Thrifting Treasures | Autumn Charity Shop Finds for My English Cottage

If you've ever walked into your home and felt like something's missing, not a thing but kind of a feeling, then this video is for you. Autumn always reminds me how much our homes shape the way we feel. The soft light and the worn fabrics, the familiar colours, they quietly hold the seasons with us. I've just come back from my favourite little jumble sale and as I unpack the pieces I've found, I wanted to talk about what it really means to make a space feel yours. Not picture perfect by any means, just warm and inviting and honest. The kind of home that greets you at the door and says, hey come on in, you can rest now, let's have a nice cup of tea. I think one of the loveliest things about creating a home is that it doesn't have to make sense to anyone but you. It doesn't need to follow a style or match a picture you've seen online, it just needs to feel like yours. When someone walks through your front door, you should get a little glimpse into who you are. The books you read, the colours you're drawn to, the mugs you always reach for first, those small ordinary details say so much more than any new piece of furniture ever could. I like the idea that a home can tell its story quietly, you know, through the chipped jug that always holds flowers from the garden, or the blanket that it's a bit too frayed to be pretty but too soft to throw away. And the older I get the more I realise that the spaces that feel the most comforting are the ones built slowly, not by shopping for what's popular and just furnishing a home in one click purchase, but by collecting what makes your heart lift a little bit. There's a certain charm in a mismatched plate, I love a mismatched plate, or a faded print, or a chair that's seen those better days but still fits perfectly in that corner. They're the kind of things that make a house feel alive and that's why I love charity shops, you know, you never quite know what you'll find but sometimes that's the best part. You walk in with no plan and you walk out with something that feels like it was just waiting for you. A teacup that reminds you of your grandmother's kitchen, a painting that makes you smile every time you walk past it, or a lampshade that casts the coziest golden light in the evenings. It's not about creating someone else's home, it's about creating one that couldn't belong to anyone but you. So fill your space with things that inspire you, things that make you feel something even if no one else quite understands why, because when you do that your home becomes more than just a place you live, it becomes a reflection of the life you're quietly building, one cozy imperfect wonderfully you piece at a time. I do present to you one of the greatest charity shop thrift jumble sale hauls of all time in my opinion. Now you can't see everything in frame right now but I recently went to the jumble sale which I went to last year. If you've been here for over a year or so then you will remember my jumble sale last year. I love it, I'm so passionate about it, I will travel and I will go. Thankfully it's kind of where my husband's parents were where my husband grew up so it's nice to just go back there but we have come home with some stuff and we didn't spend a lot but it may seem like we did with the amount of stuff that we got and I say we, my daughter and I went and we had a lovely time and I just wanted to share with you a bit of a thrift haul and show you everything we bought. It's exciting where to even start because it you'll have to forgive me it's quite early in the morning the only time I could gather a whole bunch of stuff including pottery and things like that and have it be safe is you know early in the morning and so before the children wake up and when they wake up I'm gonna have to quickly move everything I've got things all gathered on the floor. First I'll take you through a few of the things that you can see and then I'll take through the things that you can't see and it's all very very exciting. Okay it's been a while since I did a charity shop haul so this feels good. Put you over there. Okay oh first thing I'll start with are these cushions. Now if you've been to my house I have quite a few cushions and sometimes in the lounge you have to move them around to be able to sit down which isn't always ideal. I'm trying to be selective but I do really like cushions. I grew up in a house full of beds and everything now I have sacrificed the ones on the bed and but I won't sacrifice the ones on the dining room bench or the sofas. So I found some lovely cushions and this one is giving me that kind of cottage vintage vibe that fits in well with the house and I have no idea where it's from. It says Culpeper the herbalist. I have no idea where that's from but it has got some lovely detail that cottage kind of red and green and it's very inspiring to me and I really like having things in the house that are inspiring to me. So there's this one and then I actually found with it, now this needs a bit of a wash I'll give this a wash, but I found this with it next to it and I thought that was a really cute pair and this has got this beautiful frill around the edge. It feels kind of vintage and like a feather duck feather inside and it's got some lovely frills and some green patterns around and I thought again that was a nice neutral colour and that kind of pairs well with this. I just love them both so I've been using that on my armchair in the lounge. But the next thing I got with this was this very sweet coffee pot. They have so many varieties of pots and pans and crockery and plant pots and baskets and everything. It's just it's an enormous amount and I found this and thought I really really like this. It's this kind of vintage green coffee canister, ceramic, nice clean, you know all the stuff and I thought that was a nice vintage element to bring into the kitchen. Okay the next thing I picked up was a bunch of wooden utensils and I have been cleaning them to my heart's content. Let's see I've got some more down here, a whole bunch, when I mean a bunch I really did get a bunch and then also some little wooden spoons here as well. Some of them are yeah they're good good quality and I really like having wooden utensils around. I think I'll just give them a lemon and what's the thing you do? Lemon and something. A bunch of those and then also this quite little cute utensil holder that has got a hole in it. I think you're supposed to put it on the wall and I thought that was really cute but I've been keeping this in my little baking corner and I might put it on the wall at some point. We still need to put panelling in our kitchen and so I'm sort of holding off putting things on the kitchen walls but as of when the panelling is up and the pegs are up and all things like that I think I might add in a bunch of stuff to hang on the walls and things so. And then I also got this, I don't really know but paper organiser? I think it could be a paper organiser. That's what I bought it as, I bought it thinking our homeschool drawer is a little bit crazy and this would slot perfectly inside and then I'm going to line up all of the homeschool books, papers, things like that just to have a bit more organisation but also it's pretty so I could even do that on the side too. It's chunky wood, there were three of these and I was tempted to buy all three but I couldn't think of a place for them so I just got one and then maybe when I go again next year they might still be there, I have no idea. And this is, I don't really know, what is it? Levenger Will Read Life? I think it's a real book thing but prices of the things that I got so far I will show you. The total of all of this I will reveal at the end. I think you will be shocked with the amount of stuff that I got. The jumble sale is incredibly cheap and prices are kind of thrown at you, they don't have prices on them when you're walking around. There are stewards that kind of say two pounds, one pound, 50p, five pounds, an expensive jumble sale purchase. I would say you can get things that are really good quality and that they'll say that's for five pound purchase, you know that's expensive. I did get some artwork and paintings here that were 15 pounds each and that is like, you are spending a lot at this jumble sale. But obviously you go to a charity shop and then they're like 50 pounds so it's incredibly cheap but at the jumble sale 15 pounds is, you know, you're trying to bargain for 15 pounds. Okay so that's that. I got this beautiful, beautiful atlas, look how lovely that is. This was in the special kind of haul. Again this was, this one was 15 pounds so this was a bit of a special item. Absolutely beautiful, gorgeous quality, a beautiful wood base. It's got that kind of, I want to call it like a tea stained colour which I really like and I really like in these too. I'll show you these in a minute and I think that adds a really beautiful kind of vintage element to it. So that's that and I will be using that for homeschool, kind of in the dining room. We do our homeschool in the dining room and so I kind of want that to be a educationally inspiring place, let's say. So we've got a big chalkboard and I'm going to put shelves up with books and paintings and beautiful things just to kind of inspire education and reading and things. So I thought that would sit lovely in our dining room. Although our dining room is small, we're going to find room for the stuff. And then next I will show you these. So this is a pub, this is the old Salisbury Arms which was so cute. We love little pubs, quaint pubs, absolutely one of our favourite things to do. We have some beautiful pubs in our area and this reminded me of one of those and so I thought that was really sweet. I thought the frame was nice, you know, I quite like it to look a little bit worn out. I don't mind it looking, you know, a bit scratched here and there. I think it's quite nice, especially when you've got white walls and things. I think adding things that look rustic and warm is a really nice thing. And so I got this one and then I thought next to it paired really well with this one. Now what is this? This looks like a very old town. I'm not even sure honestly but it's signed, someone signed it in pencil so no idea where it is but it's beautiful. Again it's that kind of old vintage style place taking you back years and years to kind of older and you know vintage times which is really nice to see and again I find it very inspiring. The frame is old and rustic and I love it. Again it's worn but I don't mind, I like it. So these things I got for two pounds each. No, I think this one was three pounds and this one was two pounds. It was quite a... she didn't really know, I didn't really know. We were like three pounds? I don't know. Let's see, the next thing I got, oh it's beautiful, is a very large and heavy pot here which is... I'm gonna drop it! Which is perfect for making bread, really good quality. This was kind of a standalone item that cost two pounds but it's beautiful. It's so heavy, it reminds me of the Le Creuset ones we've already got and kind of fits in that theme. They're sort of bright red, orange and these are... this is obviously bright red. Very cozy, cozy dish. I like that, I like the look of that a lot. I think I'll also display and use, it's one of those. Right, have I covered everything that you can see? I think so. So moving on to some of the things that you can't see. Now the Jumbo Sale provides baskets galore and I run to the baskets to start with because some of them are so beautiful and they get taken. So okay, I got a little bundle here of baskets and I'll quickly show you. This one I thought was really sweet, can kind of hang it off of something. But I also like collecting flowers from the garden and we have a beautiful kind of wild flower-esque garden and so I really like going and collecting and I thought that was a really nice basket to do it because I've been struggling to know what to put my flowers in when I'm going around and when I'm having a look and I thought that was nice to collect things. And then also display kind of beautiful things in there as well, you know, some flowers on the table and I thought that, just thought it was really, really nice. And then this one she threw in because I didn't have change and so she said, I don't have 50p, grab yourself another basket and in a panic I grabbed this one. That's the reason for this one. I think it's kind of cute, quite like the blue stripe across there. Yeah, so that was a panic purchase but a nice one too, utensils or something. I don't really know, I'll figure it out. My children have been playing with it and putting their toys in it and going around the house collecting different bits and pieces. The next one I got was a very simple basket here. I was thinking toy storage mostly for this one and then this one is kind of a curved basket that I've been storing my oven mitts in, which is so random. I don't really know where to put these yet. I've been holding off really styling these pieces knowing that I'm gonna show you guys all of them. So I've just plopped it on the kitchen counter, put my oven mitts in it. So yeah, really nice, kind of curved, would work well on a shelf for, again, children's storage of, you know, toy rotations, things like that too. So I got that and then the last basket that I got was an unexpected one. Now I love stacking baskets like this. I have one stacked in my bathroom and I thought I would put this one on top but I've actually been storing it in our fireplace mantle area in the dining room. I thought it was lovely, thought we could put kindling and things like that inside but it turns out to actually be quite a functioning picnic basket. Things in which I didn't realise, I think I got this for, oh those baskets were about two pounds in total by the way, and this was, I think this was one or two pounds too. So yeah, it's got some things here that I need to take out and wash and things and but it's got a couple plates, a bottle opener, some cutlery. Yeah, so quite a functioning picnic basket. I don't think I'll use it as a picnic basket but you know what, when we go on a picnic maybe I'll just pull it out and use it. Yeah, so that was nice, nice surprise anyway. And it's got these beautiful leather straps on too which I really like the look of. They had a few Fortnum and Mason ones too and at the last Jumble Sale I picked up a very small Fortnum and Mason one which I loved but as I went out to reach it someone else grabbed it. That's, that's how the Jumble Sale is. If that doesn't give you a picture of what it's like, I don't know what will. It's kind of like that, you know, it's a bit of a fight sometimes. I do not fight for items. I don't think that's a very good idea. Yes, I'm trying to set a good example for my daughter and not, you know, fight in Jumble Sales. Definitely not gonna do that. The next things that I got, next few things I got, a nice wooden rustic bowl. Thought this was beautiful. We love wooden bowls. My husband loves woodwork and he would love to do things like that in the future I think. So this, just found this really inspiring compared to making bread in this. I think they're both fruit bowls honestly. I might use this one as a fruit bowl. I might not, I might just bake in them. But really lovely quality and yeah, kind of well-loved but not too old that you, you know, you can't use it. It's really nice. I like them. I must apologise for the way I'm articulating myself. It's just, it's not really working because it is really early in the morning and I didn't sleep well. So we are plodding through. Anyway, so two bowls. So these were, how much were they? Let's have a little think. I think it was like £1 total. My children are starting to wake up. So yeah, £1 total. Isn't it incredible? This is why I travel to this place because these things are amazing. The third to last thing I got, I need to wash some of these things out, is this. Now I don't really know what it is, but when I saw it, I thought utensil holder. You know when you're cooking, you kind of want to plonk a utensil down, but you don't want to put it on the side because you don't want to get it dirty. But you kind of want something to put it on. I thought this was the perfect thing and it has a really pretty blue rim around the top with kind of leaves or something. Let's see, handmade in Portugal. There you go. Yeah, it gives that kind of vibe. I did crack it on the way home, so it's got a little crack around here. I have got the piece to it and I think Josh can glue it back on or I could glue it back on, to be honest. So that's that. And then, oh, last but not least, these were incredible and I fell in love with them when I saw them, hence why I paid £15 for each of them. So this one, oh, let's see. It's big. They're big and beautiful. This is called feeding time and I absolutely love it. A lady feeding her chickens and this artist actually creates things like this a lot. He tends to do things in kind of rural landscapes, women feeding children, feeding livestock, feeding chickens, feeding all sorts of things and he called this one feeding time. It's beautiful. I love the countryside so much and I love feeding my children. I love chickens and one day hopefully we will have chickens and this just rang, what's the word? It sung to my soul. I love it. I think it's beautiful. I think it's a beautiful dining room piece. The frame, again, it's a little bit old, it's a little bit worn, but I love that and I think that's such a great story to have in your house. It's so pretty. Already got picture hooks on, so ready to go on the wall. I love it. The last item, I think that's the last item I got was this. Oh, it's upside down. Okay, and this is called autumn tints from the original painting by John Benny in the possession of the publishers, and again, thought it was very beautiful. The detailing in this is stunning. It's got a cottage here with two fireplaces, smoke coming out of the chimney. Absolutely a gorgeous, gorgeous picture in the countryside. We've got sheep and cattle, a beautiful body of water, some stunning trees and mountains, and just the whole, the tint to it, I would even say, that autumn tint to it is absolutely stunning. I feel something when I look at it and I feel inspired. Yeah, that is the reason why I looked at this and said, absolutely, you are coming home with me. Again, this was 15 pounds. Actually, I think for the size of it and the weight and everything, I think that's quite a bargain really, especially these days. That also has a picture hook on the back too, so it's ready to go on the wall. I might even hang those up today depending on what my husband's doing. I might need a bit of help there. That is everything. I think that's everything. Yeah, that's everything I got from the Jumble Sale. Thank you for your patience. I'm sorry that my sentences weren't quite making a lot of sense, but I love charity shopping. I love the Jumble Sale and I love finding beautiful, beautiful things. It makes me so happy. Thank you for sharing that joy with me. Now, we're probably going to have to move all of this stuff up quick and deal with the children that I can hear are coming downstairs. Thanks for joining me on this little charity shop haul. Oh, before I forget, I nearly forgot to tell you the total. Now, in total, I spent £50, which I think is absolutely brilliant. I had a little budget for myself. £50 is an incredible price for all of these things. If you can make it to that Jumble Sale, then please do go. You'll definitely see me there. I'm there every year and I have been for a really long time and I love it. Yes, £50. I can't believe I nearly forgot to share that with you. That's a very important part. £50. I hope this little tour of my favourite finds has inspired you to pop into your local charity shop and see what treasures you might discover. If you enjoyed spending this cosy morning with me, then do hit subscribe. There's plenty more slow, homely inspiration coming soon.