A-thrifting we will go

My ten-year-old son and I share a passion for anything vintage or retro, which means that we can often be found making the rounds of thrift or second-hand stores to see what treasures we can unearth.

We don't travel the antique circuit, for both budgetary and philosophical reasons. At high-end antique stores, someone else has already experienced the thrill that accompanies a truly fabulous thrift store find — spotting a 1950's-era Canadian Tire catalogue amidst a heap of otherwise ordinary household ephemera (collectible papers). At the same time, the antique store owners might bypass a supposedly valueless book, postcard or trinket that we might consider priceless.

That's why my son and I like to be the ones doing the exploring — limbo-ing down aisles made narrow by precariously stacked boxes while breathing in that intoxicating thrift shop scent of must, dust and time.

We've had some fabulous conversations while uncovering thrift store treasures-talks about the kinds of toys I enjoyed when I was his age and how safety standards have changed over the years (or how much we thought they had changed!) He's amazed when he hears how many times I burned myself while making cakes with my 1960's vintage Easy Bake Oven.

Together, we've unearthed all kinds of treasures: a wooden flower stand that my son immediately refashioned into an objet d'art; wooden boxes in all shapes and sizes; a metal toolbox that was meant for his Dad but that has kind of become everyone's toolbox; jars of old buttons; postcards and books galore; and all kinds of frame-worthy bits of paper. (Now we're busy acquiring frames.)

When I'm shopping with my son, the time machine starts spinning around and around. I'll be looking at a teapot or a juice squeezer that looks just like one my Grandma used to have and then I'll see my son pouring through boxes of books like a younger me. Or he'll comment on something being a fabulous deal, just the way my Dad would.

I walk out of thrift stores with more than just armfuls of other people's treasures and memories. I take home plenty of my own.

Are you a fan of thrift or second-hand stores? Do you and your family members share a passion for any kind of collectibles: old books? Sports collectibles? Old postcards or photographs?