Thrift Store Deals..

Every once in a while I like to post about great deals that I find at thrift stores. Personally I think they have even better deals than shopping resale stores, but it takes more patience. One thing to remember is that you are probably not going to walk into a thrift store and pick everything that you need right off the rack that day like Target. Instead you have to focus on buying things that you need as you come across them and I even buy ahead for the next size up. I only buy things that are in great condition, never things that are stained, badly pilled or ripped. If you get home and find a small stain that you didn't see, it's OK because you didn't pay that much for it.

Today was black Friday and I only hit one retail store and the rest was thrift stores. Some of the stores had 25% off or buy one get one free type of sales. Right now we have to buy clothes for 5 children, soon to be 6. I don't have room in the budget to buy everything new, and besides, why would you when you can get so much nice stuff for so little? Plus it's very eco-friendly to "recycle" clothing buy using it again. Americans waste so much including clothing so don't think that it's all pilled and faded junk like it was years ago. You would be surprised how many items still have tags on them.

Everything that I purchased today came to $16.00 at one store and $22.00 at the second store for a total of $38.00 for five skirts, three pairs of pants, three boys shirts, one jogging suit and 7 girls shirts.

Shown here is two girl shirts, two boy shirts and one dress pants. The plaid shirt is Izod, the dress pants are Old Navy, the pink shirt is Kohl's brand and blue one is Old Navy.

Same clothes as above except showing a purple skirt and jeans from The Limited Too.

Same clothes as above except showing a pink Arizona brand suit for Savanna.

My children (at least for now) don't care about what brand something is, they only care about how it looks and the girls like "girly" clothes. I am highlighting brand names because I know that it's an issue for a lot of people. Notice above the shirts are from Candies (Kohl's), Tommy Hilfiger, Old Navy, The Children's Place and The Limited Too....

These four skirts are Gasoline, The Children's Place, Old Navy and Talbot's Kids...

Overview of some of the clothes.

Olivia's favorite is the jean skirt with the colored buttons and this pink shirt with lace.

I'd Rather Be WEIRD!!!

For those of you that are Dave Ramsey fanatics like we are you will probably recognize that saying already. For those of you who don't: Dave Ramsey has a famous saying that "NORMAL" in American is broke. If you don't want to be broke -than you must be WEIRD. I'd rather be weird. With five kids to clothe and our quest to be completely debt free I have started to shop more and more at resale stores. I know that garage sales tend to be cheaper overall than resale stores, but there are several reasons why I like resale so much.

1. With five kids to find clothes for it is easier to go to a store where the clothes are already divided in sizes.
2. Gas prices are sky high and it's so hit or miss with garage sales. You might hit a load of great bargains or you might drive all around town and find 3 items for your time and gas. Time is worth money too.
3. When you shop used you are saving a lot of clothes from the landfill and that is great for the environment as well as the wallet.

Years ago Goodwill and the Salvation Army carried goods that had that definite "old" look to them. Everything was worn out and pilled. With America's great love of spending, and dumping out perfectly good items, it's easy to get great deals. I challenge anyone to point out in my kids closets which items I bought new and which ones were purchased second-hand. After wearing an item for one time it looks exactly the same.

Each season all of the kids usually need new clothes in the next size up. This spring after seeing all of the kids down in the garden (in the mud) with their dad, I realized that we really needed "play clothes" along with regular ones. In the past the kids would just play outside in their regular clothes and I would just treat the stains. Now I realized that it would be great if they had clothes that they could just get into anything with and I wouldn't care. I was able to find a lot of items for each child for usually less than $1.00. It is definitely worth it.

All of the clothing pictured here cost me $14.24 at Goodwill and $36.02 at The Rustic Market. Grand total of $50.26. Not everything was pictured because they have already worn some of the items. Olivia got: 8 pairs of shorts/skorts, 10 shirts including 2 long sleeve for this fall. Isaac got: 6 pairs of shorts, 13 shirts total including 3 long sleeve for the fall. Savanna got one outfit, Justin got a spiderman t-shirt and Logan got a pair of dress shoes.

One last note: did you notice that there were some designer items in there? Isaac got Tommy Hilfiger jeans, an Izod shirt and U of M shirt. Olivia got a lot of Old Navy and Children's Place clothes. I could care less what brand something is as long as it looks good and is in good condition but a lot of people care about brand names. I come across a lot of Aeropostale, Gap and Old Navy clothes. It would be easy to stay in designer brand if that's something you worry about.