Never Again

I wish this post would be a positive one. I was praying I would be telling you how "worth it" the experience was. I was hoping I would be bragging about how much money we raked in. This is not the case, my friends. I am sorry to say that I will never again have a garage sale.

For the past two weeks, during almost every nap time and after bed time at night, I have been unpacking, organizing, sorting and folding. Cleaning, setting up and pricing. I have been told by many people that putting on a garage sale is a lot of work . . . they were not exaggerating. I went through countless Rubbermaid bins, and dug through our storage closets and back shed. I set up our garage as my own personal store that was plump full of our old belongings. True, we didn't have use for these items anymore, but they still held a lot of memories. I gotta say, it was a little hard to put a price of .25 cents on some of the girls old clothes. I know that sounds a little silly, but I felt it cheapened them, and I did not like that feeling. As you can see, I don't think I am cut out for this type of business.

I myself do not go to a lot of garage sales. I have gotten a few items from some that have been great deals. But mostly when I walk into other people's garages, all I see is other people's junk. Why would I want their old crap? Again, I don't think I am cut out for this.

We opened for business on Thursday morning at 8:00. To prepare, Jenine (my friend from work who was my partner in crime) and I took out an add in the local paper. We also place 3 signs in the busiest parts of town to help drum up some customers. We were excited to see that we got quite a bit of traffic through the garage right off the bat. Our add must have been read by all of the hard-core rummagers.






I was so surprised by the amount of men we had come through. Many of them would walk in, see all the little girl clothes and toys, and turn around and walk out. But they just kept coming, one after another, for the duration of the sale! Many of these men were also over the age of 50! I just kept thinking . . . my dad wouldn't be caught dead at a garage sale! I am quite positive that garage sales are one of the few things he HATES. I just couldn't believe it.

True, a couple of them were coming to see the portable ice-fishing house we had and this:


our 1973 Arctic Cat Panther. It had a few lookers, but unfortunately, neither one of them sold.

I was floored by the amount of adorable clothes, shoes and toys that did not sell. I took offense if people would look at my stuff and not buy it. Part of me was thinking, "you think your too good for my stuff?!" I was very irritated. I don't think I need to keep pointing out the obvious, but I don't think I am cut out for this type of business!

We had name brands such as Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger (are those clothes still cool???), Gap and Baby Gap, Children's Place, and Gymboree. We even had Gucci, Coach, and Louis Vuitton . . . maybe they weren't "authentic", but COME ON!! We had the goods.

Unfortunately, a lot of our goods are on it's way to the local trift store. Oh well . . . they are out of our storage and going to a home where they will be appreciated.

On to some positives about the sale:

1. I got two days of having coffee with a good friend in a lawn chair while we laughed and watched our kids play.

(they sometimes stole our chairs...)

2. I got to meet some interesting people from around the area . . .

3. My house and garage are more cleaned out than they were a couple of weeks ago.

4. I have a new life experience.

5. It was a little fun when we had a lot of customers at one time.

6. Setting up was kinda fun . . . felt like I was setting up my own little store.

7. I do have a little cash. Whatever should I do with it . . .

*be able to buy about 35 skim vanilla lattes at Caribou Coffee

*get a few pairs of killer new shoes

*buy my hubby a nice birthday present

*be able to pay about 1/2 of my new student loan payment due this month

*groceries for the week

the possibilities may not be endless, but hey, it's something.

I am done complaining about the sale. It is over, and that is good. On to the good things about the last week.

Ella had soccer, and dang was it cute. She got to wear her new shin guards and shoes and run around with a ball. Can't get much better than that!

(LOVE the kid who came with no shirt on!)

In between watching Ella dribble and pass, I also saw a lot of this . . . Claire running away from me :)

She also liked to steal the cones off the field. I bet the coach loved us.

The girl has good form, if I do say so myself!

This week was also the last week of her swimming lessons for awhile. Although she liked most of the lessons, she DID NOT like putting her eyes in the water or jumping into the water. This made her extremely nervous . . . so we are going to wait a few weeks until we try another session.

I think she will miss her lessons and want to do another session in no time :)