast forward we got a new cat Chewie and she wasn’t fixed. I found that she used my purse under the bed as her spraying catcher. I was so upset, not at her, but at myself for putting it under there. The smell wouldn’t come out and the metal accents were rusted and corroded. I had to *GULP* throw her away. I KNOW I KNOW! You are probably asking yourself “What does this have to do with a second-hand find? You got this at work, but wait a minute this story gets better…

Serendipity

A few weeks later still fuming about my purse, Mike and I walked into the flea market, and to my left hanging on a fence was… you guessed it THE SAME BETSEY JOHNSON BAG. AHHHHHH I know. Mike said you have to ask her how much she wants for it. So I asked, The seller explained these are her daughter’s purses, so I have no idea. She called her and asked, but she didn’t answer. She came back with what I thought was going to be an astronomical amount and she replied “5 bucks”. I couldn’t even answer… Mike did. Mike replied, “We’ll take it”.

It was a little bit bigger than my previous one, so I don’t use it as a purse, but I use it as a weekender bag.

Books from my childhood

I used to be such an avid reader and I don’t know what happened over the years, but most of the books I read were because of high school. I ended up loving them so much. Through our thrifting adventures, I have ended up finding most of these books for 1.00 or less.

My Favorite childhood books

A Light in the Attic -Shel Silverstein
Prozac Nation – Elizabeth Wurtzel
The Notebook – Nicholas Sparks
The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald
The lost boy (to go with my copy of “A Child Called It”) – David Peltzer
The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath
The Outsiders – S. E. Hinton
The Grapes of Wrath – John Steinback

The one I am on the hunt, for now, is The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. I will continue looking second-hand for this.

Update April 11, 2021, I finally found The Canterbury Tales… Also as a second-hand find…

Second-Hand Finds

Lemony Snickett Books

These we bought for Mikayla because again she loves to read. We looked up and there were 13 books in total. Goodwill had 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, and 10 for 1.18 apiece. Between Mikayla’s aunt having number 6, she brought it to our house to help complete her collection. We scoured many bookstores to find the rest (7, 11, and 12). Found those for 1-3 dollars apiece. All we were missing now was number 13. Last week I found lucky number 13 at a Book Store in the Oldsmar Flea Market.

I will also throw in here her Dork Diaries books. We found that second-hand off of Facebook Marketplace bought 1- 11 for 10 bucks and have bought 12, 13, and 14 from Walmart for the regular price because she loves them that dang much!

Christmas CDs

Christmas is my favorite time of year and nothing makes me more nostalgic than finding things that remind me of my childhood. Nothing makes it feel more like Christmas until you hear the sweet sounds of Mariah Carey’s Christmas album. I found this at Goodwill for 1.18 and I also found Carnie and Wendy Wilson’s (Wilson Philips) Christmas album months later for also 1.18. Neither one of these was open. Meaning the CDs were in great condition. Knowing I have these physically in my hand makes me so excited.

Kitchen Table in New Hampshire

Our old house was really tiny. It was good for Mike and me. Then Mikayla on the weekends. Mike used to be a mover and would get free furniture from jobs he did because people decided they didn’t want it anymore.

Mike once time got this beautiful iron, marble, and glass table with 6 iron chairs. He also got a matching bakers rack. However, in our home, it was way too big. I got creative hiding the chairs in the house and only leaving 3 out for us to use.

Buy it in a different state

A couple of years into living at the home we decided to sell the table and the baker’s rack. It was sad but we didn’t have room for it. Now we were without a dining room table. In 2018 while on vacation in New Hampshire, we went to a thrift store called Savers and found this folding table with a hidden compartment for chairs. It didn’t have a price tag and we thought maybe someone took the tag to pay for it.

We walked around the store for a bit and saw the table was still sitting there. I eventually found an employee and asked how much it was… Think it would be a high price because we’re used to that happening in our hometown. After about 10 minutes later the chick came back and said the table was 13 dollars. We were sold. We bought it. It worked great in our tent while camping.

The biggest problem now was getting it home from New Hampshire to Florida. Our car was full (that was my fault) but we made it work. We got the table home and it fits perfectly in this little spot in our house and most of our Youtube videos were filmed at that table by that wall.

We still have this table and do not plan on getting rid of it anytime soon.

Thrifting is an adventure

Thrifting is an adventure for us as a family. Our whole house could be a second-hand store if I wanted to sell all my stuff. It’s like a fun little game for us to play while we are out and about. It’s hide and seek with things we want. It’s fun to point out books that we already have and say do we have that one or not? We did that in New Hampshire while at Savers we found Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and I asked Mike if we had this one… He replied he didn’t know. So I left it there only to find out it WAS one that we didn’t have. We were kicking ourselves in the bootay. That one took us the longest to find.

I hope you guys enjoyed this post about my second-hand finds. What are some second-hand items you have found that you were like I HAVE TO HAVE IT!… Let me know in the comments below and please join our Facebook group so you can show me photos of your secondhand finds!

Until Next Time, Have a Great Day!