News & Reviews: The ReStore of Levittown, Pennsylvania

While en route to other thrift shops in the Oxford Valley and Langhorne area a few weeks ago, I was fortuitously caught at a red light when I spotted a sign for ReStore. Surrounded by stores in a crowded commercial plaza, I was unsure of what to find in this unexpected thrift detour.  

A discount home improvement store that benefits the Habitat For Humanity in building and repairing homes in the Philadelphia area and beyond, ReStore typically offers preowned furniture, decor, and usable home furnishings. And don't let this small storefront fool you. Once you walk through the door, shoppers are greeted with a sign that assures 10,000 square feet of goods...downstairs. 

I should've gotten a panorama shot, to truly give you an idea of just how large this ReStore was, despite its deceptively small storefront. Deep in the guts of the building was a spread of sofas, tables, cabinets, lighting, doors, fixtures, office furniture, decor, and a highly organized book and media corner. Clean, well-lit, and fully-staffed, this ReStore was a welcome pitstop in my thrift trip.

And the prices were spectacular. I didn't find anything I needed in the way of home goods, but I will definitely be looking again in the future. Though it should be said that if I had the available space, there were definitely things that I wanted. 

So I snapped a few photos with my iPad, forked over a quarter for a fashion book, and left feeling that I had found some new secondhand stomping ground. 

This ReStore is located at 1337 E Lincoln Highway Levittown, PA 19056 

A Sweet Little Storage Solution for 99 Cents

In following my own advice, I took to Facebook to find some thrifty tips on sales and other secondhand happenings. Lo and behold, one of my top spots was having a huge rummage sale all week long. So I drove to Feasterville, PA to check out the goods. And oh, what a rummage sale it was. 

In hindsight, I should have taken photos of the rows and rows of totes filled to the brim with assorted bric-a-brac. But to be honest, I was a little overwhelmed by the mysteries within those totes just waiting to be unearthed.

According to the Impact Facebook page, they were recently flooded with small-item donations that were just too much for the staff to process and price. So they decided to pack 'em all up in totes...load those totes on wooden pallets and ship them out to all four of the Impact locations in Pennsylvania. And lucky me, there they were. All lined up and ready, everything inside those totes was just 99 cents each. 

So I rolled up my sleeves and proceeded with my very first thrift-dig. It was damn near archeological.  I'm not kidding. Young and old alike, thrifters hovered over those totes, digging through the great unknown and pulling  out all kinds of secondhand artifacts. It was so much fun, in fact, I went back to the Feasterville location a second day this week and to the Montgomeryville location once as well. 

I will be focusing on some of the found items individually, like in this post. And I'll also be doing a grand thrift wrap-up just to recap the experience. 

But as per this particular find... I saw that poof of faux flowers hiding beneath a pile of Christmas decorations. I moved some things aside and pulled out a creamy white tin with not a single scratch or dent.  This lovely tin used to hold Bon Bons. Now it's the perfect little storage piece for all my hair ties, headbands and bows. 

Now, isn't that sweet? 

A Lovely Little Desktop Addition

It's not that my desk was bare. As my reference material, reading and writing projects prove, that's hardly the case. But following a recent purge of excess items to my Etsy shop and to the donation bin, my desk seemed to be all business. After moving a few things around, I decided it needed something new. 

It needed something fun, something whimsical. Something like this vintage silhouette Wallace Berrie & Co 1978 frame. I scored this swinging silhouette from Goodwill for $1.97 and knew just where to put it. 

And if you're wondering why that name sounds familiar, Wallace Berrie & Co...also known as Russ...also known as Applause... was the manufacturing epicenter for quirky-cute finds of the 70s and 80s. Remember troll dolls? Smurfs? Those wide-eyed "I love you this much" resin statues? We have Wallace Berrie & Co to thank for all that. 

What lovely thrift shop additions have you found lately?