Category Archives: Stores and other places that sell you things

Great Mural at Crystal Voyage

There is a great mural on the exterior wall of the Crystal Voyage building at 2601 East D St #201, Tacoma, WA 98421. It is a stone mural triptych created by Macy Jewell, Jody Bergsma and Crystal Stone, the last of whom was kind enough to tell me about it. The elements of this mural form a story for those with “eyes to see”. The mural has many stories to tell, including the elements, native American legends and the Vitruvian Man.

www.crystalvoyage.com/

I remember when I enjoyed Crystal Voyage in its Freighthouse Square location, but their current space is especially nice, roomy and full of delightful merchandise. I purchased some trinkets. Really, I need to come back here more often!

 

Albertsons on Pearl

Albertson’s at 2401 North Pearl Street in Tacoma is one of two Albertson’s within Tacoma’s city limits and one of 463 Albertsons in the US (California, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming). The chain was founded in 1939 in Boise, Idaho.

Their website http://www.albertsons.com/ has some good seasonal recipes.

Heron and Fish Mural on Proctor

A brief moment of sunshine allowed me to snap this photo of the murals at 3823 North 26th Street. The heron is fairly recent, installed in 2010 and the original salmon part was created in 2007. The artist is Alexis St. John and her website is here http://alexisstjohn.blogspot.com

 

Quality Food & Deli, Available

The building at 1302 Tacoma Avenue, Tacoma is mixed use property with the Tacoma Avenue frontage having a vacant convenience store/deli and the part fronting South 13th Street having apartments. I remember when the convenience store was open and it never seemed very welcoming to me. Since its been vacant, it has been repainted to a pleasant dark green. The building in 1926.

Molbak’s Garden

I go to Molbak’s at 13625 NE 175th St., Woodinville, WA 98072 whenever I’m in Woodinville, which isn’t all that often. It is one of the largest nurseries in the Puget Sound with indoor and outdoor areas, gifts and a cafe.

http://www.molbaks.com/

 

Cowboy Market Place

The Cowboy Market Place 4170 E. Hwy. 377 Granbury, TX 76049 is really fun. They have all kinds of unusual Western theme merchandise including bronze sculptures, saddles, tact and (my favorite and I should had taken a photo!) a road kill scented candle. Their website is here http://www.cowboy-marketplace.com

Metro Market

Metropolitan Market (Metro Market) at 2420 N Proctor Street,Tacoma, WA 98406 is Tacoma’s most upscale grocery store. It is full sized store, but has many specialty items like a fine selection of salts, wonderful cheese and a great deli. I picked up a salad for lunch tomorrow, a birch beer and some Gelato which they serve right there. The employes are helpful and the check out line moved quickly.

The building began life in 1966 as the Lucky Stores Grocery and in 1995 it became Queen Anne Thriftway. In 2003 the name changed to Metropolitan Market. There are five other locations, three in Seattle and one in Kirkland.

I love this graphic I found on their site. http://metropolitan-market.com/produce/localNWgrowingSeasonChart.pdf

 

Harp & Shamrock, Tacoma

The Harp & Shamrock at 2704 North Proctor is a delightful store which specializes in all things Irish. They had some lovely outerwear items that I adored. They also had hats, scarfs, food, trinkets, jewelry and a bunch of other things. I purchased some Irish Tea because dear daughter had proclaimed that the Irish had the best tea! And indeed when we tried it, the taste was excellent. Though dear daughter shouldn’t have had three cups and stayed up most of the night!

A better photo of the building can be found here http://www.proctordistrict.com/index.php/listing/The%20Harp%20&%20Shamrock

The store is in the Davies Building which was constructed in 1924 and has apartments on the upper level.

Update 8/14 — The store closed on June 14, 2014 after 38 years in business.

Grassi’s

Grassi’s Flowers & Gifts at 1702 Pacific Avenue, Tacoma, is in  cool, triangular building that was built in 1892 as the Wynkoop Drug Co. / Pagni & Lenti Grocery. The property has also been the Little Country Grocery Store. It was renovated to its beautiful condition by Alice Mack, but ended up being owned by a bank through foreclosure. Eventually it was purchased by the University of Washington and leased to Grassi’s.

http://www.grassisflorist.com/

Sisters On The Fly at Cabela’s

 

A group of women with vintage campers that go fly fishing and camping together? How cool is that?! Of course I had to go check it out when they convened at Cabela’s at 1600 Gateway Blvd NE Lacey, WA 98516. The mission statement of Sisters on the Fly is “Offering empowerment and sisterhood through exceptional outdoor adventures. As a group of women we challenge ourselves in all that we set our mind to. There is no age, color, religion or political group. All women who want to share in the adventure of “sisterhood” are welcome. This “sisterhood” has grown to more than 2,400 women since inception in 1999.”

As you can see from the photos the vintage trailers are darling and lovingly decorated. Bare in mind that these are little spaces which usually have a bed, table, stove, fridge and some storage. Because of the size, they are difficult to capture in a photo, but the website has more photos and there are a couple of books available. The women are really nice also!

http://www.sistersonthefly.com/

Cabela’s is the world’s foremost outfitter (that’s their tag line!) and it is indeed a huge store with a large display of animals arrange in a nature setting. There is also a piper cub plane hanging from the ceiling. Besides an abundance of merchandise, there is a gun library and a restaurant. It reminds me of REI, but with more of an emphasis on hunting/fishing. There are 39 Cabela’s with more being planned.

http://www.cabelas.com/