Salted
So like Sarah mentioned, we headed back to Windsor on Wednesday so I could try to buy those antique moccasins that totally burned me last time. Kudos to Sarah for actually getting to my house on time. We made it to the auction only 15 minutes late, and luckily the moccasins had not been up on the block yet. In fact, the only thing we seemed to have missed was this giant box of VHS tapes:
Here’s how I probably looked waiting for the moccasins to be auctioned:
I won’t keep you all in suspense…I didn’t win the moccasins. I KNOW RIGHT?! Unbelievable. Here is how it went down:
The moccasins went up for sale and the same auctioneer from last time (my mortal enemy) started them at $100. He went down to 50, then 40, and when he got to 30 dollars I bid. I didn’t want a repeat of last time where I think he is going to go lower and instead he ends the item. So here I am, the ONLY bidder on these for $30.
At this point, no one else is bidding and he starts doing his final countdown before he says “SOLD.” All of a sudden, one of the EMPLOYEES starts bidding. (Very fishy I know.) I’ve seen workers bid at an auction before, but this was strange considering how badly the auctioneer did not want to sell these to me last time. And why did she wait so long to bid against me?
So we go back and forth and get up to $85. At this point, I am convinced they are trying to bid me up on purpose, so I bow out. The auctioneer seemed genuinely surprised that I did.
To be fair, I did see this female employee leave with the moccasins, so she probably did buy them. I felt at peace. I got a fair chance to buy these (FINALLY), and $85 was more than I wanted to spend. At least it was my choice, and not someone else telling me I couldn’t bid.
So with that all settled, it was on to more treasures. I bid on and won this amazing old box from the Canadian Salt Company.
There was still a little bit of salt in the bottom of this, which I was sure the border agents would think was cocaine when we tried to reenter the States. I didn’t tell Sarah about this because she already acts like a crazy person at customs. Not really a crazy person actually, but more of a deaf mute frozen in terror.
I then bid on this old bottle from Bright’s Winery, which is the second oldest winery in Canada. I just liked the look of it, but might end up putting it on eBay.
The bottle came with a ton of other glassware that I will end up putting in our garage sale this summer. I also gave some stuff away to the lady next to me, which was great because it lightened the load a lot.
Next, I bought this old glass rolling pin, which Sarah thought looked very suggestive. In reality, I bought this to use while baking, as it was just last week I made pizza dough and realized I had no rolling pin.
The lady next to me said I need to get a cork for the end, and that way I can put ice water in the rolling pin while using it. Apparently the cold will help your dough roll out more easily.
I also bought this cool book for Zach, which has lots of useful information in it.
I’ve been thinking of upping the number of servants in our household, and this book confirmed that I probably should.
Here are some things we didn’t win:
Sarah and I both wanted those green canisters, but they ended up going for like $40 or something. If we got them cheaper, they would have been an easy eBay resell. Oh well.
This hockey game would have also been an easy item to resell, but it too sold for a high price, around $50.
And look at this great, retro table! It wouldn’t fit in my car, otherwise I’m sure Sarah would have bought it.
She also would have bought this Beagle, but she wasn’t for sale.
We waited around until the end of the auction because there was some stuff that Sarah wanted. I got us “2 Pop” again, and then went to wait in line to check out. For some reason, this place has a woman who can’t do math who checks everyone out. It literally takes 10 minutes for each person in line. I waited in line while Sarah bought her last items, and then paid for both of us when I checked out. This let us hightail it out of there pretty quickly so we were home at a reasonable time.
This guy in the background also had some pop, but he obviously brought it with him:
Also of note here is Sarah’s equally hilarious and confusing expression.
-Erin
Update from Sarah: I don’t know why we thought that man with the two-liter was so funny but we did. Also, can you believe that beagle?! Oh my gosh, I was obsessed. Her name was Maggie and she was 7 months old. She also had on red nail polish. Her owner, a hipster-looking guy, told me that she was a “princess” which was sort of an odd thing to hear from a guy like that.
In the end, I got a few cool things. First, this cool map of the Detroit river from 1952:
I also got these cool old rulers:
And I also got this JC to match my Mary from last time.
He’s also busting out the immaculate heart…
Finally, I got two things at the end of the night that I had to wait around for. First up was this cool vintage book of valentines.
Quite adorable!
Also adorable are these vintage doll heads from Japan.
The only annoying thing about these were that the auctioneer made me pay $7.50 for them. Absolutely nobody else was interested in them, but he would not go down to $5 once he knew that I wanted them. Still, I have a feeling they’ll sell on eBay!
A Family Affair
Last week was chock full o’ sales for me, as I ventured out Tuesday and then again on Thursday with my sister Lindsay and dad Timmy (and again on Friday with Sarah). Timmy was super excited because there were like 6 sales within a 5 mile radius on Thursday, so our prospects for treasure looked good.
The first sale was in Redford, and was actually a repeat of a sale that happened a few weeks ago. This time, there were even MORE items, and the basement was opened. I forgot to take pictures at this sale, so here are some I pulled off estatesales.net:
This sale had some GREAT dolls, but they were all priced pretty high. I carried one around for awhile, but it was $70, so I don’t know who I was kidding…I put it back eventually. As you know, Sarah and I are on a doll kick as of late, which has been SUPER successful for both of us. Here’s what I ended up selling that little “idiot doll” for last week:
The first item I did find to buy was a Stangl pottery box. One of my newer estate sale tricks is to buy things that I personally like and would be happy to keep if they end up not selling on ebay.
The box did sell after all. I paid $4 for it and it sold for $20.
A funny thing happened when I was looking at this box. I was all alone in a bedroom, examining the piece. A window near me was open, so I could hear people outside. All of a sudden I hear a woman ask one of the sellers about a particular item, and the seller responds, “Oh, I think it is in that room right there where that MAN in the plaid shirt is standing.” Upon hearing this, I look down at my shirt, and I AM WEARING A PLAID SHIRT. And I am alone in this room! I AM THE MAN IN THE PLAID SHIRT. Hilarious and sad. To be fair, my hair was up in a bun this day.
I think my sister had the best scores at this sale, but I can’t remember all that she bought. I know she found a Rushton rubber face squirrel and an old Monchichi monkey.
At the next sale, everything was super high end, but the prices were fair. My sister found a super cool item and was nice enough to give it to me:
This is a Knight head wine stopper, but when you lift its little face shield, you can pour the wine out through the spout! How cool is that?! I can’t wait to use it.
We stopped at a few more sales which were duds. I did make one final purchase, which was a piece of cast iron enamelware. It was brand new!
These things are on Amazon for $120, and the lady had a price of $45 on it. I bartered her down to $30 after explaining that I love rabbits and showing her my rabbit tattoo. Embarrassing tactics, but they worked. She said she would make the deal because I was “cute.”
I didn’t tell her that earlier in the day someone mistook me for a man.
-Erin