Alright, I'm surfacing from my vacation to tell you about our yardsale. (btw, vacation is great! Yesterday I finished the border on my quilt, sandwiched it, basted it, QUILTED it (machine, obviously), and trimmed it.
And cut the binding. Almost there!)
And for those of you who couldn't care less about a yard sale (What?!) scroll down and see the cute little crafty I made!
.....
Anyhoo, getting ready for the yard sale wasn't as bad as I thought. My mom helped me go through the clothes (we got rid of ALL the baby/toddler clothes except what I was saving for Monkey). Everything was marked 50 cents except the really nice stuff or outfits (which I bundled together).
This was my living room while we were sorting. You definitely can't see it all here - clothes EVERYWHERE! Even I was surprised at how much we had. There ended up being more than 12 overflowing boxes to get rid of. (Plus 3 of maternity clothes and then all the 'big' stuff). I was glad my mom was there, as she encouraged me to get rid of things that I otherwise might have kept (like the MANY dresses she made for Princess - I did keep a few...). It was a little 'OH! Sniff!' while going through some of the baby boxes, but it was alright.
For the most part, the sorting was pretty fun - and, thanks to my mom, we got it done in just one naptime. It would have taken me a week by myself.
We discovered that Monkey fits (barely) into the amazing elephant costume that my mom made for Thomas right before he turned 1.
We also discovered that Princess fits (barely) into the panties (diaper cover) from her very first easter dress. She was about 9 months old. I kid you not, that girl was one F.A.T baby.
Out goal was to 1: get rid of stuff - we marked everything low in order to get rid of it (high chair, swing, exersaucer, dollhouse - the list just keeps going - we had a ton of stuff) and 2: earn enough money for the playroom toy cabinets we picked out from IKEA. It was a modest goal, but we exceeded it, so that's happy and now we have IKEA spending money (It opens here soon!) Woo hoo!
I really enjoyed talking to the people who shopped the sale. I loved the little mexican grandma who bought some handmade baby blankets, the girl (who stole my heart because she had a speech delay) who fell in love with the My Little Ponies, the young couple who are expecting their first baby and walked their puppy around in the stroller to try it out (they bought quite a bit). The clothes sold really well.
It was fun.
One of my concerns was handling the money. I didn't want to be rifling through a pencil box full of cash to find change, nor did I want to set it down somewhere (which I totally would have done) and lose it. So.... I made a Yard Sale Apron:
This is Princess modeling it. After I made it I realized I made it way small - it looks much better on her, so from now on it'll be her craft/doll salon apron.
It was just a quicky project - made with leftover fabric from a bag from last summer and some bias tape. I was getting a little sick of the fabric anyway...
Basically the front is divided into 4 pockets: I figured one for 10's and 20's, one for 5's and 10's, one for 1's and one for change. It worked REALLY well - I would highly recommend it! Nothing fell out and it was really easy to make change. The only problem (slight) was when Aaron manned the sale for a little bit - He just folded it up and kept it with him.
But I didn't expect him to wear it.