White Elephant Sales

[Quettalee]

It's one of my passions as well as a weakness. I might as well admit it...I am a "stuff-girl" girl. Flea markets, yard sales, the Goodwill...heck, I've even been known to drive around on "junk" trash day. If you have the patience--priceless, top-of-the-line treasures can be found for absolutely nothing! You just have to be in the right place at the right time.

Today's excursion was one of those golden days every pack-rat dreams of...hundreds of yard and neighborhood sales and every stop seem to abound in things I just couldn't live without!

My bestest find today...a new desk to go in our newly-remodeled kitchen! I have been wanting a new desk forever, but haven't been able to find exactly what I wanted anywhere--even retail. I found it this morning. It's a corner unit in three parts, it's black and grey (a perfect match for the kitchen), it has nooks and crannies and drawers and doors, it has a cubby hole with a light, it has shelves, and it was $35!! Found it in a nice area in town where a couple had "outgrown" their old, two-story, Victorian-type home. They have to be out by Monday, so I am taking Mare back to look at a brand new couch that has been "parked" in the diningroom. It wasn't for sale, and she said she wouldn't offer it to anyone else, but Mare has to have the final word on that.

Well, I have to busy myself with clearing my space...

I have another story to share about my newest hobby...I'm thinking it will go good here, but no time now.

Gotta run! Smooches! (and happy shopping)

[Quettalee]

Yikes!! Had to stop to go cover my new treasure...it is pouring outside! Perfect example of why you should never buy anything at a yard sale that you don't have help to unload. Lol.

Good thing I didn't go ahead and buy the couch.

[Quettalee]

Bonus of the mid-week, out-of-the-ordinary, spur of the moment, hunt...

Halloween lights! A huge blanket of either eyes only that blink or a giant spider web with the blinking eyes being the spiders...and a strand of PT-purple lights...total-$2.75!

I also got a mini fog machine at my favorite close-out store. They were having a "holiday-in-July" sale with Halloween, Thanksgiving/Fall, Christmas decor 30% off. I couldn't pass up the sale...and you really don't just see mini fog machines lying around everywhere...



See "Crabitat" thread for additional white elephants of the day.

[Quettalee]

Whole herd of elephants in one pasture this morning. (neighborhood sale)

Several little tresures, but no real stand-outs today. Lots of stops, nothing I just had to have. There is one strand of really great Halloween lights--big outdoor lights. They are three-toned...orange, purple, and black. Probably my favorite treasure today. Unless...I did pick up a book--The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon. I'm thinkin this may one to pass along after finishing it. Now, lemme see...oh, three Corning Ware bowls with lids for a $1 (that was a good deal). I also got a 50-foot, brand new, heavy-duty extension cord complete with the wrap-arounder-thingy for $3. (same place as the bowls). That was a nice yard sale. Elderly couple, new neighborhood, everything precisely labeled and neatly arranged in perfect rows--even in the garage. He had his work bench and shelves all priced individually and I swear, you would've thought you were in a showroom garage!

Oh boy, there's the lunch bell!

Smooches and happy hunting! (I'm still waiting, Gams)

[gams]

I'm still waiting, Gams

Right on it, Q....as soon as I actually get in here at times other than those when I should be in bed, or should be out the door on my way to work.

There are certain things I always look for though, and can not resist: any type of container that I can use as a planter, old books, old wooden furniture, and solid wood doors.

I've added to my collections in each category recently.

[Quettalee]

Planters...now that could get addicting with all the possibilities. I actually do a little crafty-thingy with old chairs--making them into planters. I'm sure you've seen variations. Almost anything can be used--depending on the theme and all.

Mary and I went out Saturday for awhile, but the weather was rainy Friday night and it was threatening Saturday, so it was slim pickins. I guess my best find was an actual plant stand. One of those three tier things, wooden...it was promptly painted to match the rest of the front accessories and now it holds all my little cuttings from Inez of Wandering Jew, some kind of lily, two tomatoe plants that are only about a foot high--here at the end of July. Maybe I'll still be getting tomatoes in December! I wanted the geranium on there, but the pot is too big.

[maeve]

You guys are much more creative than me. I think everyone is, though. Still our little stone cottage is home to a wild disarray of stuff.

I swear STP is part border collie. She doesn't exactly collect, she herds. And she herds odd stuff: thousands of marbles (most bought 3-4 at a time), glass paperweights, vintage clocks, thermoses, opera glasses, coffee pots. In cahoots with our roomie, we have the front porch/summer kitchen with oodles of rope lights (Q, hide yours), some of which pulse to music. I've dubbed it the Blue Moon Cafe and now we have more stuff, metal suns and moons and such like. The real kitchen is home to the birdhouses STP built, the cookie jars, and rope lights of chili peppers.
(I won't get into STP's dremel stuff...)

Said roomie has pez for every occasions and candles. And more seasonal doodads than we could ever use. A huge DVD library. And a not huge but way cool series of rock and roll concert posters.

We all have fiction. Too much fiction. We all have way too many CDs. STP just bought a turntable to CD thingie so we had to lug 1500 LPs about. And litterally wash them.

I'm guilty as well. I have three different professional libraries plus my fiction. Boxes of Lithics I inherited. Cameras -- I have a Russian version of a hasselblad (ok, so I have one of them too), oddities like left-handed shutter button cameras. Um, pens, a lot. Knives, but not fantasy knives, I make knives. A big collection of "vintage" top of the line camping gear. Tools, mostly my own that I have used often. (I still wonder why I hang onto the old VW Beetle brake adjuster guide -- every mechanic had one at some point, but not the last 20 years.)

And we are now at the age where we are wondering what the devil to do with it all. It sounds really obsessive -- it wasn't. It is just 3 pack-rats facing a lifetime of pack-ratting. I mean, I worked at several excellent camping stores and the sales guys were always trying to woo with their goodies. Okay, that makes sense. But now what the dickens am I supposed to do with like 7 backpacking stoves? What is STP gonna do with 30 pairs of opera glasses?

Now we're thinking about adding another old Benz (we have 3, two from 1985, one 1986, all diesel).

I am the white elephant coo-coo-achoo and the white elephant is me.

I think we need an intervention...

Maeve

[gams]

Ah, but you guys collect useful stuff, (although I'm not sure how useful thousands of marbles would be, unless let loose to provide amusement for the cats, and those watching the cats).

My junk is truly junk - with a "que". Junque that no one wants, and sets out on the side of the road. Yes, I am a trash collector, and everyone knows it - even my boss will come back from a job site with something in hand; a door from a barn, a piece of statuary or pottery the client didn't want anymore - whatever. Sometimes the junque he brings me is even too junky for me and it ends up in the dumpster, and sometimes he'll tell me there's junk in the dumpster, and I should go take a look.

My Xena-Sista calls this junque "Ju-ju", and it is usually prefaced with the adjective "good" when she speaks of it. She will alert me to it's presence by phone announcement, like some Blue-Light Special coming over the intercom at K-Mart, "Good ju-ju on the corner of Cherry and Superior - you better get there quick" - which means she's already picked through it. Cool thing about where we live: most of the houses are 90 years old and up; grand old houses with turrets, cupolas, fantastic woodwork and such. Attic and old back-of-the garage finds are always interesting, and old houses mean there are always renovations going on somewhere in town. I've picked up thousands of old bricks, (they edge my gardens), furniture, pottery, my beloved doors, an old farming implement, (my ninety year old neighbor says it's a potato planter), a wooden picnic basket, (a handy company's-coming-gotta-clean-off-the-stack-of-whatever's-on-the-dining-room-table catch-all), and countless other pieces of ju-ju. I am not the only one....sometimes I'll see something put out for the trash, and will be walking, or have the car when what I need the truck to haul it. I'll go back later, and whatever it is that caught my eye will already be gone.

Yard sales and flea markets - they're always on Saturdays, and I always work Saturdays; Ju-Ju is put out on Sunday night - trash day is Monday.

And anyway, as LX said recently when I had a rare Saturday off work and we hit a yard sale down the street, "Mom, yard sales are just Ju-Ju with a price tag."

[Joxcee]

gams said:

And anyway, as LX said recently when I had a rare Saturday off work and we hit a yard sale down the street, "Mom, yard sales are just Ju-Ju with a price tag."

Your daughter is just _too_ funny. I wonder where she gets it?

[gams]

She is a trip, Joxie. A queen of one-liners, (as well as Queen of the House of Melodrama, who rules along with Princess Melodrama BP). She said something a couple of weeks ago that had me laughing so hard, it hurt; and her delivery of such things is perfect - wry with just a hint of Cheshire smile.

Some of the stuff that comes out of her mouth cracks me up....the other stuff, the melodrama, I'm sure is meant specifically to drive me insane.

[Joxcee]

You better be careful, she may become a famous comic when she gets older and then we'll learn all about her family from her shows & movies.

[Quettalee]

Neither of us working this weekend and we were out early this morning for our "therapy". Found some priceless treasures--especially at the outdoor yard sale hosted to raise money for one of the local basketball teams.

For $8, we got a table umbrella, an outside shower thingy that hooks up to the hose for Mare when she lays out (remember, it's for the kids), two jean-hanger-holdy things to go in the closet, garden tools, shoe-stretchers (for the brand-new sandles that I bought Mare that are too tight across the toes), and all the clothes I could fit in a shopping bag for $2. I got two pairs of jeans, three shorts, a jacket, a belt, a skirt, and about six tops. Very hard to pass up that deal when you have growing girls in the house. (Gams, I have a box started for you. I'll be shooting for mid-Sept., but if I hold true to form, it could be a Christmas box!) Lol. By that time you won't need work jeans.

We also hit the craft store. It's the best place to find shells for the crabitat. Somehow we ended up with about $18 in additional "craft-store-treasures". Pfft. That stuff is so expensive. Especially after spending the morning chasing white elephants.

[Quettalee]

This weekend's rundown...

A strand of X-mas lights--golfball-sized smiley faces with little Santa hats--adorable, an angel food cake pan and a second 8" round pan--because you want to bake both layers of your tiers at the same time and I had only one 8", the coolest Halloween decorations because I can't pass them up and you can never have too many Halloween decorations--and the ones that catch my eye are always unique, a brand new umbrella stand for the umbrella we found last weekend, a pair of work jeans for Mare for .75--that fit like they were made for her--a child's size 16, some crafty stuff for #2 daughter, some pants for #1, and a few other little odds and ends--things that will no doubt end up as "personality trappings" in our future business adventure...

All in all, it was a good haul. Started out kinda scarce considering what a beautiful Saturday it was, but the KY state fair is going on, so I think that might've had something to do with it.

I did come across one yard sale that had three doors for sale. It was all I could do not to buy them, and had I been able to convince myself just one inkling that we could make a trip north to do the delivery in the next...year, I'm sure they would be sitting in my garage as I type. I was able to resist in the end, so you can go ahead and take a breath now, Gams. Sorry we missed out.

[gams]

Last night was a perfect fall night; cool, jacket weather; the girls both stayed at their girlfriend's house for the night - separate houses and the way they've been getting along lately, it was a good thing for them to spend some time apart. Friends of ours called to met them for a walk downtown, and a nice hot drink, or two to warm us up after the walk.

We never made it downtown. About a block from their house, Hubs found a hunk of ju-ju - funny, because we were right at that moment talking about ju-ju, and I guess it meant this particular piece of junk was meant for him, (eye-roll). It's a bathroom cabinet he's going to paint and use in the garage as (another) tool and doo-hickey cabinet. And it has all the mounting hardware!!!! (another) Eye-roll.

LMAO at how excited he was. This from the man who told me to "hurry up and cover my eyes" while we were walking around the neighborhood a few weeks ago. I obliged, thinking he was sheltering me from emotional distraught over seeing an animal that'd been hit in the road, or some other such unsettling sight. After he said I could open them, I asked what it was that he did not want me to see.

"A door. And don't look back! No, no....don't look. Damn."

So we dragged the cabinet back to Xena-Sista's house last night, and hung there inside of walking downtown. Fun. She makes my drinks just the way I like them....one...no, two pots of coffee, nice and strong, laced with just the right amount of Bailey's drank interspersed with intermittent shots of Rootbeer Schnapps. All that coffee and I couldn't get to sleep until after three in the morning. (It's almost that now, and I hope this is not the start of one of those weird sleep patterns I get myself into)

Hubs' new cabinet is now sitting on the garage floor next to my newest door in my door collection until we both get around to doing something with our treasures.

Thinking it was a good thing you passed on those doors, Q. That's how my addiction started, you know....just one beautiful door I bought at a yard sale.

[gams]

My latest find: A Nautilus Recumbant Aerobic Bike. Not quite a side-of-the-road find, but I saved it from being one. A friend of a friend was going to dump it just because it was a dust collector.

HA! I have plenty of dust at my house, I said, let's bring it there, and my dust bunnies can play.

It's cool; different courses, and different effort settings determine whether you bike past tumble weeds and cacti in the desert uphill, (are there really uphill climbs in the desert?), or mountainous terrian; the thing has a viewy-thingy that displays the "road" you're riding. Flat land, and uphills, but damn, damn where's the downhills? There are none.

And while it may end up collecting dust down in the basement eventually, (it was a b!tch to get down there, and will remain there forever), it's been nice having it this past week when I haven't been able to x-country or roller-ski....and I still get that wintery blast while riding; it's brrrrr-cold in the basement.

Now, if I'd only remember to use it!

[gams]

My latest finds aren't exactly White Elephants, but they were on sale, and I was excited about that. I found them at my favorite boutique downtown during Ice Breaker Weekend, when the shops have their annual sale...

A black, gray, and the palest dusty rose floral-patterned embroidered jacket. Jacquard? Brocade? If I knew fashion terminology I'd know it's probably neither. But I've been eyeing this thing since fall. Tight fitting in the sleeves and down to the waist, it then flares a bit down to mid-thigh; three buttons down the front, and the tiniest bit of lace around the collar. A piratesque look to it.

Another, that I fell in love with immediately after just one touch, was a bit of a splurge, even at the half-off price. A silk and rayon blend but it feels and looks oh-so-velvety soft. Dark blood-red, and flowy - I normally don't do flowy - or low-cut, which it is also. Again with the pirate look. $104.00! Even at half-off, I don't think I've ever paid that for a whim purchase.

But a couple of nice Christmas gift certificates, and I even have $25.00 left.....though the sale is now over, and that would probably buy me half a pair of socks.

LX says I look kewl in them. Hip, maybe is what she said. Stylin'? Heck, I don't remember what word she used, which proves I am none of the above.

[Quettalee]

Pictures, please?!

I'm sure you are a fashion statement in big, bold, brocadic (not really a word--I looked) letters!

[Quettalee]

Since we are opening at noon everyday now, I had a chance to get up and get out by myself yesterday morning. I went straight to the Goodwill. You would've thought I was a going for the needle.

I found a brand new pair of pants for #2. She loves dragons. This pair is brownish-tan with one embroidered halfway up one leg in gold and darker browns...beautiful. And they fit her perfectly. She was speechless. I also found a shirt and some new sweats...and another pair of pants that was for Mare, but they weren't quite tight enough for her, so #2 made out like a bandit.

Next was several things for the shop. A Martha Stewart kitchen organizer thingy. It had a mountable bar and several "compartments". We split it up and both of us have parts of it in our respectable work areas. Great find.

Several more little things...unique coffee/tea mugs for Mare, nic-nacs...all priceless treasures that I'm not sure how we were functioning without??

I think we may hit Trinity Church thrift store this morning. It's between here and the shop and altho not as big as Goodwill, we always find treasures. And socks. I am extremely picky about my socks (white, cotton, short), and they actually carry some new stuff--I think they are considered seconds because they are small for adult socks...whatever. I love them.

Happy hunting, treasure seekers!

[gams]

Look! I'm sitting here at my new control center! Not a new desk, but an additional desk.

LMAO. It cracks me up how my ju-ju collecting has spread throughout my workplace to people who scoffed at the idea of picking up stuff by the side of the road and refurbishing it, or re-purposing it. My boss is the funniest example - he used to laugh at me. Now he collects for me....and for himself too. His best find this past winter: a wooden glider bench. "It was just sitting by the road", he said, "I can't believe someone would just throw it away." Oh, David. You are hooked aren't you?

He brought it home to his workshop, repaired the glider mechanism thingy, gave it a couple coats of weather resistant sealer, and proudly presented it to me to put in the children's garden at work. I've always wanted one of these, I told him. "How much for my labor?" he joked. Quickly trying to calculate where I'd put the thing; I don't really have space on the front porch or side porch. Also wondering what Hubs would say after I made him actually dumpster-dive, (something I've never done myself, but am not beyond requesting Hubs to do), to save a bookcase from being hauled away from the Historic Society's building a few weeks prior, (which is still waiting in the garage to have a use found for it). I believe Hubs' words then were, "No more ju-ju in my garage 'til you get some of this other stuff outta here; the truck barely fits anymore". I decided the glider was too big to store.....

But.... "How much for that desk in the barn?" I spied it my first week back at work. It's a child's desk; it made it through three generations of the bosses' family, traveled much of the country, and somehow found its way from Wisconsin to Michigan this winter. "That old thing? You can have it." Cool! We hauled the glider out to the kids' garden on the trailer, and the desk out to my truck.

It now sits a couple of feet from my work desk, expanding my workspace and making it seem more organized, (somewhat), and neat, (sort-of). Cool thing about it is that it has a small hutch with compartment thingies like those old mail slots. That and the additional drawer space are bonuses; I really wanted it to set my printer and DSL boxes on to save room on my over-cluttered desk top. And look! Now I can actually see that I have a desk-top!

[Quettalee]

Well, I've been waiting to answer with a picture, but we've about decided the memory card is bad in Mare's camera. Do they go bad and have to be replaced? I think it's at least two years old...

Anyhoo, we found a small table & three chairs at one of our favorite thrift stores... (they're losing their lease )...solid wood, cut in a kinda dutch design...maybe...with a heart cut out of the backs of the chairs...with little blue teddy bears riding carousels painted under the cut-outs...adorable. A little wood glue, some cleaning up, a coat of varnish and the little ones have a table of their own on the "veranda"! Oh, we paid $15 for it...and that was before they were having a store-wide 50% off everything sale.

I love those finds. And then last week, after they told us they were closing, he let me at the Cafepress.com-reject racks--the ones he pulls from in the back. Some of the coolest t-shirt finds ever! Usually only one of each, but we have been selling them at the shop and they go like hotcakes!

And Gams, your post is four days old. I'm betting that "extra" desk space that you have acquired...it's completely hidden by now. Am I wrong? Because I know your type. I live with one of your type. It will never matter how much space you gain, it will never be enough. And keeping it organized...pfft. That usually last about...24 hours with my particular "one of your kind". Same with her end table on the couch. Yep. It's the very reason I loathe dining room tables, coffee tables...all catch-all spaces just screaming to be piled high. The same with every nook and cranny. It's like an addiction with this one. If there's a space there, it's gonna be filled.