Dig This Treasure!

Back a few weeks ago when I found that huge lot of cards, I really hit the jackpot. While most of the cards seemed to be from the late 1930s through the 1940s, there were some older ones mixed in. After doing a little research, I discovered that many of these would be considered “art deco”…

I’m selling all of these ones on eBay… here are a few of my faves up close. 

And then here are my absolute faves, that I’m not selling. 

People definitely seem to collect these types of cards, so if you happen upon some and they’re not overpriced, snatch ‘em up! 

-Sarah

Now that my mom is a world class estate saler and eBayer, she’s starting to find things that I am jealous of. She and my dad went out a few weeks ago on a Saturday and found a secret sale. I’m not sure if they chanted the secret sale song or not, but they should have, because it ended up being great. The best thing (in my opinion) that they found, though, was this handmade Noah’s Ark.

I am always drawn to folk arty things like this because it’s what I grew up with, and I loved it from the moment I saw it up on eBay. My mom already had some watchers and told me she would have just given it to me if she had known I loved it that much. She also only paid FIFTEEN DOLLARS for it. It’s pretty big, and it’s VERY cool–made out of wood, metal, rope, etc. The estate sale they found it at was a living estate sale, and the woman told my mom that she had bought it for $100 at an art fair years ago. It’s signed by the artist and everything. 

Anyway, I just figured I would bid on it because I was willing to pay up to about $60 for it, so I went ahead and did that toward the end of the auction. I let my mom know and she told me to just bid a ton of money on it so I’d ensure that I would win it. In the end, I won it for $68! Cindy would not accept payment because years back, she and my dad gave my brother their wooden Noah’s ark. This one is way cooler, though. Take that, Sam. 

Here it is in its new spot in our living room: 

Adam clearly isn’t a huge fan of this piece, but he’s tolerating it, which I appreciate. When I was asking him about where he thought it should go, he said, “Isn’t that a Christmas decoration?” I asked him what part of the story of Noah’s ark has to do with Christmas and he didn’t really have a good answer besides it being a story “related to Jesus.” It goes without saying that this was a pretty weak attempt at shutting the Noah’s ark operation down. 

-Sarah

My mom came along on Friday again–she’s turning into a true estate sale junkie, which is fabulous. She especially likes to come with us when the sales are really far away so she doesn’t have to drive all the way from her house on her own. I don’t blame her. 

Both sales we were going to were in St. Clair Shores, which is pretty far away. On the way there, someone in the car mentioned that they had read that one of the sales had an update on it that morning that said the house the sale was in flooded and everything was moved to tents outside. Sounded shady to me, and sad, because it was raining. Sure enough, when we got there, the woman running the sale looked familiar, and then half of the stuff in the garage looked familiar. Turns out, some of the stuff was from that duddy sale we went to a few weeks ago. Part of me wonders if the sale wasn’t just at the house of the woman running the sale and she was just fibbing about the flood. The quantity of stuff in the garage was definitely not the entire contents of a house.  

Anyway, we still found a few treasures. I found a huge lot of vintage cards and I can’t remember what Erin found but I do know she bought a really dirty (as in filthy, not sexy) book. Here is one thing we chuckled about: 

They’re so versatile! 

The only thing I remember my mom buying was a rubber faced monkey that she has up on eBay now. 

The next sale looked more promising because it was overwhelmingly packed with stuff. At this sale, we discovered that my mom likes to take her sweet time, while we tend to be able to get in and out of sales quickly, even if they’re packed. You can sort of get a vibe in terms of what sort of stuff is there, and these people didn’t have a ton of the type of stuff that either of us are interested in. Still, of course, I bought a lot of things. 

Before I go on, allow me to complain: One particularly disappointing thing that happened at this sale was that there were a TON of cast iron figurines and larger statues, but they all ended up being reproductions. As Erin has discovered, original cast iron can end up being really lucrative. Still, I found one cast iron thing that I bought for myself because it was cute: 

It looks big here but it’s a tiny little dish.

UPDATE: Since writing this, Adam pointed out to me that it’s an ashtray. GROSS.  

I also found ANOTHER Max statue! 

Erin cannot deny that this looks like Max. 

One other fun thing I found was this mug, that I got to surprise Adam with. 

He recently bought me a Keurig machine for my birthday and he started drinking “coffee” out of it (these weird coconut mocha cups) but I was horrified to discover the other day that he uses the same mug every morning. (Note: We have many, many mugs at our house. He just likes this one particular mug.) Now he can alternate. The “Paw” part is appropriate because I often call him “Daddy” when he’s acting like a dad (paying for dinner with coupons) or wearing dad-ish clothes. I hope he loves it. 

One strange thing at this sale was the abundance of depressing decor. Here are just a few examples: 

Worth noting: That is the second time I’ve seen that exact nervous breakdown plaque at a sale. Someone needed to give the man who owned this house a big hug. 

Ok, back to happy times: I also found this weird doll. It’s by a Japanese brand called Senpo, probably from the late ‘60s or '70s. I know that dolls with these sort of faces can be valuable thanks to all of my stalking of Becky’s Flickr and asking her various questions, but I still can’t identify which ones are the most valuable. But this one is sort of cool because it’s also musical and rotates. Last night while trying to describe her clothing in my eBay listing, I got sucked into a Wikipedia hole of pages of fashion from various time periods. Whatever, I called it “Victorian”… 

I found some other treasures, one of which I’ll write about some other time. The really excellent part of this sale was that everything was priced reasonably. The people running the sale were the same ones that gave us some good deals when we found Timmy’s Santa. 

We knew we were in trouble when we finished going through the entire house and my mom had only made it into three rooms on the main floor. I told her we would go grab some food and then come back and get her and she was cool with that. On our way to find a Mr. Pita, we actually found a secret church rummage sale! I didn’t really think this was worthy of the secret sale chant but we did it anyway. The most exciting part of this sale was this sign, telling us that really excellent things were ahead: 

We quickly discovered that we would not need to go to Mr. Pita, because this was a Greek Orthodox church and the ladies inside were cooking up some badass spankamankapita or whatever the Greek word is for SPINACH PIE. It’s a good thing because the “Mr. Pita” on my map ended up being someone’s house in the middle of a neighborhood. I still can’t figure out why that happened but we got some good laughs out of it.  

Besides some tasty Greek treats, I found these two items at the church rummage sale: 

Look, I’m shocked that Erin didn’t grab those earrings. One year ago she was wearing bedazzled velvet Christmas shoes, but now she’s too good for Santabear earrings? Also just an FYI, if you have a secret stash of Sandra Boynton items, try to sell them on eBay because there is a crazy market of cat ladies out there just waiting to give you their life savings for your fat cat gear. 

We went back to the sale to pick up my mom, drove home, and then Erin and I had an argument about Christmas in her driveway that drove us both to tears. True story! Coincidently, I discovered this picture in a photo album last night while I was visiting my grandpa: 

Clearly, not much has changed since I was six.

You’ll be relieved to know that we’ve completely recovered from this argument and are still friends. I mean after all, SOMEONE has to run this blog. 

-Sarah 

Update from Erin: It’s true, Sarah and I went all Cash & Cari on each other in my driveway.  At one point I remember exclaiming, “JESUS CHRIST SARAH!” which means that I was both really mad and not scared of going to hell.  I’ll just blame the whole thing on a drop in blood sugar because I’ve heard other people give that excuse before when they are cranky.

ANYWAYZ, I got some neat things at the first sale.  The first was a Nippon gravy bowl that I had actually seen at a sale the week before.  It obviously didn’t sell, and had made it here to this sale.  Last week it was $15, but this day I got it for $4.  I plan to put gravy in this at Thanksgiving.

Speaking of the Fall time (my favorite season) I got this awesome table runner and set of placemats.  So cute!  I asked the lady the price on this set because the sticker was hard to read.  I think she thought I was asking for a deal because she said, “Well, it’s marked $3, but I guess I’ll take $2.”  I just gave her the $3 because right before we checked out, another shopper at the sale was relentlessly lowballing this woman.  It was awkward and sad.

The gross book that Sarah mentioned I bought was about flea market collectibles.  It’s a cool book with helpful tips on common collectibles and antiques.  When I use it to buy something valuable, maybe Sarah will be less apt to knock it.

The next sale was a nightmare.  Cindy loved it and found great things, but I have no idea how she did it.  The house was PACKED, but everything was awful.  I hate saying that about someone’s stuff, but really, it was so awful.  

Sarah mentioned this, but I’ll reiterate. The problem here was that almost EVERYTHING was a reproduction–and a cheap reproduction at that–but still priced like authentic items.  Here are a bunch of cast iron banks and door stops that I got excited about, until I realized they were fake:

The thing about cast iron is that people collect it because it’s cast iron, so when it’s NOT cast iron, well, you get the idea.

And also like Sarah said, this sale had depressing things.  Here was one I found:

Besides the sad plates abundance, the sale was also really crowded and hot, so I was happy when Sarah and I left to go get food and come back later for Cindy.  At the Greek bake sale I ate a custard pie and a bit of spinach pie.  They were good.  I also ate a pumpkin bar which was obviously the best.

-Erin

Update from Sarah: I didn’t knock the book! I said it was dirty, which you cannot deny. 

After the success of purchasing my first piece of Herend porcelain, I decided that it would be nice to start collecting this stuff regularly.   I imagine a little shelf in our house with all Herend pieces.  It will take awhile to get there, but why not start this endeavor with a bang…

I found this Herend seal box on ebay and decided to splurge on it.

LOOK AT HIS SAD LITTLE SEAL FACE!  I love him.

I don’t want to say exactly what I spent on this guy, but I will say that it was more than $128 and less than $130.  Don’t tell Timmy. 

-Erin

My antique-filled birthday extravaganza continued with a trip to Greenmead a couple weekends ago.  Greenmead hosts an antique market every few months during the summer, and it is truly one of the best.

Zach and I found our first treasure pretty quickly.  It was this great old oil painting from 1922.  The painting is of a Greek ship called the Greek Frigate Hellas.  Here’s a Wikipedia all about this ship, which was part of the Hellenic Navy.

Next, I met up with one of our loyal DTT readers, a cool guy named Rudy.  Rudy had a booth at Greenmead, and had messaged us to ask if we would be in attendance.  I had assumed that Rudy was a woman, as most of our readers are.  When I walked up and asked for Rudy, and he introduced himself, I said, “OH I THOUGHT YOU WERE A LADY.”  I am obviously great with first impressions.  After that little snag, Rudy and I chit chatted about collecting.  His booth was all vintage toys and action figures.  He had some Magic cards, so I asked about the infamous Black Lotus card.  He didn’t have any, which is fine because I didn’t have the 1000 bones to buy it.

What I also want to mention about Rudy, is that he is a great testament to the potential of this blog.  I’m not just here to make fun of Sarah and write about porcelain I want.  I also hope that in time, we become a hub for people who are looking for certain items, or who have things that we want to buy.  So that said, Rudy is always buying and selling vintage toys, action figures, and also vintage knives and weaponry.  If you have some, or want to buy some, message us and we will pass along Rudy’s contact information.

OK, so on to more goods…

I found this old blow-up guy from the 1960s.  His hat says “Tigers” but I don’t think he is Detroit related.  I still bought him for Timmy because I knew he would want him for his Tigers-themed den, which has items exclusively from the 50s and 60s.  

I also bought a McCoy pitcher to sell, and a 1968 Detroit Tigers ticket stub.  Zach found an old Red Wings postcard and a small wood music box in the shape of a piano.  Here are some things we passed on:

Zach was pretty shocked that I didn’t actually buy that butter bowl.  He and Sarah have a running joke that I am the “buttermaster” because frankly, I love butter.  Really, I love all condiments or spreads.  I contend that there are way worse flaws to have in life, like buying every dog themed item you can find at an estate sale.  

-Erin

Update from Sarah: Why in the hell is that butter bowl TEN DOLLARS? And I would have bought that Tarzan patch. 

As I mentioned, the plans for my birthday last week were entirely based around treasure hunting.  Saturday night, Zach and I went to an auction in Plymouth.  I’ve mentioned this auction before on the blog, and the last time we went, we left empty handed.  This time though, things were VERY different!

We arrived at the auction and the place was packed with high quality items.  There were Le Creuset pans still in the box, Lenox serving pieces, cool art, and LOTS of porcelain.  If you’ve been following closely, I’ve been in the market for some baller-ass-rich-people porcelain.  Now was my chance to get some, and because it was my birthday, I could drop some mad cash on it and not feel bad.

I bid pretty regularly during the auction, and won lots and lots of things.  My first two purchases were Lenox:

You can’t really tell, but these pieces are HUGE.  And the edges are 24K gold.  The larger dish cost me $22 and the smaller one was $7.  Let me just say now, that this is INSANE for Lenox.  I was thrilled.

The low, low prices continued all night.  I bought a lot which included an antique silver-plated serving tray, an old silver trinket box, and a super heavy metalware cake stand.  I paid $5 total for all of it.  I bid because the cake stand is by designer Michael Aram, whose work usually sells for around $250 new.  I already have this on ebay. 

At this point, we had been at the auction for a couple hours.  The only negative about the auction is that it goes from 7pm until midnight, with no schedule of when certain items will go up for sale.  I told Zach though that I had my eye on a particular porcelain rabbit, and that I would stay there all night.

The rabbit in question was a Herend, and in the hand-painted fishnet style.  I had been coveting one of these rabbits on ebay, and even asked Zach a week before to buy me one.  It was fate, this rabbit was to be mine.

When the rabbit finally went up for auction, it was paired with a Limoges trinket box.  I was really worried because those dumb little boxes are SUPER collectible, so I figured a million people would bid.  

But then the bidding started, and it was just me and this dude a couple seats down from me.  I just kept my hand in the air, instead of raising and lowering it with each bid.  I really wanted to look at the guy and yell, “STAND DOWN.”  

But then he bowed out at $17.  SEVENTEEN DOLLARS?!  I was so shocked and thrilled.  Zach said that the guy gave me death stare when I went to collect my goods, which made me savor the victory even more.

Here’s my little buddy:

And in case you are wondering if I made a good purchase, here are some recently sold Herend figures:

As for the Limoges box, it is already selling on ebay.  

This entry is getting long, but the scores I had at this auction were never-ending.  The last item I bought was this Royal Doulton rabbit bank.  Ok, I obviously like rabbits, but look at this guy!  So great.

This bank was my most pricey purchase of the night…a whopping $30.  Obviously worth it.

-Erin

Over Labor Day weekend, I went to Canada with my family.  We’ve been making this annual trek since I was in elementary school, and our visit centers on two huge antique markets in Sarnia.  

Before I reveal my finds from the trip, I have to say that I LOVE Canada.  I love its fries slathered in vinegar, I love how nervous Timmy gets at the customs booth, I love Coffee Crisp candy bars, and I love Duty Free shops.  Canada is the best, and so are its antique markets.

Our first stop was Dale’s Antiques, a cluster of little booths and barns open every Sunday.

I spotted this scale in one of the barns and of course loved it.  It was huge and expensive though.

I did, however, buy a smaller kitchen scale for my collection.  This one was pretty rusted up, but it’s much older than my other scales and really unique.  I paid $20 for it, which is more than I usually spend on scales.  I kept telling myself that this was Canadian money though, and thus not really real.

I also found an old cookie jar that was in excellent shape.  I knew that I could resell it easily since it was classically “retro” and because it was a cat.  I paid $15 and ended up selling it on ebay for $38.  The jar is made by American Bisque which is pretty collectible among cookie jar people.

A helpful hint here is that American Bisque jars are often airbrushed, and the bottoms have raised wedge-like pieces:

After Dale’s, we visited a couple of small, independent antique shops, and then headed to a flea market called The Pinery.  The Pinery is great because you can buy beef jerky, dog bones, and antiques all in the same place–while drinking an ice cold beer.  I did all of these things.  

My best find was probably this old cast iron still bank.  I thought this was a soldier, but it turns out he is actually a boy scout.  He was made prior to 1934 by AC Williams Co.  I paid $25 for him, but auction listings online value him anywhere from $150-$295!  My little guy has a piece missing out of one leg, but I don’t plan to sell him anyway.  Right now he has a home on one of our collectible shelves.

Cute huh?  He has a little backpack that you can drop coins in.  

I’ll end with some treasures I didn’t buy.  I am seriously kicking myself over passing on these.  I have no explanation of what these felt banners mean or what they were used for, but they sure are hilarious.

“Hold It Baby It’s Too Divine”

“No-No Lady Don’t Do That!”

“Cool Me Off, I’m Steaming”

Lines from 50 Shades of Grey? Who knows.

-Erin