Garage Sale-ing

Yesterday was city wide garage sales in a nearby suburb-- Aunt Teak and Uncle Junque. Brian has to work the help desk this weekend, which means he needs to stay near home so he can access his laptop quickly. He said he didn't mind staying home with the girls, so I got to go alone. I started off fairly full of ambition, willing tables full of linens and Liberty fabric with my awesome mind power. Then I made the mistake of turning into a housing development for the first set of sales. I am sure there were plenty of happy people walking away with treasures, but I don't care for housing developments because (1) Nearly everyone moved in at the same time and sold/got rid of/donated most of their old stuff before the moved and (2) They seem to mostly be full of young families so there is a lot of baby and toddler stuff. Great for a lot of people, but not what I'm looking for. And it was jammed packed with traffic because there's only one way in and out, and people were parking on both sides of the street reducing traffic to one way. I went to maybe four houses before I decided to move on. Checked out a few more streets when it became obvious that two cups of coffee, as is my morning habit, was not a good idea today. If our street ever has garage sales, I am offering use of our basement toilet for a quarter. I'd probably clean up. Fortunately there was a church offering a "comfort station" which I was heartily grateful for

Refreshed, I set out again and decided my best bet was to just park the car and start walking. The main street had several flea markety antiquey sales set up, so I went to those. The biggest one was on the grounds of one of my favorite antique stores, and I found some nice things there:

The Japanese doll is in pretty sorry shape, but she was only 1.00 and just jumbled up with some other toys on a blanket, she needed to be rescued. The Chinese dolls I think are Ada Lum dolls, the boy in blue and the girl in red floral were only .50 each. The other girl in red I bought years ago at a flea market so now she has some friends. I'm not too sure about them being actual Ada Lum (of which I know very little about) since some online sources mention a stamp on the body, which none of the dolls have.

A bag of lace for a 1.00 and these fabric squares which were free. They kind of look like scenes from fairy tales? Not really sure. I had to chuckle to myself as I was looking at different items--I picked these up because they looked like the sort of thing I've been finding on some of my favorite blogs. Do I actually like them? I don't know, but they were free. At another store I almost bought a vintage doll pattern that I thought I remembered someone mentioning on their blog, when I realized I had several similar patterns at home and I didn't really need it.

I think I've sated my need for garage sales--I really don't like them very much. Brian loves going, he was rather disappointed that he forgot about this weekend and didn't try to arrange for someone else to cover the help desk. I just find them tedious and sometimes a bit sad--all your old junk heaped in a pile on the lawn, in hopes that someone will take it away and give you money. Dismal, huh? So usually Brian takes the girls out while I stay at home. Flea markets however, I love. But most of them around here have become like huge outdoor dollar stores with piles of socks, Disney videocassettes and cell phone covers. So pottering around the tables yesterday was quite nice and I walked away with a few little treasures.

Comments

[muralimanohar]

Gah...I am a total garage sale freak. I ADORE them. And I have the same problem of finding little treasures that the blogworld loves, but then I get them home and remember *I* don't actually adore them. I have a few things set aside for giveaways from such mistakes. :lol:

[muralimanohar]

BTW...I just awarded you on my blog. Have a peek. :)

[al]

A dangerous habit garage saleing is.. I've had to stop cold turkey, it wasn't easy :)