Yard Sale-ing

Humans aren’t the only ones with hoarding issues!

The first time I heard this term, I was working for CPS, and one of the foster parents and kids said that this was one of their favorite weekend pastimes.  I heard “yard sailing” and thought, “What is that?”  This particular foster mom was one of those who barely breathed when she talked, so I had no time to ask what she meant.  I eventually figured it out from context clues, but until then, just nodded and smiled.

We recently held our first yard sale.  I wasn’t sure what I’d think of it.  Usually I just give things to Goodwill, but I wanted to see if we could make some extra money, and we definitely did.  I read a little bit online for advice before I did it, but I learned a few things as well.

1.  Start early: We scheduled for 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.  6 a.m. to noon would have been better, or even stopping at 11 a.m. would have been fine.  The buyers, the ones who do this on the weekends get there early.  Everyone after 10:30 was mostly browsing.

2.  Wear sunscreen: seriously.  Put it on before you start.  You won’t have time to put it on later.

3.  Don’t bother to sell on Sunday.  No one is going to come, not unless you’re on a very main road.

4.  Be ready to bargain.  No one pays full price for things.  (But since I was going to give it away anyway, all was good.

5.  People might get insulted if you say no.  Someone offered me a price I thought was way too low, and when I said no, she rolled her eyes and got huffy.  The item didn’t sell and is currently on my Goodwill pile, so maybe I would have been better off selling to her, but I didn’t like her attitude.  Which brings me to the next one…

6.  If you’re a buyer, be polite.  I bargained with nice people way more often than with less than nice people.  I had one guy get something that was marked $20 for $10 because he was persistent and polite about it.

7.  Have fun.  After all, if you’re not having fun, what’s the point?

The Truth About Housework

The cat put herself in the box; she’s not for sale!

I’m not a good housekeeper, and I don’t really enjoy it.  I’d much rather be doing pretty much anything else, and one of my favorite poems is Dust If You Must.  My next three weeks is going to be devoted to houseworky type things, and I’d anticipated not being pleased about it.

I turned on my Jambox and started blasting an iTunes playlist.  I had my dogs underfoot, and it was a nice sunny day.  As I sang alone at the top of my lungs (the dogs don’t complain), I realized that it wasn’t horrible.  I actually kind of, sort of, maybe had… fun.  I surprised myself.  I’m in the process of getting ready for my yard sale, purging items I haven’t used in a long time, things that were boxed up to come here and hadn’t seen the light of day again.  And it felt good.  It felt really good to organize and get ready to get rid of things.

I actually like to organize and dispose of items.  Sometimes I forget how much I enjoy it.  Music, sunshine, and dogs… a pretty good recipe for a successful Sunday!