$5 Early Christmas Shopping!

Today is "Fun Find Friday!" And oh how giddy I have been inside (and a little bit outside) to share today's features. Boy do I have some "fun" that I "found" that I am so delighted to share about!!

(P.S. What do you think of the new look and design of the blog!?)

If you know me well, I am my mother's and my father's daughter, not just because they conceived, bore, and raised me. I am a hoarder, and even worse a cheap hoarder, which I am sure I get from BOTH parents. But I like to think I do it responsibly and not over bearingly...I hope.

With this idea in mind, I LOVE, LOVE, to go shopping around for second hand items, because great chances are they are still in good condition (and if they aren't then I am not gonna waste my money on it), but because they are used, they no longer have that first-hand, up front costly price, which I am sure you all are aware of, that's a no brainier ( I hope). So long story short, I am so so EXCITED about this little treat I found at our local second hand store (Deseret Industries, aka DI), and well to be totally honest, I am prob more excited about it than my little girl will be when she gets it this Christmas (maybe because I secretly always wanted one of these as a little kid). Okay, enough of the suspense building up, I will share in on my excitement by showing you what I found at DI for only 5 whoppin bucks, yep, that's right 5!

 Just now (within 5 seconds or less, I found this same EXACT kitchen online and the cheapest I could see it listed as was $45- Yeah baby- now this is a FUN find! The only thing that seems to be missing from it is the the "sink facet" things, but for $40 dollars cheaper- I'll take it! Plus, another bonus side to this is that because I bought it used I didn't have to assemble it (after reading some reviews on it, that seemed to be the biggest pet peeve of those who purchased this new was that it was in a million pieces when they opened the box, ha ha, I didn't have to assemble it! )

I have ALWAYS loved and wanted one of these as a little girl so I am so excited I found a good cheap one for my little girl, and maybe since I always wanted one it will be more enticing for me to want to play with her :)

Another fun plus about this, is that even though there will prob come a day when my little girl wont find this thing as fun, I know that my other children down the road can still enjoy it, and after that (as long as it doesn't fall apart), in the longer distant future, if and when we might have an in home preschool then it would be one less fun dramatic play furniture we would have to buy. Can you tell I am super excited about this!?

On other fun notes...See all these yummy looking fake foods!? I got them for FREEEEEE! Each basket full can run anywhere from $17-$50 (depending on what kind of food you are getting and all that), and even though there are two baskets here, it is three baskets worth of food minus a few. This wonderful gift is what I like to call the perks of being a hard worker, good friend of and acquaintance of a child loving advocate. Yes I know that is quite the mouth full. I got these for free because of my work and internship last fall. At the time I was working on campus as the preschool's lab assistant, since I was an assistant I worked under one of the most amazing teachers I have ever had- who loves to support and help children in any way she can. I was also working at my internship at the Children's museum, the same time as working. We were getting ready to put together an exhibit for Thanksgiving, but with the museums very limited budget, it quickly became disappointing to how much we didn't really have to add to this new exhibit. We had some good overall decorations of the room, but it REALLY lacked some good fun fake play food that could be used to roll play in the Thanksgiving feast. Maybe I am wrong, but I think the food part would be pretty important, and could really add to a more fun meaningful experience for the children coming in. Well long story short (sorry I am always giving out long stories!) I happened to one day at work causally mention to this amazing teacher how I was disturbed that we didn't have any fun fake food to add the exhibit. All it took was this ONE tiny mention and the next day at work she had bought these three baskets and said she would like to donate them to the exhibit! I hope I can have the means to be super generous like her someday. She also told me that since it was ALOT of food, that to only give the museum the foods that relate to the Thanksgiving meal and what I thought would go with it (one of them had a turkey, and many breads, corn, you know- the likes of what you'd see at that sort of meal) and that whatever was left over I could keep for myself and use for my own children- even more so generous! This lady will always stand out in my eyes as amazing. So long story short again- I got these free and they will go PERFECTLY with the new little Kitchen!!

My little girl will have just turned one a week before Christmas- I know she will prob be a little too little still at this time, but I think it will be a fun start, and I am just so excited I don't know if I could wait any longer to let her start playing with it!

Speaking of fun finds for this fine Friday- if you enter into this amazing giveaway, maybe you could win the $15 Amazon gift card and get some fun early Christmas shopping done as well (or by any other fun stuff that suits your pleasures!) The giveaway ends tomorrow, May 7th at 11:59pm- so hurry quick and join in, and check out the blog while you are at it- it just might give a "Fun Find Friday" sort of feeling, cuz it has some neat stuff! To enter the giveaway go HERE.

That's all for today on this lovely "Fun Find Friday!" What fun finds have you come across lately!?

Until next time!.....