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84 Comments

  1. Lisa Garber
    February 4, 2014 @ 9:29 am

    EVERY post – every.single.one. – convinces me yet again that you are crazy-in-a-good-way. I love you! And Paul! lol

    Reply

    • natalie
      February 5, 2014 @ 5:10 pm

      You have the BEST.STUFF.EVER!

      Reply

  2. Jenn
    February 4, 2014 @ 9:35 am

    Great job!! Love the tarps…. thank goodness you didn’t buy those blue ones!

    My husband has a thing for car parts… so I can totally relate to your Craigslist angst. I can’t tell you how many times we’ve driven to get car parts… including the trip from Louisiana to Albuquerque, NM, and then back again with a ’69 Firebird BODY (just the car’s body!) strapped to the bed of a pickup truck (we did manage to see Carlsbad Caverns and eventually convinced our 4 month old son to get back into his car seat!), and the one from IL to DE to get an engine (which allowed us to visit family for Thanksgiving, but still…)

    Enjoy your headboard!! Can’t wait to see how you make it all turn out fabulous!

    Reply

  3. Garden, Home and Party
    February 4, 2014 @ 9:40 am

    The suspense is killing me…when will part 3 be at a blog site near me. I want to know that this bed was made to work with a queen sized mattress and see it looking stately in your room. I love the looks of the bed. Did the guy selling it share the provenience with you, can you go back and buy one of those rugs for me?
    xo,
    Karen

    Reply

  4. Jessica@CapeofDreams
    February 4, 2014 @ 9:42 am

    Your saga is currently going much better than the one that I am enduring with my counters, but I have hope that both will turn out well. Can’t wait to see that gorgeous bed set up in all its glory.

    Reply

  5. Sunnie Mitchell
    February 4, 2014 @ 9:43 am

    Always good to have a magic spell, always. (And always good to have a spare extra-large tarp. Just in case.) What a glorious headboard – worth $300 just for the headboard!

    Reply

  6. Anne @ Planting Sequoias
    February 4, 2014 @ 9:57 am

    I wish I had a barn/workshop/junk room filled with incredible antiques. Like those rugs, for instance! WHY are they just carpeting his barn and not gracing my dining room?

    Reply

  7. Sarah
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:08 am

    Can’t wait to see it in all its glory!! What a find!

    Reply

  8. Laurie
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:13 am

    I do love Paul a little because he lets your freak flag fly and that truly is love.

    The rugs on the guy’s floor are killing me. I’m sure they have become hopless in his shop but it still kills me because they used to be beautiful and you can’t generally convince me that things can’t be saved. And yes, I’m the person who is still nursing the Christmas poinsettias.

    Reply

  9. Mel (MSkiKnits)
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:16 am

    I always squeal with delight each time an update comes to my mailbox! You make me want to sell my beach home, move to the mainland and buy an old Victorian home to have 1/4 the fun you are! And your husband…I want to give give him a hi-5 and tell him ladies (and gents to I suppose) are cheering for him!
    I never tire of your posts! (and my favourite is the one where you share about you & your best friend’s adventures together…the shower curtain you two decorated! Thinking of it always makes me smile and wish that everyone everywhere could have a friendship like that shower curtain embodies)
    Much aloha and Mahalo Nui!

    Reply

  10. Alex @ northstory
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:20 am

    Ok I need and I repeat NEED to see photos of this in your car on the way home.

    And the rest of his storage room would have turned me into a episode of Canadian Pickers without him even realizing it.

    Reply

    • karen
      February 4, 2014 @ 3:14 pm

      Yes I agree we need a part III to the bed saga and it should definitely include pics of you car with the bed strapped on top and you inside chanting….

      Reply

  11. ronda
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:25 am

    Victoria this is genius. Once I found a piece I couldn’t live without 4 hours from home when my husband was on a business trip. It was a huge gun cabinet covered in antlers, which I would convert to a china cabinet. We rented a u-haul to take it home, then realized we had nothing to hitch it to…and had to take our car to have a hitch welded onto it only to be removed when we got home. My husband is still not quite over it. But it’s the best china cabinet ever.

    Reply

  12. Catherine
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:33 am

    I think the thing my husband got out of this was…that Paul has a clamp-silo. “See? I’m not the only one!” oh. Yes. My husband does have a clamp-silo, too. His grandfather’s clamps, his father’s clamps, his own clamps….some yard sale clamps, some new clamps. Clamps clamps clamps. Yep. That’s what he got from this post! And then…”Yep, you do that stuff to me, too.” sigh.

    Reply

  13. Michelle @ Bianchi's Barn
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:35 am

    I was going to suggest you get a truck or at least a trailer to transport your future acquisitions, but then I realized strapping way-too-big stuff to the roof of your car adds immensely to the crazy-fun.

    Reply

    • Victoria Elizabeth Barnes
      February 5, 2014 @ 8:51 am

      What I really need is a forklift or possibly a crane. That way I will not be limited in what I can acquire.

      Reply

  14. Diana C.
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:36 am

    You mean you didn’t have Paul distract (or hog tie) the guy briefly so you could take a minute or two and explore? Those rugs alone beckon and hold the promise of more just beyond that… uh… black “drape”.

    I see old stained mattresses and shall tell a tale my sister in-law and BFF, Lisa, lived through one Saturday morning exploring some out buildings of a dumpy used “antique” furniture (and everything else) store, located in an unfashionable zip code part of town, called “Emmett’s”. The name says it all and following the store’s pot-bellied, wifebeater-wearing namesake through a maze of stained mattresses, we were supposed to be impressed that one particularly grody one belonged to an attorney. Thank goodness he didn’t give us the name; and I’m sure he knew it, for he all but had each mattress named with their histories to match!

    Now, Emmett took a bit of a shine to my beautiful, tall, blonde sis in-law and gave her his special undivided attention. Knowing her aversion to all things “icky”, I purposely lagged behind in these dark hallows of smell, dust, and evidence of debauchery, to snicker hysterically under my breath as Lisa smiled politely at her would-be suiter, only to turn around intermittently and hiss, “GET ME OUTTA HERE!!!”

    The antiques were reproductions; and after being told to look at appliances upstairs, which was unlighted, and to stomp on the (rickety and the only true antique) floorboards if we “saw something we liked”, we gracefully and swiftly made our exit. Actually, Lisa ran, gagging, to the car with the speed of a gazelle. I made my way there doubled-over laughing.

    Leaving empty-handed, it took the rest of the day to get the smell out of our noses, but the images, and story, is forever burned into our brain (read nightmares). To this day, neither of us can look at a used mattress without reliving the horror. The End.

    Reply

    • pj
      February 4, 2014 @ 6:28 pm

      Great story! Last year after ‘sourcing’ (professional term, translated as ‘hunting for old stuff’) 2 antique cast iron mantels through a Craigslist ad, I convinced my husband we should rescue them from a very scary part of a big city 2.5 hrs. away. We didn’t realize until AFTER we’d accompanied 2 men we knew nothing about– to the basement of an otherwise abandoned warehouse, via a very old cage style freight elevator– that we hadn’t told anyone else where we were going. Since the men knew we had brought at least $1000 in cash, we could’ve been walking into a trap where we’d be robbed, beaten, & left for dead while the guys drove off in our truck. But all turned out well & the mantels have been sandblasted & powdercoated, awaiting installation in their new home with 6 identical siblings (mantels). The End

      Reply

      • Andie
        February 4, 2014 @ 6:37 pm

        This is why I always add stream of consciousness commentary about my husband being a police officer… and guns… and letting other people know where I will be…when I am having a phone conversation with a Craigslist seller.
        My husband really IS a police officer but you could lie. How would they know?

        🙂

        Andie

        Reply

        • pj
          February 5, 2014 @ 6:23 pm

          Several years ago I had a bad experience with a scam artist who listed various expensive cosmetics on eBay. I only received half my order but she refused to send the rest. When I asked for a refund, she threatened to send one of her goons to hurt me. I reported the transaction to eBay, but should’ve reported her to the USPS & the police. Anyway, I wasn’t anyone would actually follow up. Instead I told her I was a private detective, which was true–I had worked for a security company a couple of years earlier & still had a license from the State. I didn’t hear anymore from her, but I got enough people to file complaints & got her suspended from eBay. She may have just created a new username, but I still felt somewhat vindicated! 🙂

          Reply

  15. Lynne Hoover
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:41 am

    I CANNOT WAIT to see this bed in its final resting place. Pun. Who but you would get a fantastic Victorian bed for $300? W.O.W.

    Reply

  16. judy
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:47 am

    I swear we have picked up huge mattresses-TVs etc. and even though we embark with a smiling sun and bluebird’s on our shoulders we wind up (buying tarps) and driving through the second flood. Ha! also different from your experience is my husbands refrain. “I can’t understand why you ALWAYS do this!” “Learn to check the weather beforehand.” I do not respond-mainly because I am busy biting my tongue and ignoring the resultant blood flow. AnyHoo. I am thrilled that you have secured further Bona Fides that you are the Queen of Craig’s list…..but wow! you don’t take the easier path to anything, do you? The beauty of the results though are well worth the effort-Right?

    Reply

  17. Mellissa Rose
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:53 am

    You are a perfect person. I love you in a totally non-creepy way.

    Reply

  18. My Crappy Housev
    February 4, 2014 @ 10:56 am

    You’re getting good at the cliffhanger. I didn’t see this one coming…

    Reply

  19. maria
    February 4, 2014 @ 11:10 am

    you ramble, you digress, you are a judy blume character grown up. you are a delightful, creative genious who inspires me to paint things sparkly and drag furniture in through a window. thank you, Muse…

    Reply

  20. Kiki
    February 4, 2014 @ 11:12 am

    O…M…..G……. 🙂

    Reply

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