“Sitting By the Dock of the Bay…”

Well, okay, not technically. We never actually made it to the Bay, but we did have a few lovely days in San Fransisco thanks to our eldest daughter who gifted us two nights at the posh San Francisco Marriott Marquis hotel. Our 31st floor corner room had views galore on two sides.

We checked in and headed out to the charming Salesforce Park nearby to enjoy all the flowers. This park reminds me a bit of New York City’s High Line.

And of course a part of any road trip includes great food (hopefully!) and I was happy with this luscious fruit tart for breakfast. What a treat!

Of course you know I had to do a little antiquing, so I hit Stuff on Valencia Street. The two-story building has 50+ vendors with a strong showing of mid-century items and furniture.

It is a fabulous store, but like most antique venues it’s super tough to find bargains as a reseller. Naturally!

I really liked this Art Nouveau style copper letter/napkin holder but it was $60 and unsigned. Now if it had been marked “Roycroft” I would have bought it! I also like the small, but heavy Chinese brass bucket for myself, but at $40, I decided against it. It was more of a $25 to $30 piece to me.

I briefly considered this mid-century McCaine painting. (I’ve sold him before.) This was priced around $300 and 40% off but I didn’t like the crude painting of the leaves or their color.

My only purchase–three books all from one seller. (In retrospect I should have stayed longer in her booth and looked through more of her books!) This 1918 book “Come Play with Me” is in poor condition (paid $2), but the illustrations are just as sweet as can be. Perfect for framing.

I am most excited about this 1969 “Typing Course for Children” for $3. Quirky books like sell for me. I found two others for sale online–one for $125 and the other for $34. I’ll price mine somewhere in between.

I really, really wanted to buy more here but it wasn’t meant to be…this time!

I also ventured to Community Thrift Store further down the street, but alas the prices on the few pieces I was interested in were just too high. Honestly I had sticker shock. I wanted to buy something to support their mission but couldn’t bring myself to overpay.

Later that night we headed to the top floor of our hotel to The View lounge for drinks. Alas we did not get a seat be the windows. Still it was lovely to sip and enjoy the ambiance.

Overall a fun mini-vacay. San Francisco will always hold a small piece of my heart. (Adored living there in the ’80s.)

Any vacations in your future?

Karen