The Coffey House: Junk

I am a junk fanatic. I'm horrible about dragging junk into our house. I am constantly filling our garage, basement and front porch with junk.

The amazing thing is my husband keeps the complaining about this to a minimum. As long as he is not hitting his shins off of something, he's okay with this. In our 10 years of marriage we have purchased about five items from a furniture store new; two sofas, an ottoman and three mattress and box spring sets if you'd like to know. So I think this helps to influence his acceptance of my junk collecting.

I get junk from all over.

My work is one great place to score good junk. While my children were very small they destroyed the first furniture store purchased sofa during nap time by falling asleep and wetting through diapers. After having to throw away that sofa (it was a clearance sofa sleeper - complete score for only $200) I became frustrated and decided I would just bring ugly old couches home from work until we were out of this stage before I would buy new again. We went through 4 of them.

Goodwill is always a great place to score great items but I just don't make it there all that much anymore.

Auctions are fabulous and so is Craigslist. Even better is that I can get my husband to make the trips and do all of the dirty work for me.

I am also not afraid to pull something out of someones trash. Ummm... okay, I'm not afraid to ask my mom to go pull something out of someones trash.

But I think my favorite place to go is flea markets.

And this weekend, that is where I was. My mother-in-law loaded up early and were off to a giant bi-annual flea market near my home. It was a fabulous day spent with great company doing something that both of us love.

My morning had been going a little slow until I found my dream booth. A friendly, fun fella named Dave who was willing to deal on everything he had. Dave had great junk and I found several large pieces I wanted but the best one I found was a large, mustard yellow, jelly cupboard. When I saw it I immediately had a million ideas for this cabinet. It would be awesome in a bathroom for towels or the upstairs hallway for extra bed linens and blankets or... my kitchen!

Yes, my kitchen, my ity bitty kitchen with very little cabinet or counter space and bags of groceries sitting next to the fridge because there is no room left in the cabinets.

At the end of our galley kitchen there is a small eat-in area that is the only wall without windows or doors.