Treasures to be found if you look

And by vaguely tolerate, I mean the conditions have to be exactly right - say the third Tuesday of the month, when the moon is on the wax, and the temperature is between 15.5 and 17.1 degrees Celsius, then I might have a potter around.

Things are different in charity shops - when I set a millimetre of toe across their threshold I'm not immediately asked “Are you looking for anything in particular today?”

Buying a dress for a special occasion doesn't cost as much as a holiday for a family of four in St Lucia, and there is also the whiff of discovering hidden treasure about it (among other things).

Luckily both my mother and grandmother are also fans, and so it has bonded us across the generations over the years.

My first fake fur coat - an important milestone in every girl's life - was dark chocolate brown and sleek.

After I bought it, I rushed to show my mum and grandmother.

“Let me look at it,” my granny said. “I donated that!' she announced, as she inspected the lining.

It turned out she was the one who’d taken it to the charity shop where I’d pounced on it. She hadn't used it for years, but I wore it until it looked like road kill, and was eventually prised from my back.

Meanwhile, a purchase of my mum's spoke volumes about her character. One day she told me: “I found some beautiful wooden salad servers with giraffes carved into the handles, and they've never been used!”

Warming to her theme, she continued: “Maybe they were brought back from Africa for someone’s aunt, who perhaps put them in a cupboard and never used them, and then when something sadly happened to her, they were cleared out and given to charity.”

I remember looking at her with slightly different eyes. This enthusiasm and imagination are just two of the many things I love about my mum, and why I will even be venturing to the shops to pick her up a little gift before Sunday.

Perhaps something that is crying out for the type of elaborate back-story only she could imagine for it.