It’s warm! It’s sunny! THE YARD SALES ARE BACK! They’re not what I would call plentiful, but when I get up early on a Saturday, there’s somewhere to go. Granted, this past Saturday I slept in, but I’m planning on that being the last late Saturday morning I have for quite a while. Now I’ve just got to figure out how to get myself out of bed at 6:30…it’s been a while, folks. When you’ve been staying home for over a year, you kind of forget what it’s like to have to get up before the sun does and hit the road running. Our mornings around here start around 8 am, when the kids have a little iPad time and I check e-mail/Facebook/Instagram, etc. We start our mornings real sloooooooooowly around here.
Before I launch into my finds of the last few weeks I have to give a shout out to my girl Shara over at Monkeybox. Three times over the past week or two, she has texted me to alert me to a thrifting or yard sale-ing opportunity. Do you have a junking friend like that? Someone who cuts you in on the deal? I haven’t ever had one before I met Shara. For most of the time I lived in Chicago, I didn’t even have any junking buddies. My thrifting habits were considered an eccentricity by my circle of friends; some of them liked the things I would bring home and decorate my apartment with but none of them would consider going shopping with me. That changed the last summer I was in Chicago, when my wonderful friend Shannon and I made it a regular habit to hit the yard and estate sales on Saturdays. Shannon is a yard saler from way back and had always talked about going to yard sales together, but she is a young person with an actual life and was often too busy on Saturdays to make a date. That last summer I was there, we managed to hit up quite a few sales and had a fabulous time doing it. Our tastes overlapped enough for us to be interested in the same sales but were different enough that we weren’t going after the same merchandise. And I LOVED having someone to talk to about the sales we were going to — that was the best part of the whole experience, getting back in the car and talking about the weird/fabulous stuff we had just seen. Unfortunately, I was unable to convince Shannon to leave Chicago for Arkansas (go figure) and thought I was back to yard saling being a solitary experience…but I have had the pleasure of meeting so many people here who share my passion for junking — not only Shara, but the lovely Laurie; Amy, who is responsible for bringing exciting flea market opportunities to the area, Linda, who has an astonishing five flea market booths under the name Possum Valley Vintage; a whole bunch of the sweet women who have booths at Daisies and Olives — Barb, Carrie, Phyllis, Mary, and Martha, just to name a few; and, of course, my wonderful friends Kristie and Bailey who run Rescuing the Past Estate Sales and who know everything about everything that was created before 1982. Before I met these people, my only chance to talk about my passion was through the blog, and I have been so fortunate to make so many wonderful pen pals through this format (in fact, my friendships with Shara, Bailey, and Kristie started because of the blog). However, having a local network is an entirely new experience. You might think there would be a competitive edge in these relationships, and, if there is, it is entirely friendly and good-natured; I think the joy of sharing our passion for vintage, old, and antique cancels out any kind of negativity. I love reading blogs like Yard Sale Bloodbath and Dig This Treasure, which detail the travails of yard sale friends, and love reading updates from Laurie and Amy when they go on their junking trips together. In short, I think it’s important to find people who share your passion and to always remember: there is plenty of junk to go around.
Which brings me to Shara and her multiple alerts recently: the first one occurred on a Thursday. I had just given the kids their lunch and sat down at the computer to check e-mail. Shara sent me a link to a Craigslist yard sale listing with a note that said that she was thinking of going but that it was awfully far away. People, I was in the car backing down the driveway before I knew what hit me. I wish I had saved the ad — I remember old jars, old books, old furniture, and old frames being listed…you had me at “old.” Luckily, Justin was home from work (he had his gall bladder removed that Monday, so I wasn’t above leaving him with the kids for an hour or two) and since it was almost nap time, it seemed reasonable for me to disappear for a while. I called Shara from the road and she said she had decided not to go but to let her know how it was. Well. A long, windy, forty-five minute (albeit beautiful) drive later I pulled up in front of a house that had a ton of stuff ON tarps but even more stuff UNDER tarps in their front yard. Turns out the stuff UNDER the tarps was sold. I happened to pull up right as the man who had purchased all that stuff was loading up his truck — he had been one of the first shoppers there that morning and was just getting back to load up. The ad said the sale began at noon, and it was 2 pm; after talking with the homeowner I found out that when she showed up to get the sale together at 10 am there was a long line of cars waiting for her and she actually started selling that early — so I had missed a LOT of stuff. I am still not over that. It was a junkers DREAM sale. The owner had purchased the home and all of its contents and, as it turned out, it had been occupied by a hoarder. We throw that word around a lot, but this was a case of a TRUE hoarder. The owner told me it was a pretty disgusting process to clean out — beside the house was a flat bed trailer piled six feet high with stuff they were taking to the dump. It was only later that I realized I should have had the nerve to ask her to poke through that pile, because I kept overhearing her and the people who were helping her expressing surprise at the stuff folks were buying — great stuff like garden fences, wooden gates with great patina, and weathered barn wood. Lord only knows what they threw away. The stuff under the tarp, that the guy was loading up, was AWESOME. A really old drop-leaf table and an antique wooden file cabinet were two things I was slobbering over; Linda, who had hit the sale an hour or so before I did, said she saw tags of $10 on them. The folks holding the sale didn’t really care how much things were worth — they just wanted them gone. I got 5 or 6 great old frames for fifty cents each, and paid a dollar for what I thought, at first, was two Cathrineholm enamel bowls:
It was only after I did a little Internet research that I discovered it was actually a fondue pot.
Unfortunately, it’s on the top part — there should be another enamel platter to go underneath and then the mechanism that holds the little burner underneath. I’ve got it on Etsy right now but I had no idea how to price it — it’s at $32 (the full fondue sets go for between $75-$110) and that might be a little high. I guess I’ll let it sit for a bit. If I were a collector, I would totally buy it and use it as two bowls!
I also got this drawing:
There is a very old label typed on the back of it that says “An original brush drawing. We bought this in London in a large collection of miniature drawings. Not later than 1840.” When I bought it, the woman selling it said, “Oh, I hope you find out this is worth a lot of money! You have to let me know if you do find that out.” I said, “Oh, I’ll totally come back and share the money with you,” and she said, “No, no, no, I don’t need any of the money, I just want to know.” I have no idea how to research this. There is no author’s name and I know nothing whatsoever about art. So I have no idea what to do with this.
I LOVE these two prints, which were…FIFTY CENTS! Are you sensing a pattern?
The woman who had owned the house previously, whose stuff this was, must have gotten these at the thrift store, because those price tags look like thrift store prices. I think I’m going to find a place to put these in the house.
I got these random drawers for a buck a piece:
Time to search “what to make with random drawers” on Pinterest.
My FAVORITE buy, though, were these:
These are HUGE! Around four feet tall. I got four of them for…are you ready? FIVE DOLLARS A PIECE. Window casings just FLY out of the booth and I have never had any this big, so I have high hopes for them. The bummer is that I broke one on the way home. Really mad at myself. But people also buy the frames, so I should be able to sell it, just for less than I could get if it were intact. Wouldn’t it be amazing to use one of these for the door of a cabinet made out of reclaimed barn wood? If only I had the talent and ability to make that happen!
It was a really fun sale, despite the fact that I had to watch all that great stuff be loaded up, right in front of my eyes. Sometimes, you’re not the early bird, and you just have to live with it.
Shara continued her status as my Junk Guardian Angel by texting me on Friday about the cutest little armoire that was selling for $15 at a yard sale she was at — it was insane that it was still there, at about 12:30. Once again, I was in the car before I realized it and headed to check it out. This time, I had just sat the kids down at the table, with their lunch plates in front of them, and said, whoops, never mind, we’re going to run a quick errand, and rushed them out to their car seats with bare feet. Bless their little hearts, they didn’t even complain. Apparently, they’ve already made peace with the fact that their mama is crazy. This is the CUTEST little cabinet in such a usable size — a little under four feet, I think.
This is a terrible picture of it — it’s so cute, with Art Deco hardware and styling. Why would that have sat there until 12:30 when it was only marked $15? Actually, I wondered the same thing about the huge windows at that hoarder’s sale — the entire sale had been picked over, yet those were still there, the Cathrineholm pieces were still there, the brush drawing were still there…there’s ALWAYS potential, no matter how long a sale has been open!
The other time Shara texted was earlier in the week, from Potter’s House, my favorite thrift. She said it was loaded with good stuff. Since Justin was home recuperating and the kids were asleep, I was at the liberty to hop in the car and meet her there — we had the best time, shopping for around 45 minutes. Shara, you are the best junking friend!
I made what I thought was a really exciting find a couple of weeks ago — a bunch of tintypes at a Salvation Army in a town about 20 minutes away that were priced at only seventy five cents each.
I do not consider myself any kind of antique dealer — most of my finds, at best, are “vintage.” It blows my mind to hold in my hand something that is close to 150 years old. To think of it being passed down generation after generation of a family. How on earth does something like this end up at a thrift store? If you had photos like this of your ancestors, can you even imagine giving them away? I was pretty excited about the find, but after taking the time to photograph each. and. every. tintype. and put them in lots of four on eBay, only two of the lots sold for just a little bit above what I paid for them. So, bummer. I have no idea what to do with them; I would love to keep them, but don’t know how to display them or use them in some meaningful way.
At that same Salvation Army — which I really need to frequent at least once a week because they have some truly cool stuff there and it’s much less picked over than the stores that are in town — was this neat wooden serving piece.
This is it after I oiled it with mineral oil, MY FAVORITE THING TO DO. I really want to keep this, but since I couldn’t come up with a single thing to serve on it and the last party I held was three years ago, I reluctantly priced it and sent it to the booth. I think it might sell on Etsy but I couldn’t figure out what to call it in order to get some attention on it.
And now, some random finds from the past few weeks…
A pair of fashion prints.
A very bad picture of a very cute vase.
These are 1940s authentic cobra skin pumps — poor cobra! Those heels are nearly four inches…what the what? I think these are so cool, and they were only $2, and I found them at 2 pm. Once again, ladies and gentlemen, the potential for greatness at a yard sale is always there, no matter how late the hour!
Aaaaaaand that is all for now. Hope all is well in your neck of the woods!
Linking up to Sir Thrif-a-lot’s Thriftasaurus.
by Lara Jo
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