Saturday, August 1, 2015

Burn out

In my last post I mentioned another town wide garage sale I wanted to go to and some construction we are doing in the house. Unfortunately, I didn't end up making it to that town wide sale. There has been so much going on with our construction that we were up until 11:30pm the night before and I was just completely fried. There was no way I was going to get up at the crack of dawn to load up my car and drive out there. I was wondering if I made the right choice to stay home cause we can really use the extra money, but the weather had also called for a chance of rain, and the grey skies in the morning solidified my decision. The sale went on, rain or shine, and apparently it was still a big success. The sky stayed grey, but the rain stayed away. Oh well, maybe next year.

As for the construction happening, it's going slowly as my husband is doing all the work himself. He had a week off where we did most of the big stuff like putting up new walls, but now he can only do the rest on weekends. All our stuff has been been, or still needs to be, boxed up while it goes on. You really don't know how much crap you have until you have to box it all up. I kind of understand now when people move why they just throw everything out, because I was tempted to do the same thing myself a few times! 

All this chaos has lead to a bit of garbage burn out for me. Right now there is literally no room to bring in anything new anyways. The heat has been terrible lately and it seems nobody is throwing anything out on my regular runs. I've been coming home with almost nothing... I even asked my husband "Doesn't it seem like I was finding way more stuff last year?" I've just been feeling really "Meh" about going out at all lately. I may just stick to my first of the month runs for now.

Anywho, here is a look at the stuff I did bring home in the last few weeks...

The first thing I picked up was a nice convection oven that a lady that was moving gave to me. 


also from her pile I grabbed...

a whole bunch of jewellery I had to sort through


Some high end womens golf clothes



lots of marijuana paraphernalia

and a fun sparkly lava lamp


 at other spots I also picked up...

a small shelf unit still in the box


 2 fold up stools


And this throne looking chair that looks like it was handmade. My oldest son's name starts with an R so he claimed it immediately.



The next pile I stopped at was huge, I had to go through it quickly as it was starting to sprinkle out. Here is what I managed to pull from it...

As you can see from peeking into one of the bags, there was tonnes of goodies awaiting...



From that bag and another, I pulled out an entire box full of CDs and DVDs, some still with the plastic wrapping on...

and from other bags and boxes, I got...

A working cordless phone


And various electronics...


The best score was when I looked into this box


All in all, there was the Xbox system, 2 controllers a Turtle Beach head set, and 26 games. My kids flipped out when they saw it :)



After loading up that pile, I was quite wet from the rain. I went to drive off and my husbands car wouldn't start! This happened to me once before with his car, so I started freaking out again. Thankfully, after waiting it out a bit, the car finally started. We came to the conclusion that hubby's car just doesn't like moisture and humidity. I swear, I'm never taking his car out again!

At the next town I hit I found...

This oil painting on canvas


I really like the nice details in the fruit. At first glance I wasn't crazy about the piece, but the little light details and brush strokes in it really made the piece grow on me.


a nice pair of matching lamps, light bulbs included


I think I saved this plant just in time. It was shoved into a black garbage bag. 

A bunch of dolphin themed doodads. Clockwise starting at the bottom we have a round globe paperweight with 2 dolphins inside, a magnet of 2 dolphins swimming through a propeller, a thermometer, a pewter figurine, and another magnet.


and this Avon box


which revealed this never used/opened/worn pretty dragonfly broach inside


Off to town #3. 
This is the view I see as I cruise down the mountain in this town. It's pretty all lit up at night too :)


Here I found the following...

Some nice glassware


Lots of children's clothing  


A new floatie still all packaged up and now being used in our pool and at the beach :) 


More jewellery. The beige watch is a Swatch. One like it is going on Ebay for $85 and another one closer to the condition mine is in, is going for $55. Not that it will necessarily sell for that price, but it's nice to know that it does have some collector value. 




This stop threw out a bunch of generic toys and games that went to the second hand store, but I kept these V-Tech V-Smile cartridges to resell.

 At another stop, I found a bunch of more toys in open boxes, and when I went to peek into one of the garbage bags, I found a tonne of Play Station 2 games. There were also some of the console cords in the bag and I looked for the system itself, but I'm thinking it might have been in one of the open boxes and someone else grabbed it before I got there.


and at another stop where I was checking out some furniture (which was pressboard and got wrecked from the rain) I found these old french play and story books hidden inside a drawer. I can't find a date on any of them and I haven't reseached them yet, but they do look old.


The 4th town is pretty small so I didn't find much there this time, but I did manage to find...

An electronic coin bank with .34 cents inside and an additional dollar in quarters in the bag it was in


At this spot someone was throwing out tonnes of samples of tiles, cabinet faces, and fabric. I assume they either had a store or were some kind of contractor. I saved a little box of small tile samples and all the bolts of fabric. I gave some of the bolts with thinner and/or girly fabric to a friend (she has all girls, and I have all boys) and kept the thicker stuff for myself when I recover chairs. 


Here is a closer look at some of the patterns

I also found thee 2 canvas print frames in what looked like a move out pile.  These will do great at a garage sale.


From my regular runs aound town I also picked up...

A box full of crafting supplies, some things with tags still attached


Inside the box was also some photo frames, an old plate and what looks to be a candle holder


This plaque roughly translates to "May God bless your union so that it remains an adventure of love for always"
 

I picked this hand mower from the curb and then promptly sold it for $20

On the way back home from a grocery trip, I passed by a garage sale that was done, and 2 men were loading things up to the curb. I ended up taking 2 big Rubbermaid bins (that I'm now using to store and transport some of my garage sale stuff) and this clothes drying rack. With the racks down, this is what is currently holding all my clothing up in our bedroom while waiting for the closet to be done. 


Here is a look at how how stuffed my van was when I loaded all the stuff up for the second hand store. All the seats were removed except for the passenger seat, and my youngest son's seat/car seat right behind me when I drive.



 A few days ago I did another town wide sale, the last one that I know of for the season, but I'll save that for my next post. :)

Thanks for checking this one out, and I hope you all are enjoying your summer so far!

3 comments :

  1. Unbelievable all the good stuff that people throw out.

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  2. I hear that about garbage burnout... there's just so much stuff and so little time. Or something there's no stuff and you're wondering where it all is.

    Recently I've become more selective about what I pick up, and often leave behind useful stuff that isn't particularly valuable. In the past I would take these things more often and try to redistribute them. However, this just adds to my already heavy workload and contributes to what I call "garbage fatigue", which I had really bad around July 1st of this year (moving day). It's a shame to let the stuff go to waste, but being more selective means I have more energy when I come across the real treasures, and perhaps have more energy to find extra treasures.

    I'd suggest taking a good break as you suggested you might do. The love of the hunt is always there and always comes back. It's just that garbage, and life itself can sometimes make it all a bit overwhelming.

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