My friend Amy and I were suppose to go on a weekend trip to Antique Alley in Richmond, Indiana but a foot of snow ruined those plans. So we improvised and created our own antique trail.

We started the day at Antiques Village in Dayton, Ohio, which is only about an hour drive from my suburb right across the river from Cincinnati. This 800,000 square-foot mall has over 350 booths. I have never seen so much Pyrex in one location and it was all reasonably priced.

This booth had mostly Pyrex. Several other booths had Pyrex as well.

Every booth was setup so that we could easily move through it an see all of the merchandise. It took nearly two hours to walk through the entire antique mall. We loved seeing the old toys, furniture, games, decorations and albums. It was like taking a walk down memory lane. Although we really enjoyed seeing everything in the mall we only made one purchase since we both live by the theory of if I don’t have a specific place or use for it, I’m not buying it.

Amy purchased this fun ornament for only a few dollars.

Next we had lunch right down the street from the antique mall at Chappy’s Social House. We chose this strictly based on location but we’re so happy with the choice. We both got a shrimp po boy and cheesy mashed potato casserole. The french bread is from Sam’s and amazing. The mashed potatoes are homemade and seriously delicious.

Lunch at Chappy’s

Our next stop was the Ohio Valley Antique Mall on Dixie Highway in Fairfield. This mall features 550 dealers in the 85,000 square foot mall. This mall is also fantastic but some of the booths are overcrowded making it hard to see everything. We spent at least 2.5 hours here. We did leave with a few more items though.

Amy chose the game because she had fond memories of playing it at her grandmother’s. One of my husband’s favorite movies is Pinocchio and he loves listening to records. He will enjoy sharing this with our 3-year-old granddaughter. I bought the old valentines to decorate with. We both spent less than $15.

You would think all of this shopping would be enough but we weren’t finished yet. We headed to the Valley Thrift just down the street from the Ohio Valley Antique Mall. Amy found a cute bag of gnomes to decorate her plants with for only a few dollars.

Even though our legs were tired we made on more stop at the nearby Goodwill on Dixie Highway. I bought an adorable Minnie Mouse helmet, that looks as if it was never used, for $4, for my granddaughter to use at our house when she rides her bike with the neighbor kids. I also got my daughter a nice hoodie for just a few dollars.

We decided 10 hours of shopping was enough and finally headed home. We actually discussed spending the next day on the Kentucky side of the river hitting the Fort Thomas and Florence Antique Malls but we were deterred by the pouring down rain and chose to clean our homes (making room for new stuff) instead. Hitting the antique malls in Northern Kentucky is definitely on the list for a future day of shopping as well.

Do you have a favorite antique or second-hand shop? What is the best item you have ever found at one of these shops?