I spent the last five days in beautiful Big Bear Lake with my family.

The view from our room

Among water skiing, boating, fishing and relaxing, Big Bear is a prime location for picking. Along the main Blvd. from Big Bear Lake and into Big Bear City (a stretch of about 7-10 miles), there are well over half a dozen thrift stores. We arrived on Friday which meant I had an entire Saturday to engage in some local yard saling and thrift shopping.

Yard saling was slow going, though. But, if you endure long enough, there is almost always a treasure worth seeking somewhere along the route.

Meet the bearded boys! They. Had. The. Most. AWESOME. Stuff!

A vintage gasoline pump with the original pumping mechanism on the inside that I’m pretty sure they had no intention of selling but I made an offer they couldn’t refuse.

I was like a kid in a candy shop at their house! I bought a set of antique theatre seats that are UHMAZING! They had some fabulous antique furniture that I had to pass up in order to get the antique seats and the gas pump home. But, they threw in some of the most gorgeously chipped enamel pots, one of which is yellow and orange. I’ve NEVER seen a yellow enamel pot! 

One of the guys says to me, “hey…come check out the inside of the house.” Under normal circumstance, a man with a lumberjack beard, tattoos all over the place, a cigarette hanging out of the mouth and a “Fed Sex” shirt inviting me into his house would be a MAJOR RED FLAG…but not this guy. I just knew his house was cool!

I walked through his front door (which had hand made stained glass windows) and was transported into an old west style saloon! These guys hand crafted a saloon for their living room!

On the top of the saloon bar was hand burned art.

These guys are super talented and have an amazing eye for antique finds and vintage decor.

I was begging them to sell me the old tin Coca Cola sign with no luck.

It was so much fun sharing stories with these guys and made for one great day of picking!

The other really neat piece I found in Big Bear was a unique chandelier.

I loved it when I saw it but it is so different from my usual style. I sent a picture to one of my antiquing buddies asking for his opinion. He said “GET IT!”

I did some research, and I believe this is an Italian made Tole Chandelier from the 1950’s. I haven’t done much more digging than that, but who cares where and when it came from. It’s just downright cool and I’m excited to have a unique lighting fixture for the new store space!

Oh yeah…about that! You may be asking yourself…”wait, she was on vacation? I thought the store was moving this last weekend. That can’t be right!”

Well…I was on vacation while my team back home spent the weekend and first part of this week moving.

In some regard, I felt guilty about enjoying myself knowing that a dozen plus people were working on my behalf to move furniture, paint walls, install lights, crown molding and baseboards. While the business-minded, leader and go-getter part of me was itching to be part of the moving action and lend a helping hand, the mom/wife part of me (that gave up a real-paying career with full benefits and a car to be a better mom/wife) couldn’t wait to get away and enjoy the scenery and outdoor fun.

And, I did enjoy it…taking a nap in the middle of the day with my two-year old, fishing with my five year old, water skiing with my husband, BBQing with my in-laws…

I enjoyed my time away because I didn’t have a single thing to worry about, knowing that Macy, Caitlin, Mom, Dad, Patti and soooo many other people helped to move everything across the street, and are continuing to help with the set up of the new store. I’m so blessed with an amazing support team that “handles business…” literally!

I did leave my husband and kids behind to come home a couple of days early to help get things set up and I’m really excited about how it is all shaping up.

But, that is a blog post all in itself sometime in the next couple of days!

We will be working feverishly over the next couple of days to get things up and running in time for our Paint and Play this weekend and National Night Out this Tuesday night. And, though the store is a disaster, stop by to peek through the windows to check our progress!