I got married to my soulmate a little while back (I'm such a lucky girl) & I really wanted a wedding gown that reflected my own artistic personality & my love of vintage couture.
I wanted it all too... poufy, lacey, full on Cinderella stuff.

That gown existed in my mind & so when I decided to make it a reality I was lucky to find a lovely seamstress in Rita, a perfectionist like me who was able to work with me to create the gown of my dreams!
This gown started as a blank tulle dress I purchased at David's bridal but it was transformed into a couture , one of a kind work of art by the time she & I put our minds together.
Believe it or not, the fabric that we added into another layer of the skirt was a set of BLUSH PINK CURTAINS that I had found at a thrift store about 5 years earlier!
My friends said I was CRAZY to want to add old curtains to my wedding gown, lol. 
It was fate though! It was a new/vintage (kinda) dress that was going to worn by me,
a second time around bride lol.

She was PERFECT.
so of course I had to do her very own photo shoot :)

Just look at those awesome vintage curtains under that tulle!
​The perfect shade of blush pink!

This beautiful forest was where our wedding reception took place...
​

and this is me.. livin the dream.....

& I still am ❤

​​Thrift store shopping is essential to my life. Period. Serious. Spare moments are precious & mine are spent in thrift stores, lol.
Annnnnd some of you know I have a love of special dolls......
Yesterday, I happened to stumble across a sweet little vintage baby doll.

But not just any baby... A prince!

There sitting on a cold rack , waiting for his new mum was
beautiful little Prince William himself!
Made by Royal Doulton & the House of Nisbet, this 'First Born Collectors doll' is premium hand painted bone china, not regular porcelain.

I knew when I picked him up he was needing love & had to come home with me!
His bonnet needed a few stitches & his face needed a little wipe but after all,
​ what are dolly mums for? 
I think he looks pretty cozy in his new spot don't you?

Don't forget to subscribe to my blog posts & be entered to win a fabulous hand painted work of art by me, Carolyn of Barefootbutterfly House of Vintage & Barefootbutterfly Studio.  Award winning Chilliwack, BC, Canada Artist & Photographer.

Maybe it might seem odd to folks that im posting a pic of a giant pine cone but there is a story to it :) 
I had a great weekend with my love Scotty down in Seattle, going to a huge Christmas craft show at the Tacoma dome & hitting all sorts of thrift stores etc .. but one little thing that we did was the most thought provoking by far. We went to an estate sale. 

I don't know how many of you have been to an actual 'Estate Sale'. The real thing... where the reason you are there, in a persons home, is because they have passed away & their family has hired a company to come in and liquidate all of their personal belongings. I have been to a few but this one was different. I wanted to go because frankly, the photos I saw of the furniture on craigslist that were going to be sold reminded me a lot of things I remember my own grandparents having. Fine furniture, gilded items, beautiful things & the like. 
So the craigslist ad said that the sale was over at 4pm due to the apartment complex rules & in typical me style, we drove up at 4:02 :) I wasn't sure if they were going to let us in but I figured, ah, what the heck, it's worth a shot. So we go to the front door of the apartment & some fellows are being let in with a dolly to pick up furniture that was purchased & I say with puppy dog eyes, 'are we too late for the sale? We came all the way from Canada...' She eyes us up & says, 'ok, go quick!'  I hear her say on the intercom "a couple is coming up, they are from Canada" lol.. i guess we have pull?

So up we go in the elevator & enter the apartment which was 3 floors up. The absolutely amazing view of the Seattle skyline hit us right in the face when we walked in.
 I quickly do my "scan for the good stuff"... surprisingly, there was still good stuff left. I nabbed some ornate Borghese trinket boxes which I was super surprised that an antique dealer had not scooped up, a beautiful little hand painted cabinet, a couple of sweet round occasional tables, a cool assortment of hobnail glass & because the sale was over & I was the last one in, it was all 50% off. NICE! 

So I've gathered my goodies & i'm doing the last look around, reflecting on the fact that this was the last of these peoples worldly treasures when I spot this lonely cardboard box in the corner with what looks like a chunk of wood sticking out. As the lady is wrapping up my treasures, I go take a quick peek. Low & behold, there in the box, are thee biggest pine cones I have ever seen! They are giants! My mind starts wandering as to where in world they could be from... the mystical redwood forest maybe? I scoop them up & add them to my pile. They are the real treasures :) 
All weekend they were buried in the back of our truck in the box they had been in for, Im very sure, a reeally long time. I brought them in the house when we got home & laid them all out, big to small. This is a collection. A collection of memories from someones life! There are giant ones & tiny ones. Smooth ones & prickly ones. Shiny ones & iridescent ones. Natural memoirs of good times & trips gone by in a cardboard box in the leftovers of these folks fancy Seattle apartment was the best find of all :)

UPDATE! :)
I've had a bunch of questions as to what the pieces are in this bird bath so here goes...
There are 20 pieces in this birdbath all together...
 #1-the bottom piece is a large plate. I've heard that old microwave plates work well for this & you can cover them with dirt or mulch.
 #2- a bowl with a square foot. 
#3- a square decanter. 
#'s 4,5,6,7,8,9,10 are custard bowls. 
#11 is the large pickle dish with handles,
#'s 12,13 & 14 are more custard dishes. 
#15 is a cut glass candle holder. 
#16 (which is sort of hidden inside #15) is a smaller cut glass candle holder.
#17 is the twin of 16 turned upside down.
#18 is the small pickle dish with handles.
#19 is the finial (top, lid) from #3 (the square decanter) 
last but not least, #20 is my little black & clear swirled birdie! 
I find if you use thicker glass everything is much sturdier & use quite a bit of glue & allow to dry very thoroughly, gluing 2, maybe 3 pieces together at a time. I'm creating my next one with mostly all pieces of glass with a familiar vintage pattern called Early American Prescut Pattern by Anchor Hocking. It's also called the Star of David pattern & I think everyone had a cream & covered sugar bowl in their home! It's been fun finding pieces to make the bird bath & I'm almost ready to start gluing! :)