My sister and her kids are still visiting from New York, and it seems like our days are go, go, go from the moment we wake up until we finally crash into bed, usually after midnight. It will end up being an almost three week visit, and I will need a vacation to recover from it all by next week. Mind you, I’m not complaining. I hate that my sister lives 3,000 miles away.
So rude.
Here are a few photos from our frugalicious fun: Hiking up to Wahclella Falls in the Columbia Gorge, photo courtesy of my sister’s iPhone and her groovy panorama function. (Click on the photo to enlarge.)
Finding odd things at Goodwill, such as an official Cirque Du Soleil souvenir dress. Who buys a dress as a souvenir?! Actually, it was kind of cool. Also, I will forever and always take photo while holding a dress in front in front of my middle-aged spread. Suuuper flattering.
And finding wonderful and wacky thrift shop finds like this gem:
There’s so much going on with her I don’t even where to start! First of all, the arms come from the front like horrific pointed pepper breasts. Which of course means . . . no arms. She also appears to have just given birth to a cabbage. (Makes me wonder about who the father was.) And best of all are her googly eyes. I ♥ googly eyes, which featured prominently on every craft project from 1972 – 1979, which incidentally were my prime crafting years. I’m dubbing her “Carmen Mir-What The Hell.”
Thrifting is such great entertainment!
And let us not omit our bestest and most wonderful frugal social summer activity, which was STAR TREK IN THE PARK!
And you guessed right, this year’s production was The Trouble With Tribbles. Sadly, this end’s Atomic Arts’ “five year mission,” which means that next summer will be sadly devoid of Star Trek goodness.
So sad . . .
Good thing I have five more days before my sister flies back to New York. Are you enjoying your summer months? Please share your frugal fun in the comments section below.
Katy Wolk-Stanley
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
Hmmmm . . . . has my redhaired grandson sprouted extra hands? Please advise.
Hmmm . . has my redhaired grandson sprouted extra hands in the last few days?
That Carmen Mir-whattheheck is startlingly creepy. But you missed purchasing the souviner Niagra Falls plate in the background. Or did you score that buy? I’ll bet it was reasonable. Does anyone seriously have these plates? Every Goodwill I have ever shopped has at least one of them. The one person who bought them must be unloading them now.
Sound like you’re having a wonderful summer with your sister and family. Good for you!
This is our first summer in Austin, and we are pleasantly surprised at the amount of free activities. Firstly, all of the neighborhood pools in the city are free and quite a few have 1.5 ft. deep pools…which are perfect for my water-loving, yet not quite swimming independently 3 + 5 year olds. Univ. of TX also has great free days and activities. Their TX Memorial Museum, we’ve dubbed the dinosaur museum, is always free. Their art museum is free on Thurs., has lots of kids’ activities, and even has a free separate art lab. You do have to pay for parking, but it’s cheap compared to what you’d pay for admission for three or four. We’ve also found that every city has free movies in the park, free concerts in the park, and many, many kid-inspired activities like Bubblepalooza. Add on all of that, we actually have natural creeks and bodies of water to romp in. This is my husband and I’s first summer where we can actually enjoy being outside rather than having to flee indoors as we did in Phoenix. It’s absolutely glorious (except having to drive far since living closer in to all of the fun free activities is insane).
We have concerts in the park too. My daughter and I went to an extreme couponing class that was really couponong 101 because finding coupons for real food is difficult. Having family potluck s are fun as well. I’m having fun watching the grandchildren play.
my cousin would so wear that dress
I think the dress would be pretty cute with black leggings and your red shoes! But who knew such a thing as souvenir dress even existed?
But that Carmen Miranda thing is scary! Wish my Sally Ann had such entertaining oddities.
This summer we have really enjoyed our local children’s museum. It is free on Wednesday afternoons. We have also taken advantage of the 50 cent ice cream cones at Burger King. My kids think that this is a huge treat! But, our favorite frugal activity will always be the library. Free books, movies, and audio CD’s. Plus, we all participated in the summer reading program and earned all sorts of fun prizes.
We have enjoyed our Children’s Museum this summer. It is free on Wednesday afternoons. My kids have had lots of fun at many different local free parks and walking trails too. We have also taken advantage of the 50 cent ice cream cones at Burger King. My kids think that this is a huge treat! But our favorite frugal activity is always the library. Free books, movies, and audio CDs. Plus, we all participated in the summer reading program and earned all kinds of fun prizes.
Katy, you didn’t wear a Redshirt to the Star Trek event, therefore you are making a statement that you are NOT expendable 🙂
We took our 2.5-yo twin daughters on their first CAMPING TRIP!!! Camping is frugal in a lot of ways: you pay 10-20% for overnight stays (state park-v-motel), you pay grocery store prices instead of restaurant prices for food, your entertainment is nature and each other (hiking = free!, swimming = free!, campfire songs = free!). We already own the major equipment, except for a camp stove and giant cooler, but were able to borrow those (free!) Our family of 4 took an 8-day vacation, and spent less than $1,200 including gas. That’s less than $40 per person per day, thank you very much. It would have been much cheaper, but we had to travel about 800 miles from our home in San Antonio to find a place with both water and daytime highs near or below 90.
A camping vacation is frugal in another way, too. I didn’t quit my job from stress and frustration, so we saved BIG TIME.
Love the panoramic photo!
As to the Cirque du Soleil dress, I have a confession: I own three pieces of C d S wear. The first is a “sweatshirt” made of thin woven cotton, awesome for preventing sunburn when working out-of-doors in the heat. The second is a sleeveless T with a cool “two-faced” design that I wear with any black skirt, pants or shorts. The last, a spaghetti-strap tank top, still has the (sale) price tag on it, alas. I am just not a spaghetti-strap kind of girl any more. The first item I purchased in the euphoria of exiting the first show ever in Los Angeles. (The one where they had enough money to get to LA, but had to earn the money to get back home. True story.) The other two items came after seeing other shows where the tickets were FREE.
Please don’t hold these splurges against me… At least I wear two out of three. Sure got a good laugh out of your photo. No amount of post-Soleil euphoria would have convinced me to slap down the dough for that one.
Hi Katy, just wondering: I posted a (pithy and illuminating, of course)comment here and it didn’t show up. I tried again and it said I had already posted a comment. A week later and no comment. What am I doing wrong? I’ve never had this trouble and I try to only make useful comments here, as I so appreciate your message. Help!
[WORDPRESS HASHCASH] The poster sent us ‘0 which is not a hashcash value.