Weekend scores

In a Friday afternoon brain-dead moment, I went down to the local fancy Italian shoe store to see if they might have the Chie Mihara's I'm lusting after.

Alas, they did not.

But the Crate and Barrel outlet was right next door, so I wandered in to see how we might spend the gift certificate the my brother and sister-in-law gave us last Christmas. (You know it's a busy year, when your Christmas gift certificates are still hanging around in JULY!)

I was super excited to find these stemless wine glasses, on sale for $1.75/ each, which I think will make great bud vases to complement the larger vases I found on ebay. If you need anything in the way of vases or kitchen ware, you've got to check out the Crate & Barrel outlet. The Thirty-something Bride scored some cute vases there last week.

I realized recently that the long tables of our venue call for more than one centerpiece per table. But at $25 and up for professional flower arrangements, that's going to be hard to fit in our budget. So these little vases can hold one or two stems each -- and when we're done, they're hip wine glasses. (A further bonus is that they're apparently 30% recycled glass, according to the Macy's website where they sell for $25/ 4 glasses! And $16/ 4 at Amazon.)

Feeling that the shopping gods were with me, I took a spin by the 99 Cent Only store.

Last time I was there, I scored eight blue glass vases like this for $1 (image from here, where the price is $15!)

My intuition paid off! I scored 40 of these glass votive holders for 25c/ each - or $10 for the whole mess of 'em! (A sign of the times, by the way, that my computer keyboard has no 'cents' sign.) It's definitely worth checking out the dollar store- you never know what you'll find.


Now back to C&B tomorrow, for the votives - 30/ $6 - to go in these, and our tablescapes are just about set.