Consignment Store Hunting & Gathering

I have the nesting bug.  I've had it for a very long time. 

I am knitting up a storm, and gathering together essential and not-so-essential baby stuff.

The past few weeks have been great for consignment store hunting and gathering.  Everyone is clearing out their fall and winter stock to make room for spring and summer stock.  It's the perfect time to stock up.

A few weeks ago I brought home a big pile of mostly gender-neutral onesies, pajamas and comfortable pants for baby.  I choose age appropriate sizes knowing that the baby will be 5 months old at Christmas.
Everything was 50 to 75% off, and I thought I did quite well for myself.  I only chose items that would be about $2 each or less.  It wasn't hard to find about 15 pieces that fit within those criteria.

Today, one of the local consignment stores announced that all the remaining fall and winter stuff was marked down to $1.  Everything!  $1! 

I headed over there first thing this morning (the first day of the sale) to see what I could track down.  I allowed myself to buy some less-gender neutral items, including some cute little girl pinafores. 

Mostly I went for things that are generally more expensive and I ended up with a whole lot of jean in my bag.  Baby jeans, jean pinafores, jean jackets.  Yep.  I splurged and bought a jean jacket for when our bébé is 0-3 months old.  How indulgent.  For $1, I can afford to be indulgent!

I love this little jean dress.  How chic!

I also got a few great sweaters (fairly gender neutral).  The Canada one is an Olympic Sweater from the Vancouver 2010 games.  I love the mittens, that also serve as pockets.  All the babies I know need pockets.

If we have a boy, I'll save the little dresses, or pass them on to someone else.  I think we're having a boy, but I don't want to jinx anything by saying it too much.  I don't really mind either way, just as long as whatever we have is healthy! 

Consignment stores are a great way to buy beautiful clothes on the cheap.  Next week is the semi-annual 50% off sale at Value Village.  I'm going to hit at least one store (maybe two!).  I haven't really looked at the baby stuff there much before, so I'm not sure how much of it will come home with me.  They are definitely not as picky as consignment stores, so I will have to watch out for stains on clothing (formula stains clothes!) and be a little more on my toes.