Dig This Treasure!

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!

-Erin

Sarah and I must be getting sick of each other, because last Thursday we invited Timmy along on our adventure, and the following day, we brought along Sarah’s mom, Cindy.  The day started out similar to the dud the day before.  Sarah tried on some ugly shirt and I left empty handed at the first sale.  

Cindy bought a little German wood box with Christmas figures inside, which we all proceeded to bicker about on the way to the next sale.  None of us can read German, but we tried anyway.

At the following sale, I got a really neat ironstone pitcher from the late 1800s.  The tag said it was from 1915, but from researching it, I found out that the maker’s mark was discontinued in 1890.  It is in great shape for being so old!  The price on it was $20, but the nice sellers took $10 for it.

You can’t really tell, but this pitcher is huge and heavy!  It stands about 13" tall.  I almost didn’t buy it, which would have been a mistake.  It already has 15 watchers and 2 bids on ebay.

I got another antique at the next sale.  At first, I had no clue what it was.  I just knew that it was cast iron, and that it looked kind of dangerous.

It turns out that this is an old farm field balance.  The hooks would hold tobacco, grain, etc.  The large weight slides along the iron rod and determines the weight of the hanging items.  Or at least that’s what I think based on my online reading.  The good news is that I have no grain to weigh, so I don’t really have to know how to use it.  If you have some grain, you can buy my scale here.

The last sale of the day was by far the best.  It was packed full of high-end collectibles and rarities.  We knew it had to be good when we showed up and there was a line.

We don’t have to wait in lines very often because we usually start sale-ing around 11am.  For that reason, I kind of enjoy the times when we do get stuck in a line.  We might as well have been standing outside of King Tut’s tomb the way everyone was acting.  It is just a constant stream of speculation about what could be inside.  I love it.

Here’s what was inside:

Lots and lots of cool old things.  It was all priced pretty fairly.  Not cheap, but still reasonable.  I got an old ceramic Napco Santa, a vintage Gund rubber-faced beagle, and three giant garbage bags full of bubble wrap (my favorite find).

The basement of this sale was probably the most exciting.  It was just packed full of old brochures, knick-knacks, cards, and more.  

By the time I got down there though, I was tired and hungry.  I dug around a little bit but then gave up.  I think Sarah found a ton of things here though.  And so did Cindy!  I’ll let Sarah fill you in…

-Erin 

Update from Sarah: Erin jokes about having a brain tumor because she says words incorrectly about 43% of the time, but I’m starting to think she’s on to something. She got the order of sales completely wrong, and has no idea where she found any of her treasures. We started out by finding a secret sale. I had a feeling that it was going to be one of those “estate sales” that’s actually just a glorified garage sale. Turns out I was right. Still, my mom and I found some treasures. Actually, that’s a lie. I bought one Lefton bookend that I didn’t realized was chipped until I got home. But I also found a book. The sale was really weird because it was inside these people’s house, but it was hard to tell what was for sale and what wasn’t. 

The next sale looked promising in pictures but wasn’t that great either. That’s the sale where I tried on that hideous shirt, and Erin bought that terrifying farm balance. I did find a pretty cool quilt for $20 which was a good deal.

When we left that sale, my mom couldn’t stop talking about a vintage baby toy she saw for $7. While I was driving away, Erin started trying to help her figure out if it was valuable or not, and I wish I would have recorded the ensuing conversation. Bottom line: What it was was a vintage “crib toy” and it sort of looked like this. 

Ultimately, I turned around so my mom could go back in and buy it. When she came back empty-handed, I thought I’d never hear the end of how someone else got the super rare valuable crib toy. Turns out the toy was missing an arm and Cindy is not down with broken toys.

The final sale was the best sale, as Erin mentioned, and I did find a few cool things at it. Here is my favorite of them: 

Her arms are a little loose. I have no idea how you fix them, though.

Turns out my mom is the queen of German Christmas items. She found a huge German Christmas decoration that I’m forgetting the name of, that she was really pumped about. She’s going to wait to sell it until it gets closer to the holiday. She also found some other treasures that I’m forgetting about.

I think it’s safe to say that my mom had a good time with us. She has since purchased a smart phone so that she can look up the value of items at these sales herself. By the end of the day, Erin and I were ready to pool our money and buy her one ourselves…just kidding! (Sort of.) Let’s all wish my mom luck on her future adventures in treasure-hunting!