Our next obstacle was sorting through the mounds of stuff at mom's. We had been working on it in bits and pieces, and finally just bit the bullet and finished it. The upstairs was a treasure trove and a time capsule all rolled into one.(More about the Time Capsule aspects in another post.)We separated things into piles, Keep, Throw, Goodwill, and Sale. We each took some things we weren't ready to let go of. We gave anything to the Goodwill that was inexpensive, used, or out of style no matter what it cost originally. We threw away anything that we ourselves wouldn't use. In the end, we had truckloads of things to haul to Jill's garage and price. We tried to be as unsentimental as possible with our prices. We knew we weren't going to 'make' money on it. A vast majority of the stuff was new, in bags, with receipts, so we knew just how much we were losing with every sale. We priced things well below thrift store prices. A new Ralph Lauren quilt was marked $20 and went for $10, a new matching set of full sheets, marked $15 and went for $7.50. Cookbooks were $1. A walker that was just purchased for $100 and never used was sold for $50. A new 12 piece glassware and pitcher set went for $7.50. New hand stitched quilts from Macy's were marked $10, and went for $5 on the last day when everything was half price. We just needed it G.O.N.E.
We set up things in the garage like a boutique. It was fabulous if I do say so myself. We had Easter on one table, Americana on another. Displays of wooden fruit were set up in baskets for sale. Fake flowers went in vases. Lamps and lampshades were displayed side by side. And so on, and so on, and so on......If we had a dollar for every time someone would say," Did you own a store?", we could've skipped the sale itself for that money! We had to restock as we sold things because we didn't have near enough room for everything in one fell swoop.
We set aside 3 weekends. OMG! The first it snowed! The second it sleeted and the wind howled! The third it poured! We sat most of it under blankets with a space heater, freezing anyway. The only thing missing was the locusts.
And then we sat. Sat with a capital S. SAT! SAT! And waited for the piles to disappear.
We did have some entertaining characters to keep us from losing our minds entirely. One set of sisters came every weekend, sometimes twice. They were a riot. They had us in stitches describing how a fighting couple came to their own garage sale one time, swearing at each other and arguing so much they kept one hand on the phone to call 911 in case it was needed. And yes, BTW, the 'Swearington's' bought something! A women from a nearby senior housing rode her bike over every day also. Told us she didn't mind the weather. But didn't show up the last day during the deluge when Mother Nature finally got her goat.. A older guy came over a few times, we think just to talk! I can picture the wife sending him out of the house for a few minutes of peace and quiet. He never bought anything. He has a cabin "up north" and says he'll watch for us when we go up to Dead Lake in July. Oh boy! We had a very eccentric woman show up right before close on Friday. She was wearing a full length fur coat. By that time it was in the 60's and sunny. She kept her money, all coins, in the fingers of a purple latex glove, shoved inside a baggie, inside another baggie. Said she had never been robbed. Go figure! She asked to use Jill's bathroom while dancing around in the garage. She told us many, many personal things about herself. In the end she dumped all her coins on the table and asked us to help her pick stuff cuz she wasn't good at making decisions. You think? She proved that to us with the fur coat and the purple glove. The most memorable character was a guy who showed up late the last day. He talked to Jill for 1/2 hour about all the fights we had been in, all the times he had been jailed, all the accidents he had, and showed us the marks from the police Taser. I waited until the garage was full of normal people, and ran inside to get Brian. He wasn't needed by the time he came out, but in the future, if a stranger starts a conversation about the time he took 12 hits of LSD and drank a quart of Bacardi 151,consider yourself warned.
In the end we made $1100. Which works out to 10 cents an hour for Jill and me. We sold $900 worth of stuff, (and made $450) in the last 3 hours! We still have a garage full of stuff. We may save some for a garage sale at Dale's in the summer or fall. A majority of it is going to the Goodwill. Some will be on CraigsList. But everything is gone at my mom's but the kitchen stuff. We figured with 5 kids and 9 grandkids, we'll use it all. The house hasn't been that empty since 1962! And I have mixed emotions about it....
Special thanks to Molly for putting in long hours in the cold garage setting up, Caitlin for occupying Sophie when I had to be in two places at one time, and the guys for hauling. A very special thanks to mom for sending dimes when we most needed it.
