I wasn’t really planning on going to sales on Saturday. I thought I might stay home, work on getting items priced for our re-scheduled sale, go to the dog park, and maybe clean the house. In the end I woke up early, had some coffee and headed out around 8:00. Even being on the fence, I had printed out some sales the night before — just in case.

I have this habit of really being organized when I print out my sales and I even highlight what time they are open and the address, placing the sales that look the best on top and then dividing them up by area. Not today. The very first sale had no address — in fact I found 2 listings with no address. I mostly just drove around to see if I could find any signs.

The first sale was held by the Seattle Women’s Rugby Team. Nice ladies, but really bad sale. Video tapes, bad books and t-shirts were the bulk of what they had. Honestly, the sales started out crappy. They either had nothing, everything was priced way too high, or they didn’t have anything out yet. I don’t mind that if it’s before the sale opens, but when you list 9:00 as your start time, you should try and have most of your items out.

One sale had been listed as being a benefit for Doggie Hospital Bills (way to pull at my heart strings!) and out of the 5 girls doing the sale, 3 of them worked at Nordstrom. BINGO! I didn’t lose my mind as much as I could have. I did purchase a large rolling Roxy Hawaiian suitcase that I remember seeing at Nordstrom last year (for a whopping $110) and I talked her down from $20 to $15. I purchased some (unopened) Clarins and Kiehls products, a copy of Madonna’s SEX book for $3 (I never actually looked at it until now) and some nice new candles. Final bill: $32.00.

I hit some serious duds today and I was almost ready to give up when I hit 2 different estate sales. At the first one I purchased some really cute 80’s clothes (one T-shirt says “Rip It!” with wacky 80’s cube patterns) and 3 different Boy Scout/Cub Scout books.

The next one had started the day before and it looked like folks had walked all over the house.

This sale was what I can only describe as “Crafting Gone Wild” — this woman crafted/collected way beyond what I would consider normal. In fact I would put this out as a warning to not purchase yards of fabric, patterns or yarn that you don’t need and won’t use.

I was excited to find the box for a Jewel Toned Owl purse, but it turned out to just have more knitting magazines inside. I did take a photo of the box, since it was pretty cool.

All in all it turned out okay for a day when I didn’t even think I was going to go to any sales at all.

It was one of the most beautiful days out last Saturday, so I knew there would be tons of sales. Since both Jenny and I are trying to get ready to have a yard sale next week, I planned (in my mind) to only go out for 3 hours and to only stay in our neighborhood.

I didn’t notice that I didn’t have my camera with me until I went to what I can only describe as a “bachelor pad sale,” in a good-sized house filled with nothing that I wanted to buy. It was an estate sale, and it was pretty clear that he lived alone. The house wasn’t exactly dirty, but more masculine than domestic. Up for sale were crappy albums, Playboy magazines, car and motor-cross magazines, really butt-ugly clothes, plastic glasses, tools, and some of the most nasty furniture known to man. This house would have been ripe for photos, but it was 9:00 am and I was about 40 blocks from home, so I wasn’t about to go back for the camera.

Most of the sales I went to were just sales, nothing to really talk about, nothing really great for sale — I went to three sales that only had baby stuff. I hate baby sales! I would call these three “hidden” sales, since I would have just done a drive-by, but the sale was either hidden on their back porch or behind a large fence or shrub. Fuckers.

I went to a sale and purchased 3 vintage ’50s era lampshades. I need to be honest here and say that this takes my lampshade collection up to 4 that don’t have lamps they go with. Since the shades are harder to find I used to buy them and pair them with lamps, but these days it’s hard to find “the good stuff,” so I haven’t seen anything that goes. The 2 smalls ended up being $5 and the large was $8. I also purchased a red Bakelite stirring spoon.

I didn’t really get to see too many freaks this weekend, but one of the last sales I went to was an estate sale on my street that started at 10:00. I really don’t go to them very often when they start, since I don’t like standing in line when I could be at other sales. The house was old and I was feeling that it could be worth it, so I got a number (eek! NUMBER 46) and got in line. I figured even if the sale was crappy it was in a huge house built around 1908 so that would be cool.

Everything inside was old, some of it much older than what I collect, and I think my mom would have loved some of the china and other items. I found a pretty orange brown honey comb Bauer bowl right away. It was pricey at $15, but with no chips I thought I would carry it around with me at the sale and then make up my mind.

The woman who’d lived there was a rock hound and the whole basement was filled with rocks, polished and not, tons of cigar boxes filled with rocks. I picked up two 40’s handbags, an early copy of Walt Disney’s “Thumper,” another wire-handled basket (I fear I’m getting a little TOO into those) … and the most odd thing I purchased: BOOZE! She had two unopened bottles of Amaretto and Creme De Cacao, both sealed, and both for $2. Alcohol doesn’t go bad does it? Anyone want to come over for Grass Hopper Cocktails?

We have generally found that there aren’t a ton of sales on the Saturday of a holiday weekend (like Memorial Day or Labor Day). But last Saturday there were a good handful so we went out for a few hours. Most of the sales were just so-so. We went to one fundraising sale where I found nothing, but donated $2 for a cookie (Meghan got a rice krispie treat which once again was sub-par – what is up with that?) About halfway through she ran out of money when she spent the last of it on a small vintage stained glass window (muttering all the while about how her boyfriend was going to think she was insane for buying it). A few sales later I mentioned that I had only spent $5 the whole day and she said with a horrified look “You mean all of that stuff in the trunk is mine?” Sadly, this was almost true.

We went to one sale in the carport of some new townhouses where just about all there was were trashy platform shoes and computer games. The girl there asked us what we were looking for, claiming that she could probably produce it from her house. She boasted about producing some “ruby slippers” in just the right size for a previous shopper. We just left, and agreed that we had both sort of wanted to take a picture of her and her odd selection of stuff, but didn’t even want to ask because she probably would have been too into it.

The best sale of the day came a bit later – an estate sale that didn’t sound all that great from the ad, but turned out to be pretty cool, with a house full of crusty but kinda fabulous old junk. Meghan spotted this picture on the wall:

“How much is the ponytail girl?” she asked the woman taking money by the door. “You mean me?” she replied. “My sister drew that, long ago.” It wasn’t really for sale but it almost sounded like she was thinking about it. Meghan said “I’m not even going to ask you then” and we moved on.

We were also pretty entertained by this collection of old Frango boxes (and entertaining button selection. Do it! Do it Now!)

After that we decided to call it a day and go have breakfast. We ended up stopping at a couple more sales along the way where I bought an orange phone for a quarter that turned out not to work, and a hilarious book called “Sexercise” with line drawings of a man (with fantastic 70s mustache and sideburns) and a woman demonstrating the “exercises.” Still, my contributions to the trunk were pretty meager!