Wind Up
Sometimes estate sales are a blast not because you find a bunch of great treasures to buy, but just because they are fun to browse through. I recently went to a sale like this, and even though I only bought a couple things, it was a really nice experience. The whole house was like a time capsule.
Better yet, it was a time capsule of only adorable things! That Holt Howard rooster set used to be very collectible, although prices on it have dropped recently. If the prices were a little lower at this sale, I would have still tried to flip it on ebay. I hope this found a good home though because it is so cute.
It is hard to tell in the photo but this faux fireplace was pretty big. It was made of styrofoam and was obviously really cute, but we don’t really have a place to put it. I hope someone bought it!
Continuing on with the trend of large holiday decorations I do not need, let me present you this Easter tree:
I was kind of obsessed with this. It was a perfect mix of hideous, intriguing, and adorable. I should have bought it and left it on Sarah’s porch. Or saved it for a white elephant gift exchange. I am not sure what those brown ball things are near the bottom but I assume they are representative of Easter bunny turds.
There were several wind up toys from the 80s and 90s that I thought about buying, but each one was priced around $10-$15. Had they been $5 I probably would have bought all of them. Everett would have loved them dearly, although I would be spending the rest of my days constantly winding them up for him.
The Musical Munching Bunny was a steal at $2 but I still didn’t buy him. I’m being very disciplined with my purchases lately.
I did buy one wind up toy, which was this seal for the bathtub. Everett is crazy about him and yells, “SEAL! SEAL!” as he swims around.
I also bought this amazing cat poster from the 70s, which I promptly sold on ebay. It was $1.
My last purchase turned out to be a lame one, but it was only a $1 investment. This stuffed bear is supposedly collectible, according to ebay, but so far it hasn’t sold! I don’t know what the deal is. He is a Clifford Berryman bear.
I mean, he is definitely cuter than this thing that I left behind at the sale:
-Erin
Peeping Tom
I broke Erin out of Baby Jail on Friday while Granny Sandy watched lil’ E. We were both thrilled to see each other–while I love that baby, it’s just not as fun to estate sale without Erin there to harass me the whole time.
We started out afternoon off right–by eating some garbage at Daly’s. Be sure to click that link if you want to see the jankiest website ever created. When it was time to get moving, we kept it close, just in case there was a baby emergency, and stopped by three sales in Livonia. The first was pretty grubby.
I stumbled upon this award winning title but decided to pass.
Basically, everything was yucky.
I did find one treasure–a 1943 Esquire Vargas pin-up calendar, that’s complete and in good shape. I spent $40 which seems like a good investment.
While in the basement, I started hearing some commotion above me on the main floor. The old lady running the sale had a really loud smoker’s voice. She yelled downstairs like a lunatic, “RALPH! HAVE YOU SEEN THE CALENDAR?????!!!!” as if some crazy ninja had come through the house and stolen it. I meekly let Ralph know that I had the calendar in my hand and planned on buying it. Ay yi yi.
Next up on our agenda was a sale that was at the home of an antiques dealer, who seemed to specialize in linens. Neither of us collect fancy linens but it seemed worth stopping at.
That’s the linen room, and there I am, lookin’ like a big dummy (but sporting my cute buffalo plaid coat from last winter.) Shockingly, I have sunglasses on my head. I swear, one day I’m going to just do a post of all of the pictures of me on this blog with sunglasses on my head. It could be pouring rain and I think the picture would still have me with sunglasses on my head.
Right away, I spotted these adorable Holt Howard Santa mugs inside a china cabinet. I bought them, so here they are.
Are they not the most adorable? Anyway, as I was carefully removing these from the cabinet, I somehow knocked a tiny port wine glass off the shelf and it shattered all over the floor. It’s amazing how much attention you can attract by breaking glass inside a stranger’s house. (Note: I immediately offered to pay for the broken glass but the woman running the sale was very nice and told me not to worry about it.)
The sale contained a mix of modern and antique goods…with some general garbage mixed in.
Those were some awesome masks–but the set was marked $25 and it was too steep. They were made on really heavy boards, but still…too risky.
I found a few other items at this sale but that was mainly when I went back the next day to pick up something that I’ll feature another day as a Fave Find. When we went back, I realized I hadn’t gone into the garage at this house and out there, I found a handful of very cute little dudes to put in my mini holder.
The cutest is that teeny tiny kewpie.
I also bought these cool Duralex mugs (set of 6) to resell. One of them had some very prehistoric dead bugs inside.
Anyway, while I was trying to check out, the woman from the estate sale company kept talking to me about how I had a “great eye” and kept talking my ear off about it. I just thanked her and nodded politely because I got the impression she thought I had never been to an estate sale.
The last sale ended up being the most fruitful, and it was a total accident! When we first got there, we had to walk down this super long driveway to get to the house, because it was in the middle of some woods. Here’s the first thing that caught my eye. I wanted Erin to buy it because she wears pins a lot, but she didn’t.
The house backed up to a gorgeous wooded area with a little stream running through it.
That picture doesn’t even really do it justice. It was so beautiful.
I made my way upstairs and found a room of old children’s books, toys, etc. I noticed a box of old films right away and asked how much they were. The guy there said $5 for the whole box. I was super excited but didn’t want to lose my cool. I then noticed this packet of stuff that was marked $15. Inside, I noticed these old brochures about the Detroit Free Press, but then I saw that there was a record inside.
WHOAAAAAA! You can listen to both of these things here.
Anyway, while I was looking around, the guy in that room asked me what sorts of things I normally look for, and I told him paper, photographs, books, etc. He said, “Slides?” and I about leaped with excitement. I told him yes and he said he was going to check to see if there were any left. I expected him to bring down a little box of slides but when I turned to look for him, I saw him coming down the stairs with an enormous stack of carousels.
I felt a little overwhelmed because, as he was walking, I could hear another guy asking him how much he was charging for the slides. The estate sale guy was pretty good at reinforcing that he was bringing them for me to look at, but the other guy was just relentless. As soon as he put the slides down, the guy zoomed over to me and was literally ON TOP OF ME, breathing down my neck. I don’t do well with people invading my personal space to that degree–especially when they seem to be interested in stealing my amazing merch–so I was not very friendly. He proceeded to grill me about what I was going to do with them, where I sell them, and how he could find my listings! WTF?! I asked if he wanted the slides and he said that he didn’t–he just knew the guy who lived at the house. It came out that he was just a neighbor, and in the end, all I could picture was a peeping tom, staring in this poor old man’s windows.
In the end, I was successful in buying ALL of the slides.
And the man charged me ONE DOLLAR per carousel. Yeaahhhh!
The only other thing I purchased at this sale worth mentioning was this awesome photograph of a girl and her great dane.
I can’t reiterate how fun it was to get out with my homegirl. I guess absence does make the heart grow fonder! And for all you baby crazed folks, here’s a current picture of Everett, chilling in his Mamaroo.
-Sarah
Update from Erin: I really did feel like I was breaking out of Baby Jail. I felt like I was a wanted felon on the run and at any moment I would be picked up and escorted back to my house. This was seriously like the third time I had been out in public during the last month. It was amazing.
I didn’t buy anything at the first sale because it was indeed yucky. At the second sale, it was the best ever when Sarah broke that wine glass. I heard a huge crash in the kitchen area and immediately exclaimed, “Rut Row!” (You know, like the Scooby Doo version of “Uh oh!”) I then thought to myself, “Oh man, Sarah is right in the middle of that melee.” Then I realized that Sarah WAS the melee. So good. You could tell she was mortified.
I did buy an amazing treasure at this second sale, but I will detail it in a “fave find” entry. At the third sale, guess who was there to greet me:
Can you believe it?! Those same g*ddamn snowmen came out to welcome me back to sale-ing!
This last sale was seriously fun. The house was like a weird dollhouse with a million tiny rooms. There were also multiple levels of the house all separated by tiny half staircases. And some rooms were too small to even stand up in.
I ended up buying two old, framed photographs. I am going to display these at Easter. They bring me such joy.
I also found one of those old Detroit Zoo scrapbooks as shown in this entry. I paid $1 for it and my sister said I could resell it easily. It is in perfect shape.
All in all a great day!
Yogurttown
First of all, HOLY SH*T. Thanks to all of the new followers and to the Tumblr staff for featuring us. We are glad that you are all here and hope you enjoy our adventures! If you do, then like us on Facebook. And if you don’t, well then, don’t.
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Last Friday, Erin and I had a lot of sales on our list of prospects. There were actually quite a few near her house, but only one looked good. Erin really wanted to go because she spotted a Selmer saxophone in the pictures online. If you remember, we once saw a Selmer sax sell at auction for over $6,000, so I can see why she was excited.
When we arrived, however, the Selmer was gone. The guy running the sale said it went for $3,000 and the guy who bought it was first in line, waiting at 5 a.m.
There were some other instruments but none that seemed as valuable, I don’t think. So Erin passed on the rest.
This house was a typical “old person” house with not a lot of fabulous things, but some treasures here and there. I came away with a few of my own to both resell and keep. To keep, I found this cute strawberry bowl (my kitchen is green and red) for two bucks.
To sell, I found this adorable Holt Howard kitty pin box with a tape measure for a tongue!
I only bought this because it was $1 and super adorable, and I had never seen anything like it. I didn’t know that Holt Howard was a collectible brand but it appears that it really is!
The thing that I have is from his “cozy cats” line, but it looks like what sells best are his “pixieware” pieces, like the one above. Here’s a closer look at the pixieware:
Pretty cute! I can see why people collect these things. But they’re probably Erin’s worst nightmare because they’re so Mid Century/Retro looking.
Next up on our list was a sale in Dearborn that looked pretty good. I found some old Christmas cards right away, and Erin prevented me from buying this shirt:
I told her that it was so cute because it looked like something an elementary school art teacher would wear but she reminded me that that isn’t what I do for a living.
Erin spotted this portrait of me wearing my brown wig…
Right after that, she found that picture of herself that we posted on Friday.
I discovered these cool antique weights, but they had them marked $40 for the set:
I found some cool old records, including Disney’s Peter and the Wolf, which terrified me as a child. One of my earliest memories is of climbing out of my crib because the shotgun sounds on the record scared the sh*t out of me (I think my parents must have been listening to it with my brother, who is 5 years older than me.)
After we left this sale, it was lunch time, and Erin surprised me by having a craving for Mexican food. Let me tell you, ever since Erin’s had morning sickness, our food options on our adventures have been greatly limited. Normally, she only wants to eat somewhere if it has “family dining” in the name. We had some delicious food at Frida in downtown Dearborn, and then treated ourselves to some Yogurt Town. Here’s an action shot of me, delightfully planning my yogurt creation:
It did not disappoint.
Next up was a sale in Wyandotte, and on the way there were found ourselves at a completely different sale, which was where I found that Dave Grossman statue that Adam hates. To give you an idea of how these people overprice things, check out these book prices:
I’m not sure where a Reader’s Digest book is worth $15, but it’s not in this galaxy.
In the end, I also found some cute Christmas items at this sale, including a few knee hugger type guys, and a brand new vintage Holly Hobbie apron!
For the record, the woman tried to charge me $5 for each of those knee huggers. It didn’t work.
The last sale we hit was a doozie. These people had priced everything in the house as if it was a brand new item at a store, at 100% retail. They had a bunch of Jim Shore stuff that is Erin’s jam and not mine, but I did buy this beagle ornament because it was pretty cute.
Here’s a shot of all of it:
Nice stuff for sure, but not worth buying at an estate sale at its original retail price!
The only other thing I found here was a Zingerman’s book that was in great shape.
When I brought it up the lady looked super annoyed and/or confused. I said, “It’s supposed to be a dollar.” She said she knew, and then it occurred to me that she was probably upset because she thought she could get more than a dollar for it. COME ON!
-Sarah
Update from Erin: At the first sale, they were trying to sell opened food products, which is always so strange to me. I’ve come all the way to this estate sale, and ah yes, wonderful, a half used bag of sugar! Also, don’t any of you DARE touch the cake pop mix because it clearly belongs to Martina.
Look at that! THE SPAGHETTI BOX IS TAPED SHUT.
Anyway, at least there were some cute, non-edible items at the sale.
I found these little moccasins. One day I will force my baby to wear them, but for now I will just stare at them in admiration.
I also found this little trinket tray for $2. I gave it to Zach’s mom as part of her Mother’s Day present because she loves all things Mexico. This is from Juarez.
The second sale was kind of grody. I didn’t buy anything. You know what was NOT grody though? Yogurttown. I give a full endorsement to Yogurttown in Dearborn, MI. Hear that Yogurttown? If you are reading, I want some free froyo. And a t-shirt. Preferably one that says froYOLO.
After our froyo excursion, we hit a secret sale that happened to be really overpriced. I saw this rubber face reindeer as soon as we walked in:
Now, I previously sold a similar one of these guys on ebay for a hefty profit. I asked the guy how much this one was, and he started talking about how they are selling on ebay for $75, and how he’s not really sure, and on and on.
I wanted to say to him, “Are we on ebay right now? Is this ebay?” Seriously, we hear this all the time… “Well on ebay that’s sellin’ for blah and blah.” Cool. THEN SELL IT ON EBAY. I would have no problem if people running estate sales pulled the best stuff ahead of time and sold it on ebay for the best price. But once an item is in a sale, let’s be realistic.
In the end, we settled on $15 for this guy. And yes, I will be selling him on ebay.
Here is something I didn’t buy. Mostly because it has wings on the FRONT of its body, and a soulless face.
I wish I could have bought some of the Jim Shore stuff at the last sale, but it was all priced sooo high. I’m talking $25-$50 per piece. Here is one piece I took notice of. It appears to be Santa praying over the body of a dead child. Am I right? The child has a halo! Not Jim’s best work…
I did enjoy shopping this sale though because it was one of those times where peeking into someone’s house turns out super interesting. Usually we see messy hoarders, but this was the complete opposite. This person was so neat and clean that they kept all of the tags and plastic on the house lamps!
