Yard Sale

Finally, a reward for my few friends that haven't given up on me ever posting again. Sorry that it took me so long, but I have been very busy. For the last month I have spent nearly every day at my late grandfather's house, cleaning and sorting through his possessions. His house was not very big, and he had already given many things away, but there was still PLENTY to go through. My grandma died 8 years ago, and it appears he didn't have the heart to get rid of her stuff, so I got to sort through 90 years of accumulated possessions for two people. One thing that I learned is that I know very little about my grandpa. He lived a long, full, active life before I ever met him, and it was fun to sort through the pieces of it. The saddest thing I found was a beautiful journal, embossed with his name on the front. When I eagerly opened it--blank inside. A lesson to all of us!

After four weeks things were finally cleaned out enough to hold a yard sale. What a zoo! The last time I was involved in a yard sale was before 1990 and all I did was sell Kool-Aid. This time I helped carry things (although my husband and brother got the really heavy things), clean things, sort things, label things, price things, test things, sell things, and collect the money. Oh yeah, I was also taking care of a baby! The day before the garage sale I made this cute shirt with an iron-on I printed on my computer. It came in quite handy, because approximately 25 people approached her where she was chilling out in her swing, and exclaimed, "I'll buy you!" or "How much does she cost?" thinking that they'd made the funniest -cough- original joke. Without this shirt I'm sure I would have been forced to laugh as if I hadn't heard the same joke 24 times before and think of something witty to say in response. Instead, I would just smile and wait for them to get closer . . . and then they'd bust up laughing about MY joke! Ha Ha Ha! I am so funny! Okay, I'm getting control of myself again. You see what yard sales will do to you?

Anyway, I'm glad it's all over. When the sale ended we put up a big sign that said "FREE" and were saved from having to haul most of the stuff away by a family of 6 kids that went bananas over the idea that they could have anything they wanted. It was like a giddy feeding frenzy, as one boy joyfully rushed to the car with an armload of stuff, shouting, "All my Christmas shopping is done!" (Yeah, hopefully his siblings didn't see what he grabbed.) It was at that point that the parents stopped chatting with my husband and suddenly realized that they'd better leave while there was still room for people in the car.