Yard Sale, Anyone?

Since it's so cold outside, I thought I'd ask the question:

What do you do on a perfectly sunny, autumn day?

I don't know about you, but I had a hankerin' to have a yard sale back in September. After dragging out all the leftovers, the unusables, the unmentionables, and gifts from well-meaning friends with poor taste, the Saturday came for it to all go on the tables in the yard. For better or worse, some friends and I thought this would be a good way to do two things - get rid of unwanted clutter in our houses, and make a little cash.


And we sold everything we thought someone would want. Drawers from the old kitchen counter that had fallen apart, knick knacks galore, books, tables, and even a pair of crutches!

The tarp was on the ground at perfect child-friendly level (but funny enough most of the buyers were adults, who actually haggled over the 25 cent price tag). The clothing and textiles hanging on the clothesline were a big hit, with one woman buying over half of them and then exclaiming she'd spent too much (I think her total was a little over $20). Of course there was everything hanging there from sweaters, tablecloths, and curtains.

The furniture didn't do so well, but someone did eventually buy some of the endtables. The bed is a 3/4 bed, and the dining table was a Craigslist find we later replaced with a mahogany one that came from a friend.

A lot of the chairs sold at $5 a piece. The white parsons chairs went first, and the shield back too. The white one, which was the only antique among the bunch, did not sell and I kept it.

This is about half-way through the sale. These toys were pilfered and filtered by collector's hands, all thinking they'd found a prize.

Of course the real prize was this lamp that a friend brought to sell - and we all waited to see who would buy it. Usually, in my experience, weird things sell to very interesting people. Unfortunately, this lamp went unsold and we were thwarted in our quest to meet an interesting person.

However, it was a good time - and we did meet some nice people and made a little cash. And what didn't sell we put into a local consignment shop. So far, I've made more on the consignment shop than I did at the yard sale, but I still enjoyed it. Yard sales are not an easy thing to set up - and they don't pay well (unless you're one of those fancy ones on tv that somehow manage to make $3000 in one day).

Now when I look outside and see all the messy snow, the wind, and the cold rain - I keep thinking about the warm days when I can actually get out and do things like have yard sales (or better yet, go to someone else's). Because no matter what, it's sure to be an adventure...