Did You Get Yours?

I got mine!

SOMEONE is going to win.  

Will it be YOU?

Will it be ME?

Woohooooooooo!

A Tisket, A Tasket, A Different Type of Basket

A couple of weeks ago, my neighbors were having a yard sale.  They were still bringing things out when I stopped.  They used to own a Radio Station and a Mexican Restaurant (not at the same time) so they had some different things like industrial coffeemakers, thirty five sets of glass salt and pepper shakers and other oddities.  Since none of it was the sort of thing I usually buy, I had to take a second look at everything with new eyes.  

Source: littlebirdiesecrets.blogspot.com via Shara on Pinterest

(I do wish I would have seen this photo on Pinterest before I passed on all those glass shakers though.  I have a metric ton of glitter and I could have filled them all up.  Oh, well.)

Anyway, some of the shakers were in a red plastic hand held shopping basket.  I had one from a Drugstore, but it cracked and I can't use it anymore.  I used that thing all the time - I carried things to the Flea Market, packed things in it to take in the car, packed bulky picnic items, sorted Christmas ornaments in it and so on and so on.  

When I realized that I was looking at a shopping basket, I asked if it was for sale.  I do see them from time to time, but they aren't normally for sale.   The girl said, "It is for sale and we have more."  Then she pointed to the other side of the driveway.

Yeeeees.  An entire rack of baskets!  Ten baskets!  Woot!  I paid $15.00 for the whole thing, much to the chagrin of the man buying the industrial coffeepot that was oogling them too.

I really, and truly thought I would sell them to the owners of the Flea Market.  I asked but they didn't think they needed them.  (I always grab a handheld basket at places like that, so I think the DO need them)  I thought I might put them on Craigslist too.  Because, they are meant to be in a store, right?  

But, you know me.  They are in my garage and I am using the HECK out of them.  I used them to sort my Easter items.  I used them sort items at the booth.  I used them to sort some craft supplies the other day.  I love them!  

Source: google.com via Shara on Pinterest

The only thing better was if I could have found a set of the old collapsible shopping baskets.  But, until then, these are pretty darn handy!

*Baskets are in front of a HUGE chalkboard headed to the booth.  It's about five Feet tall.  Fingers crossed it will sell f-a-s-t!

Today I.....

Got up
Got dressed
Fed the cats
Got the newspaper
Started a load of laundry
Paid bills on the computer
Read my blogroll
Folded the laundry
Fed the family
Drove to the Flea Market
Boxed up the pottery
Boxed up the toys
Boxed up the glassware
Boxed up the kitchen stuff
Boxed up the miscellaneous things
Carried eleven boxes to the car
Carried five bags to the car.
Carried the shelves to the truck
Carried the boxes to the car.
Drove twenty miles to the other Flea Market
Carried in the miscellaneous things
Carried in the kitchen things
Carried in the glassware
Carried in the toys
Carried in the pottery
Carried the shelves in
Set up the shelves
Threw all those things up on the shelves and on the walls.
Set up a new booth that looks just like my old booth
Sweated a ton.  (Short and sweating in March.  It's ridiculous)
Drove home
Freshened up
Went to dinner
Drove past Goodwill - I can handle NO MORE junk today.
Came home
Fed the cats
Cut a fresh Lilac Bouquet
Watched Survivor
Threw pipe cleaners on the cats ears

Watched American Savage (Have you seen that - it's about metal detecting, treasure hunting and history)
Checked my email
Read my blog roll
Checked Facebook
Checked Craigslist for Yard Sales tomorrow (it's an illness, I tell you, this junk thing)
Wrote this blog
Submitted this blog
(Took a shower and went to SLEEP shortly there after)

I AM TIRED!

(What did you do today?)

The Week in Junk 3/26

Saturday The Bean and I hit an Estate Sale with a TON of super nice and super expensive items. I'm talking $300.00 pieces of pottery and $2,000.00 furniture. It was being run by an Auction company and they had NO idea what they were doing. They had only put of the best stuff and the rest of the house was in boxes lined up in a big warehouse, out of touch so you couldn't go DIG. There was a long table full of ephemera, postcards, old sepia photos (one of a lady in a casket) and other thins like I like to buy. But, nothing was priced. So, I had to ask about each item, which resulted in two people pouring over each item, looking things up in a book and on the Internet, giving me a speech about what it was and what it was worth (it sells for $20.0, so you can have it for $18.00) Uh, no thanks. I did end up finding four things to buy. When the auctioneer himself tallied up my items, he said, "$2.00, $2.00, $2.00 and $5.00" That's $8.00 all together. I said, "Are you sure about that?" He said, "YES!" like I was bad at Math, so I paid $8.00 and left. I feel bad not paying the other $3.00, but Jeeze, if you all but point out the error, shouldn't they figure it out? And, it wasn't like it was several hundred dollars. They should have KNOWN that piddly amount. Oh well, don't think badly of me, please. :)

The good news about this Estate Sale is that what they didn't sell yesterday will be sold at Auction on Thursday. They locked the door behind me, so I know what is still in there and it is EVERYTHING. Auctions can be hit and miss. I spotted a few of my old oak splint baskets that I love so - one nearly as big as a coffee table. It was $125.00 marked down to $45.00. At the auction, it could go for $200.00 or $2.00. Just depends who is there and what they want to pay. I, of course, want to pay $2.00. But, I am sure that won't happen. Although, a poorly advertised and badly run auction on a Thursday morning just might net me some DEALS.

Rubber Tod-L-Tot Baby - she squeaks.  

A very old candy tin from England.  I thought a family had had their photo put on it, but then I realized that the little girl on her Dad's lap is Queen Elizabeth.  She was born in 1926, so I am guessing that this tin is from about 1933 or so.

I love this old Whitman's Prestige Chocolate tin.  It's shaped like a chest with a curved lid.  I know it's an old one too.

This old scrapbook was supposed to be the $5.00 item.  I was really surprised the lady told me $5.00.  Based on the other prices, I would have bet it was going to be $25.00.  So, I'm glad I asked.  

It is chock full of old cards for every holiday.  They all belonged to Mrs. Amanda Frances Welch Taylor.  She sounds important, doesn't she?

She wrote who they were front on each card.  They are tightly glued in and I hope I can save them.  But, I might just leave them in there.

Sweet Mother's Day card.

This tiny paper shoe is actually an Invitation to a Bridal Shower.

"A surprise, please."  So cute.

My personal favorite just for those little bellhops.  Too cute.  

Are cards that cute nowadays?  

I think not.

A sweet Valentine Postcard.  "To Mamma". I always wanted to be called Mama.  I am MOM.

Ever notice how people used to write their names on everything?  Even cardboard boxes and sheet music and books?

I hit a couple of sales earlier in the day and found the rest of the photos.

An old Thurnauer bowl and an old metal Slinky.  I think I have a dozen old metal Slinky's.  When I see one, I have to grab it.  Not sure what I will ever do with them....but the new plastic ones are just not nearly as cool.  Love that slank-slank noise they make.

A German Savings bank.  I thought it was a Weather Station at first.  I've never seen one of these.  It was $1.00 and it's a keeper.

An old metal recipe box full of handwritten recipes for things such as Egg Sauce (ick), two tacky 1969 Mr. Christmas decorations and a cup that says, "When I said, "I do", I didn't think I'd have to do everything."  I don't buy much new stuff, but that was too funny to leave for 25¢.

Five vintage porcelain light fixtures for 25¢ total.  They were filthy, but they cleaned up nicely.  I think I will ebay them.  You can't buy the old ones anymore.

Three old copper claw feet from a piece of furniture.  I;m sure long ago there were four, but I only found three.  Some idea to re-purpose them will pop into my head one of these days.  25¢ for all.

And now, the thing I have been looking for for YEARS but have never mentioned.

A vintage Brach's Candy case with the BEST slogan EVER. 

"Candy is delicious food....Enjoy some every day."

My Mom and thought this was hilarious years and years ago, but the slogan quickly disappeared and we were beginning to think we had dreamed it!  I saw the box in a room full of empty boxes at the Estate Sale and snuck in there and put my purchases in it.  A boy had already offered to get me a box, so I knew it was okay to get one.  I just didn't want to have to ask to a specific box like some sort of loon.  Do they still have the bins where you can buy bulk candy?  I haven't seen on in years.  At my first job, you could get five for a quarter and I would buy five on Monday and put them in my locker and eat one every day.  I was a very poor college student living on her own and that was my one and only treat.  

Anyway, I was super happy to find that silly box!

What did you find this weekend?????

If Disaster Strikes, I Am Ready

Saturday, The Bean and I went to the Home Safety Show.  It was geared towards Home Safety aspects like tornado shelters, filtering your own drinking water (from rain or ponds), drying your own food, being self reliant in a crisis and other slightly terrifying things.  I'm not one of those Doomsday believers, so I don't think I need to prepare for the end of the world, but it would be nice to have a storm shelter and some food packed in in just in case we had a storm.  We learned about lightening strikes and CPR and other important things.

Having said that, so I sound like a responsible adult wanting the best for my family and their safety.......I really only went for one reason.  And one reason alone.  

To get me some Survivor Colby Donaldson eye candy.  Mmmmmmm.....Mmmmmm he is delish.  When I walked up to him, he smiled and shook my hand and introduced himself, "Hi!  I'm Colby!  And you are?????"  And I replied, "Hi Colby.  I am Shara.  Nice to meet you."  But it came out HIcolbyIAMsharaNICEtoMEETyou all in one sentence and it might have sounded like a mixture of Minnie Mouse and James Earl Jones too.  Good to know I can keep my cool when I meet celebrities.  Actually, celebrities don't thrill me.  But Colby, well, he was just too damn handsome for his own good.  Yummy.  As much as I like Colby, well, my Mom loves him more.  A lot more.  In her words, "That boy can wear a pair of jeans."  I wanted to tell him that, but I couldn't decide if that would make him laugh or mortify him.  Besides, he didn't appear to understand my Minnie Mouse chatter anyway.  I did get it together enough to tell him my Mom's name so he could sign her a photo and to tell him how much my Stepdad likes Top Shot.  He understood that, because he told me "Good - good - glad he's watching and he likes it!"  Later in the day, Colby walked past me and sneezed.  I gave him a "Bless you" as he passed.  Now, today, my head is all congested and I think I am getting sick.  So, my story is that Colby gave me a cold.  I've never been prouder!

*I took a lot of photos, but the iphone didn't do as well as I hoped.  I din't have the sense to take a photo of him and The Bean for his "Famous Folks I Have Met" Wall. 

Not that the $6.00 admission for me wasn't completely worth it just to meet Colby, we received goodie bags chock full of freebies including pens, flashlights, t-shirts, a gigantic roll of duct tape (I mean HUGE) and other things PLUS I won one of the door prizes which was this giant set of loppers for trimming trees.  Oh yea, I also won a $10.00 Home Depot Gift Card.  Not bad for $6.00!

Fastest Sale EVER

Last Thursday I made a ten minute run to a yard sale at the other end of my street.  The ad said they had 50 tackle boxes and lots of lures.  I know nothing about fishing stuff, but I figured if they had all that old stuff, maybe they would have some other old stuff too.  I was wrong.  Just a lot of stuff in general.  So, I dropped any hopes of finding Vintage and just looked at what they had instead.

When I spotted this basket tray wrought iron thingy, I thought it looked like Longaberger.  I see Longaberger at sales a lot, but it almost always has $20 or $30 prices on it.  I always look at the price though, because you just never know.  This was priced at $4.00 and included the basket, lid, fabric liner, plastic liner, wooden divider, two smaller dividers, wooden tray and wrought iron tiered holder.  I knew it had to be worth more than $4.00, so I picked it up.  

When I paid, the lady said, "I never did use that thing."  I asked what it was for and she said, "I thought Bagels and stuff".  I didn't think that was right and I was glad she hadn't used it.  When I got home, I did some research and discovered that is was a Charging Station and Mail Sorter.  One had recently sold for $128.00 and there was one currently on ebay with a BIN of $104.00, so I decided to list mine at a BIN of $100.00 just for fun.  I thought someone would bid on it and that would be the end of my BIN.  I started the auction at 20:30:29 and it sold at my BIN price at 20:34:08.  That is less than four minutes!   I can't even imagine how the buyer found it that quickly.  But, I am glad she did!  After shipping (I undercharged a couple bucks because I ended up needing a bigger box that I anticipated), ebay fees, PayPal fees and bank fees - I still cleared about $80.00.  Not a bad return on my ten minute stop and  four minute sell time!

The Week in Junk 3/18 Edition

This week I handled a lot of junk, but most of it was stuff that I already own.  I am slowly moving out of my original Flea Market Booth.  Yesterday I brought home a rather ugly brown wooden shelf that was okay for that booth,but needs a coat of paint to be worthy for the other booth.l  It's all a bit confusing, I and will be more than happy to only have one booth.  Well, I might end up with two, but at least they will both be in one location.  Anyway, I digress as usual!  I pulled out the things that I wanted to donate - new Beanie Babies, a bunch of Troll Baby dolls that I bought a while back and some other new-ish things that don't belong in an all-vintage booth.  

In the booth across from mine, there has been an old oak Mission Rocker crammed in the corner with junk on it for the longest time.  It was $80.00 but it has slowly been marked down until yesterday it was $19.00.  It has been recovered with a 1990's Southwestern fabric which needs to be removed.  The bones of the chair are good and it is old.  Really old.  It has real metal rusty springs, burlap covering, old ticking tying the stuffing to the springs and whatnot.  It has age to it.  I can't find any markings on it.  I wish I could say that I have found a Stickley, but I know it is just a want to be and not a real one.  Nonetheless, I think I can price it at about $150.00 and resell it.  *Since I wrote this, I took off the covering and found pine needle and wood shaving stuffing.  It is super duper old.  

There is another booth that recently set up and she puts out Ziploc bags full of random things and prices them at $1.50 to $2.50 a bag.  I like baggies of stuff - you never know what you might find in there.  Most of today's goodies came from that booth.

First up though, a Goodwill find.  I was checking out and behind the counter thy have a mixture of items that are priced nice to put out on the floor or too fragile to handle.  Normally things are priced too high back there - like the two Confetti bowls I spotted earlier in the week - one for $25.00, another for $35.00.  On this occassion, I saw a doll and decided to ask to see her.

She is an old composition doll and has some issues, but she is ding-dang sweet in my book.  

She has an open mouth and sleepy eyes.  She has a squeaker in her back too.  She was $10.00 and I debated, but I had a ten dollar bill in my hand that I had just gotten as change, so I just handed it back to the guy and kept the doll.  A s I was walking to the car, carrying her like a baby, a lady came running over and wanted to look at her.  She looked her over carefully and asked me how much she cost.  When I told her, she said, "She was worth every.single. penny."  I already knew that, but getting validation from a stranger made me feel better about buying her.  I need to research her and get her listed before I get attached to her.  That, will not be easy.  :)

So, about those baggies of goodies.  This particular day there were five baggies full of Easter things.  And, from what I could see - it all appeared to be Vintage.  So, I scooped up all five bags for a total of $7.00.  Let's see what I got:

There were some things that were "Eh" at best.  But sometimes even "Eh" has its rewards.  That blue bunny is cut out of Styrofoam, but it has one perfect Mercury Glass bead for an eye.

 Then it started to get better.  Vintage tiny Easter Baskets.  I remember getting tiny ones like this at Easter when I was a kid.

A bevy of bonnets - both in straw form and flocked.  

I don't often think of candles when I think of Easter, but this little beaded candle has a bit of charm with the tiny plastic bunny sitting beside it.

 Flocked chickie love birds.  In pink!

Flocked bunny with eggs and a flocked chick popping out of an egg.

Handmade Mister and Miss Bunny.

Real eggs with tiny seed bead decorations.  And flowers.  And vintage trim.

Now we get to the GOOD stuff!  Gorgeous blue eggs with vintage Millinery flowers. 

A real egg cut out with the tiniest most adorablest (yes, that is too a word!)- Spun Cotton Chick.  And a blue velvet ribbon!  

Chenille stem bunny.  Chenille stem COVERED bunny.  Holding Millinery flowers.  

Let's have another look at that guy.  That took a lot of time to make.  Either you will love his vintage cuteness or you will find him tacky.  I think we all know how I feel about him.

And now, in the words of Larry the Cable Guy.....The Pizza of Resistance....

Ack!  That is all.  Just Ack!

Vintage Easter Sweetness.  

Love!

So!  What did you find?

Ring-a-Ding Ding!

I used to be a person that liked certain things just because I like them.  But, now thanks to blogs and to Pinterest, I find myself falling in love with things that other people own and I WANT them too!  I find myself being a follower and wanting these things.

 I started seeing these little tin toy telephones pop on blogs.

 Once it shows up on a blog, it starts popping up on Pinterest, of course.

Since I seem to be collecting tin toys now - I didn't even know that until tonight when I looked around the house and found two tin dollhouses,  a tin doll high chair, a tin sink fridge and stove, two tin typewriters, a tin globe, a tin toaster and a few other tin goodies - I decided that a tin phone was high on my WANT list.  But, I have never, ever seen one out thrifting.  I'm sure of that, or I would have already owned it.

 For curiosity, I went where I have no business going.....ebay.  Oh, I love selling on there, but I really don't need to be buying any treasures on there!

But, I did.  I went "window shopping".  And I found this sweet little red tin telephone.  At a ridiculous beginning price of 99¢.  So, I bid.  Why not?

 As you an see, despite a few other bidders, I won this adorable telephone for $1.50!  I could have never, ever thrifted it for THAT!  

Sure, I had to kick in a little for shipping, but the buyer wasn't too far, so it wasn't too bad.  

Still a sweet little deal in my book!

So, are you a follower too?

*The seller did wrap the entire package in that sticky white tape that athletes use to tape their feet or ankles.  It took me absolutely forever to unwrap.  Weird use of that sort of tape, I thought.  And sort of expensive too, right?


Edited to add photo of package:

It kind of looked like someone had mailed me a human foot!