Auction Virgins

Husband and I strike again.

There was a contents auction around the corner by our house. Sadly the Mrs. of the house had passed away and the Mr. was moving out. Poor man. Our neighbor, who has a grapevine that extends throughout the entire town, knew the couple a long time and watched the festivities from her porch. We decided to check it out. We had never been to an auction before. In our hometown, estate sales are the popular choice but apparently in our adopted home auctions are the way to go. I was pretty excited to go even though I didn't expect to walk away with much. Oh, how wrong I was.

It started innocently enough with buying a box of goodies for $3. I had my eye on apple bakers in there which are super cute. They are definitely adding the ranks on Etsy. After the lawn boxes, the backyard and basement had been auctioned they headed to the porch where, in my opinion, the most interesting items were. There had to be at least 50-60 people around us and it was getting more competitive. There was a very ornate silver plate tea set which was fun and we got in a bidding war over it but I couldn't bring myself to spend $30 so we lost that. There was a fantastic silver plate pitcher that caught my eye. It looks like hotelware and I can imagine the elegant Grace Kelly attending a luncheon where this pitcher would refill her water goblet. I was the only one to bid on it, along with other silver items in the flat, for $3. I accumulated quite a bit of silver plate, some of it just too neat to pass up.

After half an hour the ledge was lined with flats of crystal glassware, vases, more silver, and other breakable oddities. The auctioneer set the bid, all contents on the ledge $5. Everyone hesitated and husband and I looked at each other. It was ours. There were at least 7 box flats, a giant crystal punch bowl, etc. Altogether I think we wound up with about 75 different items. Not one minute after we purchased the left overs two gentlemen came up to us, one wanted this awful black vase for $3 and the other wanted three porcelain eggs which we gave for $1. So technically we paid $1 for 75 miscellaneous items. I think that's a pretty epic win.

Despite living two and a half houses away we had to bring the car around to pack all of our stuff. Mom and Dad-in-law came over later and went through the stuff with us. They were excited about all the things we got. We spent a grand total of $17.60.

The auction was so fun! We did amazing for our first time and I can't wait to go to the next one!! It's a little bit of an adrenaline rush when you're victorious after a bidding war or when you spend next to nothing and get fantastic surprises. I really should start taking pictures and cleaning the items to get them Etsy ready but I am exhausted. As it is husband and the puppies are sleeping next to me. Sweet dreams. <3

Weekend Treasures!

So this weekend husband and I went a little crazy.

Now that it's spring, it is garage sale/estate sale/flea market season! The streets were filled with hidden treasures and I spent Friday morning mapping out a route (because we mean business when it comes to this wonderful time of the year). Our first stop was a "garage" sale (really a giant barn) not too far from our house. It all went downhill from there. We wound up spending an hour rifling through this barn, finding one glorious thing after the other. Between Mom-in-law, Dad-in-law, husband and me, we found so much we had to make a second trip with the van to pick up the bigger items. I found two vintage silver plated hotel serving trays, Jack Daniel's glasses (to add to husband's collection), two cabinets and a 1940 RCA Victor.

The radio is the bees knees. It was supposed to work but when we got it home we discovered the amp needs to be capped (no idea what that really means) and it needs a little bit of a polish. It reminds me of A Christmas Story which is one of my top favorite Christmas movies. Can't you just picture Ralphie sitting in front of this with his Little Orphan Annie decoder pen, waiting for a secret message? Or maybe you can't get the pink nightmare out of your mind!!

Yikes.

Eventually we tore ourselves away from the barn and spent the good part of the morning following my map. Another great find was a vintage medicine cabinet for $5. Currently the medicine cabinet is waiting for its new home in our bathroom. This may not be as exciting for you as it is for me. Our previous cabinet was insanely ugly (at least in my opinion). When the new one is in I'll post some nice pictures. (It's not a piece of cake. Our house was built in 1920 so no project is easy. It takes the skill of my beloved to make things work.)

We have other projects to attend to because of this barn sale but more on those later. Who knows what adventures will find us this weekend!

Jewelry Jewelry Jewelry

It's fitting that my revamped blog would start with a post about jewelry.

I LOVE jewelry. I remember being four years old and having a massive collection of plastic bracelets, necklaces and stick on earrings. I've had countless jewelry boxes and my first ear piercing was at the tender age of five. My Mom has excellent taste in jewelry and if she ever had to go away without me and I would be upset she would let me wear a special bracelet or necklace of hers until she came home. I always managed to convince my Dad to play Pretty Pretty Princess with me so I could dress up in plastic jewels and the awesome plastic crown. (Although I think my Dad was a little ahead of his time since he would clip the earrings on his nose.) One of my favorite things to do was go through my Grandma's jewelry boxes. Every once in a while she would be cleaning out the drawers in her dresser and she would let me touch everything! That's the best thing about Grandmas, they let their little grandchildren play with the fun stuff. Looking back it's easy to see why jewelry means so much to me. Every piece has a memory.

Fast forward a few years. (Okay more than a few).

I'm a new seller on the fantastic Etsy, where people like myself share their creations and vintage/antique items. I'm tapping into this whole world of amazing things. I never thought I would make jewelry and try to sell it. It is so crazy and wonderful. Mom-in-law has been amazing in helping me get started. She and Dad-in-law are the vintage masters and I hope one day I could be half as amazing as they are. They have donated some choice little cute things for me to sell and I don't know what I would do without their guidance.

A few weeks ago Mom brought out a bag full of Grandma's jewelry. Grandma passed in 2005 and there are bags that we still don't look into because it is too raw. However, Mom told me that I could keep or sell whatever I wanted. We went through the bag and it was like I was seven all over again. Necklaces I remember playing with, bracelets that I don't remember and soooooo many earrings. Grandma had such great stuff! Now here's the hard part...what do I sell?

I can't keep everything because something are just so...Grandmaish. Even if I wanted to keep everything, my jewelry vanity would bust at the seams. This weekend I went through the bag and managed to experiment with my photography. Of course it was dreary all weekend and the light was less than desired but I think I did a good job. I listed a few pieces on Etsy and I hope someone will enjoy them.

Even after all this time I'm still playing with Grandma's jewelry.