Dig This Treasure!

Wow, hard to believe that over a month after my trip out there, I still have tales to tell about South Carolina. 

After our two previous treasure-seeking trips were pretty big busts, we decided to head out to another nearby town–Summerville–to see if there was anything good to find out there. Our first stop was the Summerville Antique Gallery. 

Right away, I knew it would be at least good for window shopping. It was a huge building with lots of little booths throughout. 

For the most part, prices were more reasonable than they had been at the place the previous day. Some were still pretty high. My dad was really interested in this Coca Cola stadium carrier. It had a strap that you’d wear around your neck–you know, to walk around baseball games and sell pop. 

But I looked it up for him and it was priced a little higher than what they sell for on eBay. Whomp whomp. 

I thought this was a pretty cute ways to display cards and other paper items! I loved those teeny clothespins. 

Here’s some of the cards close up. 

Cuuuuuuute! 

Does anyone know if these civil war bullets are legit? I thought they were but maybe I’m dumb. 

This thing was so cool…but what would you do with it? 

Ok, so I found a few cute things to purchase. First up is this adorable little girl sitting with her dog on a dresser. I don’t really know why I bought this or if I really need it (answer is no) but it was too cute to pass up. 

I also found a collection of these little trinket boxes. I’m almost positive that they’re new, but I still thought this one was too cute to pass up. 

Yep! When you open it up there’s a tiny little dog bone inside! 

I also bought this small, beat up chalkware dog for my mini shelf.

Anyway, we knew it was time to leave when I spotted this piece of sheet music.

I actually immediately hopped on a plane and flew home to Michigan.

-Sarah 

Shortly after Everett was born, there was a sale being put on by our favorite Ragamuffins, but it was really far away, so Erin passed on the opportunity and I went alone. It was a former antiques dealer, according to the ad, so I was prepared to find some cool stuff! 

I ran into my parents there, and they were in the market for “guy stuff”–so this sale did not disappoint. They bought some of those very trucks pictured above. 

The guy on the left is my dad, checking out some high quality items. 

My only complaint really, was that there was cool stuff–but it was all priced super high. We’ve had this problem with the ragamuffins in the past. The good thing was that there wasn’t anything I was dying to buy that was overpriced. If there was, I would have been really annoyed. For example, look at how some of this vintage Christmas stuff was priced: 

That flocked Santa is marked $25!! Now, if those were a bunch of knee huggers or Joan Walsh Anglund Christmas items, I would have been ticked. 

Another example: Playboy puzzles marked $20 each. No.

Actually, I shouldn’t say I wasn’t disappointed because I was. This person had a ton of books, but they were priced so outrageously that I didn’t get any. 

Promising room: 

Disappointing reality: 

Oh well! 

I also spotted these cuties but they were a little too dirty for me. 

I did end up finding some deals because the basement was filled with boxes and boxes of vintage Playboys–which I have admittedly vowed to stop purchasing. However, they were selling them for $1 each, and if you had patience, you could find some cool super old ones. So that’s what I did. While I was down there, this guy told me that if I put together a big box, they’d give me an even better deal. So I did that. 

You can see both the deal maker and some of the boxes of Playboys in the picture above. One thing I learned during this trip–a big cardboard box of Playboys is hella heavy! 

The ragamuffins ended up charging me $50 for everything in my box, and I made that up quickly by selling the two “Coca Cola” issues that I found. If you ever stumble across one of these and it’s priced cheaply (meaning less than $5 and it’s in good shape), snatch it up. 

I sold each copy of this for $35. I have a ton more old issues to sell, but the first lot did pretty well. It included issues from 1959-1962 and sold for $30. 

Cha-Ching! 

-Sarah

Like I mentioned, I hit up an early sale last Friday while Sarah was at the doctor.  She and I met up later for some very interesting sales, which we’ll cover in another entry.

Besides the moccasin slippers, I bought lots of cool things!  The whole house was full of quality items, namely glassware and pottery.

I know what you are thinking, “how pricey!”  Luckily, not everything at the sale was priced so high.  These dishes though were handmade or something in Sweden.

More dishes!  And look at that gorgeous hutch!

And this one!  See what I mean?  Everything here seemed like good quality.  I was having a lot of fun looking around.  

You can’t really tell, but that is a really tiny couch.  It was so cute.  I assume it is for dolls.  It was only like $30, which seems reasonable for something like this, but it was also in bad shape.  Plus, I have no use for it, so I moved on.

I did end up finding this great Crown Devon mug, which I bought for $3:

When you look inside, there’s a little frog!  In fact, when I went to check out, the woman running the sale exclaimed, “THERE’S A FROG IN THERE!”  She sure got a kick out of it.

I have this up on ebay now, and usually these mugs sell.  However, no bites yet!

I also found this enamel on copper plate for $2.

When I first saw it, I got excited that it might be by Miguel Pineda.  Here’s a plate by Miguel that I watched on ebay for a long time, but never bought because it was $400:

I should have known that my turtle plate wasn’t a Pineda piece…I don’t think there are a lot of turtles in Mexican folk art.  It turns out though that my plate is by a mid century artist named Annemarie Davidson.  I have the plate up on ebay now, and so far it is selling like a champ.

Next up, I bought this reproduction cast iron Coca Cola man.  He was $5, and I saw that others sold on ebay for over $25.  I figured this was an easy resell, so I bought him.

He’s selling on ebay too at the moment!

Here’s a thing I didn’t buy at the sale, and kind of wish I did:

I don’t know what I would do with that little guy, but he sure is hilarious.  I’m not sure of his original use (why the long neck?!) but he would make a good shelf prop.

-Erin