Jaci Dawn

Yard Sales have been pretty “blah” so far this season. Maybe it is me, but I don’t think so. They’ve just been “blah”.

I stopped at one last weekend that I can usually rely on (a church’s garage sale in the church parking lot). It was pitiful this year. I picked up a few items, all unmarked, and asked how much.

“Five dollars,” the woman said. I looked at the pair of wicker Christmas deer in my arms and said, “For the pair.”

She hesitated and I knew she wanted to say, “a piece” but she relented. How much for the nice photo frame?

“Two dollars.”

And for the unfinished 11×14″ frames?

Same price.

For all three?

No, a piece.

I put those frames back. The deer, I bought.

I pulled all the lights out of them (“For Indoor Use Only – now why would I want to use the reindeer indoor? My living room is only 20×12′). I wanted them for summer use in the garden, anyway. They weren’t really worth $5, but I like them.

My husband just rolled his eyes.

This weekend, I found something I wanted, not at a yard sale but at our local Goodwill Store. I eyed it good and long yesterday but I didn’t buy it. I wasn’t certain it would fit into my car, to begin with, and I kind of wanted to run it past my dear husband  before I invested in it.

He was ambivalent.

Today I decided that if it was still at Goodwill and I could fit it into my car, it was coming home with me. I packed a measuring tape and my wallet with me.

I measured the bed of my car with the seats down: 67inches. So if it was any taller… Well, I could scoot the passenger seat all the way forward.

I measured it in the store and determined it might be 70”, but I was sure I could get it into the car. The clerk who sold it to me looked doubtful. “I’ll print a second receipt in case you have to get someone to come haul it for you.”

The Goodwill employee who carried it out looked doubtful. “I don’t know…”

I closed the hatchback and said, “Well, looks like it fit.” Grinning, because I carried the measuring tape.

I used my Goodwill Card. Got 5% off the Goodwill price. How pitiful is that? Getting a discount on already discounted merchandise? I love my Goodwill card: I get a bigger discount on my birthday month. There’s something about feeling like you got a screaming deal that hooks me.

$37.99. That’s what I paid for this painted wrought-iron baker’s rack.

At first, I thought I would plant it in my flower beds and turn it into a potting bench. But after I pulled it out of my car (it’s amazingly light weight which means it is probably not really wrought iron under that paint, but I’d already discerned it was a far cry from an antique), I started thinking that maybe – just maybe – I could use it in my kitchen.

I could make room for it.

It has a certain country charm to it.

So…

My husband just rolled his eyes.

What do YOU think??