Thrifty Finds & Treasures *09/20/08*

I made my way out for a full morning of yard sales yesterday — the first time in months that I got my big butt out of bed and on the road with maps and CL ads.  My purpose was as many yard sales as possible and to completely fill the truck and empty my wallet.  Ok. Maybe I’m stretching it a bit.  But I did it all.  And a first for me, I wrote a check at a yard sale.

There was a very weird thread to today’s yard sales: dead husbands, no cookbooks, and not a lot of buyers.  First, there were three (late-60’s) ladies having to leave their McMansion homes because their husbands had passed away recently.  All three women had friends helping with their sales, and all three were selling their deceased husband’s stuff.  It ranged from “all things golfing” to books and clothing.  At one sale, I arrived after noon and everything was marked half-price.  The woman asked me if there was anything in particular that I was looking for.  Hmmm.  Pyrex?  She headed back inside and came out with a perfect set of bowls in graduated sizes.  They had about 10 men’s leather briefcases that would have been a great deal, but no one knew what the combinations were and they were all locked.  Personally, I would have popped the locks to make sure they were empty before selling them.  When I was done, I ended up paying her with rolls of quarters that I had left over from my own yard sale in July.

I didn’t find many books today at all, and no cookbooks.  I think that that was a first for me.  I always find a cookbook or two or fifteen during a full day of yard sales.  I also noticed in the past, many sales would be pretty cleaned out by 11:00 or 12:00, yesterday it seemed that there was just as much stuff out late as what the sellers had started with.  Oh. Yeah.  And if anyone ever needs to buy any kind of kid’s toy, please come to Virginia and save these people from burying themselves in Fisher-Price.

I bought for myself a set of stainless steel Towle Bros. steak knives, a whole bunch of DVDs that I separated into sell and watch (then sell) [I listed half last night on Amazon, and have already made back the whole amount of money I spent on everything yesterday.  Woohoo!), a pretty tropical style framed mirror for my bathroom, two Leo Ward Bluebirds, three civil war books.  All of this stuff got put away before I got the camera out. Sorry-o!

Here are a few pictures of some of my other finds:

Cocktail pitcher with 6 glasses. The lady I bought this from said it had belonged to her mother since the early 1960’s. I love the color. ($5)

Another White House Ornament for mom’s collection. ($5)

And another! ($5)

Great set of Pyrex mixing bowls. ($5)

Mickie Mouse Club Coffee Mug (25 cents)

Vintage Christmas Candles, Made in Japan (10 cents)

Hand carved trivet from one piece of wood. ($1)

Magic Presto, the trivet is a basket, too!

I love this shape soup bowl with the two handles. ($2.00)

Japanese Kimono ($15)