Sure I still have unpacked boxes begging for attention, a garage full of unloved furniture, and a room devoted entirely to packing paper and cardboard, but a girl’s gotta shop for her new pad, right? I put it off as long as I could, but yesterday in between errands I managed to speedwalk through an antique mall which was, perhaps predictably, stuffed with junque. Still, while mining the hills and sifting the sands I managed to find some gold in them there hills.

You may recall my obsession with trunks, and especially with all things Sarreid. Well, this guy may not be a Sarreid, but he’s still damn handsome. I think he’s going to make the perfect end table, and toy storage is always a bonus.

The booth that housed this beauty also held a number of other curiosities. I kind of wish I had bought this stainless footlocker, too.

Another trip may be in order? Who’s in?

And now I have to figure out how to unload my score from the front seat of the car, where it is wedged in tighter than Kim Kardashian’s booty in… well, anything.

Craigslist is littered with asshats who think their doo stained sofas should fetch 1st Dibs prices, but you can’t let that stop you from using the craig for good and not for evil. To be perfectly honest, it’s been a while since I checked in and zoned out on tables and chairs. Today I had a few extra minutes to search for treasure, and I was a little surprised by all the awesomeness I found among the mirrows, rod iron, and chester drawers. Of course, much of said stuff was Knoll and therefore astronomically expensive, but I did find a few cheap and shiny gems. Warning, many crappy pictures shall follow. People, please learn how to use a camera so you can stop making our blog ugly. Thank you.

That’s right. Smoked glass and brass coffee table. $65 here. Shazam!

Mirrored coffee table. Cool shape but those flowers are dumb. It wants to be painted black so badly. Can you help it? $60 here.

Neato chrome chair — would look amazing floating in a room where you could see it from all angles. Gold star for decent photography. $60 here.

I actually opened up photoshop for this, just so you could see the majesty of this sweet little bedroom set in all its glory. $150 here.

It’s got the Mediterranean flava. $35 here.

Pair it with this light. $50 here.

And this rug. $120 here.

And hey, why not this pair (yes, two) of square topped, vintage pedestal tables? $25 here.

Or skip the trad trend and get retro with a pair of square brass mirrored tables. I like these better for our room, anyway. $90 here. The hideous photography is free. You’re welcome.

This will also go nicely in our fantasy room. Antique buffet with clean lines and pretty wood. $75 here.

In a totally different room (like, my living room) lives this huge heavy black lacquer 70s coffee table with BRASS base. $45. Within walking distance of my house. Why have I not bought this again? Did I forget to put the link in? Silly me.

Finally, this is not really cheap ($350 here) but I love the shape. The vaguely southwestern pattern/palette is potentially troubling, but I say you just Nagel the bleep out of that shit.

Perfect! And only $10.

And there you have it. Obviously I have rekindled my craig obsession, which is bad since I need more furniture like Oprah needs more celebrities to tell her how AMAZING!!!! she is. Now go buy one of these things, send me a picture of it in its new home, and I will post it.

As long as the picture is good.

Last week my brother and his fiance moved to Portland from Virginia with only the goodies they could fit in their car.  Being the altruistic older sister that I am, I took it upon myself to scour craigslist for all the Pacific Northwest has to offer.  I found quite a few bodacious goodies for their downtown loft, some they loved and bought and others are making their big design crisis appearance today.  And guess what?  Not a single item has a bird on it.

First up was this leather sofa, at $900 it was a bit steep, but oh that charcoal leather looks so soft and dreamy.  Plus it’s in amazing condition.  Also, the number one rule of craigslist is don’t talk about craigslist, but the number two rule of craigslist is this:  always talk the sellers down.  It’s so important it really should be rule number one, but, hey, I’m not in charge of these things.

Next was this mid century teak coffee table.  Since I’m in the market for a coffee table myself, and a big square block of wood is exactly what I want, I was pretty excited about this find.  Turns out the table is much to large for their small condo, so it was a negatory.  It’s $100.  Someone go buy it.

Since I’ve never met anything in white tufted leather that I didn’t love, I was pretty excited to stumble upon this sofa.  Turns out the bro and his lady already found a couch just right for them, which means I won’t get to visit this gem in the fall.

Pick your chins up off the ground.  This was easily my favorite Portland Craigslist find and for $20 (twenty dollars!!!!) I prayed to all things holy that D & E would share my sentiments.  Luckily my bro has great taste in women who has great taste in tables and they bought that mofo.  Dear portlanders, this table had been on craigslist for a week.  You should be ashamed of yourselves.

If you’re hankering for a piece of brass in front of your sofa after seeing the last dreamy table, they had two of these tray tables, this one here and this one here.

Or get some brass for behind your sofa here

This arc light was priced a bit high (remember rule number 2!) but I still think someone should race out and get it.

I usually defer to ebay for all interweb lighting purchases, but I thought this little gem was just delightful.

Turns out there’s lots of burl wood laying around in Oregon (go figure).  I found this tabletop here and this one here

Ok, this is where I pull out the showstopper:

I found and developed an obsession for this rug early on (wouldn’t it look AMAZING under that brass coffee table???!!!).  The young couple decided to pass and their loss is your gain, Portland readers.  Go, roll around on this rug, stare at it longingly for hours, I will hand write some love letters for you to read aloud to it, the rug will like it, I can tell.

I’ve seen pics of all the pieces D & E have selected so far and it all looks awesome, I can’t wait to check it out in person.  As for Portland craigslist:  All in all, I found some pretty good stuff up north, you dudes have a pretty nice well to tap into.  And to whomever ends up with the rug:  sleep with one eye open.

Oh, PS, if there are any amazing secret stores the new Portlandiers should know about, leave a comment, yo.

A couple of weeks ago I was doing the thrift circuit and in some cosmic event, each store had the same vintage wicker trunk with brass hardware. In another cosmic event, I restrained myself from buying each and every one. One was too dirty, one was too expensive, and by the time I came across the last one, I had convinced myself wicker trunks grow on trees. Later that day I happened upon this photo and finally all the planets aligned just to blow my mind…

Lazaro Rosa Violan

Eclipse! Solar flares! Other stuff I should remember because I took astronomy in college! Whatever. I had a plan, and it involved copious amounts of spray paint and those damn trunks.

Those damn trunks were gone. Turns out they don’t really grow on trees.

Because I always want what I can’t have, I have now developed a mild obsession with trunks. Ok, let me level with you: I MUST HAVE ONE.

Katarina Malmstrom Brown via Desire to Inspire

Suzy Hoodless

Misplaced the source… bad blogger.

Nuevo Estilo

Guess what? None of these are as good as the pair of shiny BRASS trunks Karly is currently using for her nightstands.

I am hoping she’ll be so knackered from baby tending that she won’t notice me tip toeing around in the dark with a black ski mask on…

I was also watching a brass Sarreid chest on ebay, but homeboy went for $635!!! Do people think I am made of money?

And don’t even get me started about the Restoration Hardware trunks… when I looked at the prices (even on sale), I nearly spit out my precious coffee.

So, long story short: I really should have bought those stupid wicker trunks at the thrift store. Now I am going to have to wait for the next planetary event, which will probably occur approximately 5,692 years from now, and by that time the trunks will be used to hold my ashes.

Dumb dumb dumb.

I have been working so hard at avoiding Christmas shopping that I deep cleaned my range top rather than making a list and checking it twice. Sure, my family will cry cartoon sized tears of sadness when they realize Santa must have found them to be naughty rather than nice, but at least our kitchen is clean. And to further squander my precious (nearly non existent) free time, I took pictures of our new Ikea shelves and artwork.

You may recall that we completely remodeled our kitchen over a year ago, but if you’d like to check out the whole story, click here. We finished the bare minimum literally a week before Ike was born, so we didn’t have time to accessorize or even install the shelves I had planned for. It looked pretty barren over by the sink:

My spice rack wasn’t even full. But at least the paper towel holder was a klassy touch.

Too bad our kitchen has the worst. lighting. ever. Hunny Bunny caught me with my tripod in the kitchen making 10 second exposures and asked me why I was shooting in complete darkness. Maybe someday if I have an even BIGGER issue to avoid, I will actually whip out my light kit and make real pictures. Anyway, you get the idea. Shelves: check. Thrifted tchotchkes that will likely be rearranged on a daily basis according to the whims and vagaries of my highly mutable temperament: check. No more paper towel holder: check.

I was feeling the primary colors when I picked up that nifty cubist painting (must be a long lost Picasso, right?) at Round Top for $30. I snagged the vintage lithograph of the Roman forum at le thrift store for $2.99. Look, I filled my spice rack. Also, it is 1:02 pm.

I’m still on the fence about the brass light. Ok, I’m not even on the fence. I picked up a huge vintage round glass fixture with a black chain that will be perfectish kitchen over the sink, but I’ve been too lazy to install it… so far. Christmas isn’t here yet, right? I’m liking the shelves, though. We used Ikea’s Ekby series, and the finish matches our cabinets perfectly.

That’s really all I have for you today, but I’m trying to squeeze in more time to photograph mini house updates. I created a new category on the right column called Erin’s House, where you can track the evolution of our humble abode over the last two and a half years (good gravy, I’ve been blogging forever!). I made a category for Karly, too, but she’ll have to file all her own projects when she returns after the new year…

I can’t put off this Christmas shopping forever, you know.