Best. HomeGoods. Steal. *EVER*.

I loves me some HomeGoods.  It's like a crack den for home furnishings.  God help me if I ever worked there.  I used to work at Chico's (back when the employee discount was 50% off of retail) and I never saw a paycheck.  I'd be in the red for sure working at HomeGoods.

Anyway, I've gotten some pretty good swag there.  Just recently, two very nice Broyhill faux mercury glass lamps for $19.99 each - down from $60 each.  I still can't figure out what was "wrong" with them - they look great.

But tonight...ah - tonight.  Tonight was the Queen Mother of all hauls - at least for me.

A lot of bloggers that I read can afford to shop at Crate & Barrel and Pottery Barn and Williams-Sonoma and SoftSurroundings.  I used to be able to do that too, and then one day the life I knew ended with a betrayal that has taken me 5 years to process.  I know that sounds very Lifetime TV movie-ish, but it's the basic truth. 

So I went from Talbots and Ann Taylor and Needless Markup and Sur-Le-Table and the aforementioned home stores to Target and Goodwill.  Yeah - I said it.  I'm not ashamed.  I've scratched my way to self-sufficiency and I'm proud of how far I've come.  And I can spot a diamond in the middle of a coal pile and that has served me well in decorating the first place I've ever lived in by myself.

I still get catalogs and emails from my "former life", and I love looking through them and playing "what if".  I've also always been a voracious reader and a fan of vintage everything for as long as I can remember.

Linen brands like Frette and D. Porthault have always fascinated me.  They are the stuff of 1930s novels in which society brides ordered all their "linen" from one of these mystical firms.  Hemstitched and damask and point-d'esprit and the correct placement of monograms fascinated me.

The thought of paying upwards of $600 for sheets is simply beyond my ken, but I still daydream about waking up to a bed full of Guirlande Blanche

So imagine my surprise tonight at HomeGoods when I saw a package of a dozen D. Porthault dinner napkins for $19.99.  Surely, I thought, my reading glasses had finally bought the farm and that package said $39.99.  Nope - $19.99 and "compare at" $45.00.  

Hmm.  That sounded suspiciously cheap, but I ran like Atalanta after those golden apples.  

They're lovely, really.  They are the "Hotel Collection", which I surmise isn't the ne plus ultra of the D. Porthault line but they are beautifully made with a satin stripe. They're large - 22"x22".

"D. Porthault - Paris" is embroidered on the reverse.

According to gilt.com, they retail for $111.00 for 6.  I got them for $19.99 for 12.  My mad math skillz tell me I got them at 90% off retail.  Woot!

I have been an embroiderer/cross-stitcher in the past and I think a tone-on-tone "P" in white perle cotton is just the ticket for an instant heirloom.

I am linking up at:

Dwellings - Amaze Me Monday