Down on the Farm

Two Saturdays ago, I noticed a listing on Auction Zip for a “Farm Fest” in Ann Arbor. Here’s the flyer:

Community garage sale, you say? Flea Market? And an auction? Sign me up! The cherry on top was the petting farm. If I didn’t find any treasures to buy, at least I could pet a sheep or something!

I arrived to Ann Arbor pretty early because the auction was happening first. When I walked into the auction barn, things were already in action.

People were buying these giant Barbies for $60 each.

In fact, Barbies were the hot commodity. There were hundreds of them, all being sold in giant box lots. A box of about 7-10 sealed Barbies would sell for $100. I was clearly in the company of some Barbie-loving high rollers.

Some of the other goods included Care Bears, Cabbage Patch dolls, Madame Alexanders, and Littlest Pet Shop Critters.

Did this all come out of one house? Please tell me this didn’t all come out of one house.

Anyway, so I’m looking through the aisles of goods, and…what’s this? A WHOLE BOX OF SASHA DOLLS?! Someone pinch me.

Sarah and I had a frantic text exchange about these dolls. You would have thought we were setting up a drug deal.

I was so nervous waiting for these dolls to go up for auction. Sarah and I want these so badly! You’ve all had to read about our Sasha doll obsession a few times now. And yet, these dolls keep eluding us! We especially wanted two of the dolls at this particular auction because they looked like us:

Here is mine:

And here is Sarah’s:

Oh whoops, sorry. That’s another doll that looked like Sarah. Ok, here is the Sasha doll that looked like Sarah:

So how did things turn out? Well, terrible actually. Heartbreakingly terrible. When the auctioneer got to the box of Sasha dolls, he decided to sell them as a lot! He really should have separated them out. I bet they would have gotten at least $100 per doll.

The whole box sold to a phone bidder for over $500. I couldn’t justify spending that much on a giant box of dolls, even if I could have sold them all on ebay. Imagine my husband’s face had I purchased these. Sarah, however, thought I was a fool for not splurging on them.

After that devastating loss, I headed over to the “community garage sale” and “flea market.”

It was disappointing to say the least.

I was definitely striking out. At least there were some animals awaiting me. I set out to find the petting farm area. On the way, I watched some guys pull tractors across a field of dirt.

Here’s my tractor:

Just kidding. I don’t have a tractor.

So as it turns out, the “petting farm” was just false advertising. The cow buddy above was the only animal at the place. Whomp whomp.

Despite the letdowns, I actually did have fun at the Farm Fest. It was a beautiful day outside. And I did end up with one treasure…some vinegar fries and root beer!