A Special Garage Sale Find: Mary's Craft Box

Today's "garage sale finds" post is not quite like any of my other posts bragging about my great deal, but more about the humbling experience of my special find!

I went out garage saling with the boys this morning, as I often do on Thursday mornings.  On our way back home we decided to stop at just ONE more sale, even though the car was pretty well packed with a large kids' picnic table I had just purchased, among other things.

This sale was full of all kinds of interesting things.  There was a huge 10 gallon tote full of little matchbox cars, and Sammy had a blast digging through them.  We took home as many monster trucks as his little hands could hold.

But the bargain that got me most excited was a huge Rubbermaid bin marked "Arts and Crafts."  The sticker on the box read "$5 for all."  Inside the bin were more smaller bins full of interesting items.  There was another bin next to it for the same price, so I figured I'd take this larger one, being the bargain hunter that I am.

Below is a photo of the bin and contents, AFTER I spent an hour sorting through every item, tossing out little scraps & dried up paints, pulling out all of the already finished crafts, and re-organizing.  There were beads, scissors, a glue gun, ribbon, pom poms, puff paints, wood pieces, you name it!

But the interesting story here was not in this great bargain I had, but the story behind it.  I told the woman at the sale that I'd take that big green bin full of craft supplies.  She said, "Oh, great! I had a little girl with Leukemia and that was all we could do to keep her busy!"  She followed me over to the bin and started piling on more plastic storage containers full of popsicle sticks, pipe cleaners, and other supplies.  "Here, take these too!  Your boys can have fun with these..."

I went home happy that I had scored such a great deal, but sad to think of another child who had to go through something as tough as Leukemia. Pulling a small bag of colored feathers out that still had the $5 price tag, the price I paid for this entire box, I thought to myself, I'd spend hundreds on craft supplies for my kid's too if they were battling cancer and it distracted them from that harsh reality for even a moment.

As I sorted through the items in the bin I couldn't help but think of Mary, the little girl who worked so hard on the dozens of finished ornaments, pins, earrings, and other items in the box.  I pulled out this little guide to the "Craft Show Extravaganza and Bake Sale" at Children's Hospital from November 2001:

I found some unopened packages of "Specially Hand Made By Mary" labels.

(If anyone out there named "Mary" would like these, let me know and I'll send them to you for free! I just couldn't toss or donate them!)

I couldn't help but think the whole time I sorted through these items about just how blessed we are to have two healthy boys.  How lucky I am to be stocking up on craft supplies to keep them busy when cooped up this winter...not because they are stuck in a hospital undergoing chemotherapy, but because their feet got cold and wet with snow that soaked their boots after building snowmen and sledding for so long.

I don't know if Mary won or lost her battle with Cancer...I couldn't bear to ask her mom.  But I sure hope she had one rockin' successful craft sale at table #42 in the Children's Hospital in November of 2001.  Her listing in the directory says "former patient," so that give me hope that she won her fight, and I hope it never returned!

I gently stacked most of the little crafts and ornaments in my charity donation bag, but decided to keep one ornament to hang on our Christmas tree.  This one I thought captured the hand made nature of Mary's crafts the best:

I plan to hang this ornament on our tree each year as a reminder of just how lucky we are to have healthy kids who are here in our home with us, making enormous messes every 5 seconds, dirtying tons of laundry from playing, and eating us out of house and home. Thank you, Mary, for this valuable reminder. How very blessed we are!!

Eat, Shop & Play Without Throwing Your Money Away!

This morning I had the privilege of presenting to my church's moms' group with my wonderful, creative, and resourceful friend Jessica VanMarter!  Jess has inspired me in so many ways.  Her encouragement and recommendations were what gave me the final "push" I needed to try out cloth diapers.  (See Part 1, Part2,  Part 3 & Part 4 of my extensive exploration of all types of cloth diapers if you're interested!)  Every time I talk to Jess I learn something awesome, which is why I'm so glad she recently started her blog! 

We had a a great time sharing our experiences and our tips and tricks for saving money in three areas of our lives as moms...eating, shopping, and playing!   Jess shared many great ideas for saving money in the "eat" section, and really opened my eyes to the enormous savings you can enjoy purchasing bulk spices, among many other ideas!  I shared my own tips and tricks for saving money buying other non-food items in the "shop" section, as well as some fun ways to have cheap and free fun with your kids. We really enjoyed sharing our tips and tricks, and learning even more great ideas from our audience! 

As promised, we have the slide show available for those of you who missed our talk, and those of you who would like to check out the links inside.  In general, the underlined text throughout the presentation are all web links.  (for those of you who attended...I took out the Price is Right theme music and animations to help shrink down this file size!)  We had to cut things short at the end so there are a few random tips and tricks still to see!  For those of you who didn't make it, check out the slide show for a great rundown of what you missed!  We purposely made this slide show in a way that someone who did not attend could still get all of the info they missed.

We also put together a "chicken challenge" and notes page which we handed out hard copies of.  You can download a full color pdf here!  The idea behind the chicken challenge was to challenge you to make one whole chicken, and then see how many meals you can stretch it!  Don't be intimidated if you've never made a whole chicken...the first recipe is really as easy as it gets!  We then show you how to make chicken stock from the carcass, and give two recipes to help use up the left-over meat.  Give it a try and see how far one chicken can really go!

Keep an eye out here and on Jess's blog for more tips, tricks, recipes and links related to our talk today! We hope to put together a "beef challenge" and "pork challenge" soon as well!!  Happy cooking, shopping, and playing everyone!

Fun Friday Finds

I'm mixing things up a bit this week.  This week's "Fun Friday Finds" post will not be online finds, but "physical" finds from the week!

Yes, you guessed it, I'm going to start with more thrift store bragging! Yesterday I got a chance to go to the Unique thrift store with my sister and found a bunch of fun stuff.  Here are just a couple deals...

 This Thomas travel case was just like new with the hang tag still on it, for less than $3.00.  It will be perfect to hold all of Sammy's engines!  It's tucked away for now, ready to come out when his train table is revealed.

I've also been collecting old 1980's Micro Machines for the boys (and stashing them away until Toby is old enough for small parts).  I remember my brother playing with Micro Machines, and already have a little city that folds up into a van-shaped carrying case, and a few cars.  The ones I've found at one Unique Thrift store were under a glass case, and about $1 each.  On this trip I found these 9 Micro Machine cars taped in a baggie to the carrying case (the black thing in the back) for under $4.  Then, I scored this awesome "Super Auto World Playset" (going for $289 on Amazon...whatever!) that also pivots on that blue piece to become more compact.  It was a whole $1.95!!  I can't wait to pull these out on some cold Minnesota day when we're snowed in, can't go to garage sales, and need something "new" to play with!

 

For less than $2 I picked up this vintage Fisher Price "Jolly Jumping Jack" dated 1969 for Toby.  When you pull the red ring, the arms and legs go up and down, eyes move, and it squeaks.  It's really cute and works great, and the stickers and hanging strap are in great condition too!

Today my mom and I also attended the Junk Bonanza in Shakopee, where we found so many really creative ideas for turning old thrift store finds and antiques into new treasures.  It was really a fun and inspirational outing!!  I posted a few initial photos on my Junk Mail Gems blog, and plan to share more photos of individual vendors in the days to come.  Check back at that blog for more great ways to repurpose your great thrifty finds!!

ID Mommy Tips: Finding the Best Garage Sales

Okay, okay, I know, you're tired of listening to me drone on and on about how much I love garage sale-ing.  But, I figured it's not fair for me to brag about my sweet deals without sharing my tips on how I find them with you! I'm often asked how I find such good stuff at garage sales, by friends who claim that they "never find anything good."  So, here's what I do to find the great deals!  And contrary to what you might think, the sales are not all over after Labor Day.  Watch out for one more wave of great sales, now that the kids have gone back to school!

FIND THE BEST SALES
When you have one or more small kids with you, you want to make sure you are not wasting your time at sales that don't have the kind of things you're looking for.  I make a list of the best sounding sales, and resist the urge to veer off route to follow another sign.  I may end up missing out on some good ones not on the list, but I know I'm not going to waste time driving and getting the kids into the stroller to look at stuff I'm not interested in.  After I hit all the ones on my list, if I still have time, then I'll follow signs that I see on the road.  Here are some places I find good sales:

- CraigsList - I love to find sales on CraigsList because people can really describe their sales well with descriptions and photos without the worry of their ad costing too much.  Now I use an iPhone app called "iGarageSale," (see next bullet).  Before that came along, I would browse through the garage sale section the night before I planned to go garage sailing.  When I found one that sounded good (ie. "lots of kid and baby stuff, boys 0-4T" or whatever), I'd copy the text with the date, time and address, and paste it into a word processing program, or an email, or my "stickies" program, so I could print out the list and then Mapquest each location to plan my route.

- iGarageSale - if you have an iPhone, this app will pull the garage sale ads off of Craig's List and pin them all on a map for you.  You can simply touch the pin on the map, read the ad, and then mark it with a star if you want to go to it.  You can also browse by date.  This app has saved me TONS of time searching and then Mapquesting and has saved all of the paper printing maps!

- Local Papers - Don't forget to check your local paper.  You can find a lot of good ones there, and it's also a great place to find larger neighborhood sales.  Many local papers have online versions of their classifieds so you can check many papers every week.

- First Day Only! - I don't bother going to a sale that started yesterday...they really do get picked over fast by the serious shoppers.  I start as early as I can on the day they start, which for most sales is Thursday.  I have found that more and more have even started on Wednesdays this year.


PLAN A ROUTE
- Route Planner - I used to use some other website but now Mapquest finally offers a multiple-stop route planner.  You can take the addresses from your list, plug them all in, and let Mapquest figure out the shortest route to hit all of your spots.

- GPS - I use my GPS every time I garage sale.  Now that I use iGarageSale, I type in each address.  However, before that I could go to Mapquest, type in the addresses to the sales I wanted to hit, and then send them to my "favorites" to my GPS.  I think Garmin is the only one that works with Mapquest like that, but you can manually plug them in too.  Then when you look at your favorites, you will see them already organized by distance, so just touch the one you want to go to next.  I always get turned around when Garage saling, so GPS makes it all a lot more fun and less work.

- Neighborhood Sales - Watch for large neighborhood sales.  They can be a really great way to hit many sales in a row with minimum time spent getting in and out of the car.  These transition times can really slow you down, especially if you have more than one kid.

GET AN EVEN BETTER DEAL
With the exception of some way overpriced sales, garage sale prices are already a great deal. However, you don't have to stop there...here are some tactics I use to get an even better deal.

- Just ASK! - It never hurts to just ask if they will take less for something! Most of the time people are having a sale to try to get rid of stuff, not to make a huge profit.

- Bring small bills - Don't ask if you can get a $20 item for $15, and then hand them a $20 bill.  That's just not cool.  Plus if you look like you only have exactly $15 left, you're more convincing that you can only pay $15.  ;-) 

- Buy-one-get-one - Many times if I'm buying a "larger" item, for example $10, and then I find one other small thing for Sammy that's $1, I'll ask, "will you take $10 for both of these?"  Basically you get one thing free, and they are happy to have gotten rid of more stuff.

MORE TIPS
- Shop Ahead! I get all of my kids' clothes at garage sales and most of them look like new.  During a summer I will shop in the size range that will work for the next year, including winter clothes.  I'll collect enough to get through the fall, winter, and spring until the next garage sale season, and organize clothes in bins by size in their closets.  It's so fun to pull out a new bin full of cute clothes in the dead of winter that I already bought the summer before!

- Teach your kids about money.  Garage sales are a great place to do this.  Try giving your child four quarters or a handful of pocket change that they can spend.  You'd be surprised how much you can get with pocket change, and they can learn about spending money without spending a fortune.  Don't forget to check out free boxes too!

- Stash away toys for later!  If I can manage to buy things without Sammy seeing, many times I'll stash them away for the future.  They come in handy for road trip entertainment, or just a rainy or cold snowy day when you need something new and interesting to help pass the time!

- Clean it up! I wash everything the day I buy it so it's ready when I want to use it.  Clothes go right in the dryer, along with plush toys and pretty much anything fabric or soft.  Legos I dump into a big bowl of soapy, hot water.  Check out my previous post full of tips to get old toys looking new again!


Okay, now that I've shared my tips and tricks, here are a few more great finds I've made over the past few weeks...

This little water "table" was only $2!  Sammy LOVES it, and I love that it's not a huge, bulky one.  It can easily be tucked away in the garage when not in use.

I got a nice wood box with handles and a lid, FULL of all these wood train tracks and accessories.  They all look like brand new, and these things are EXPENSIVE new, which was why I was willing to pay $30.  This was from a thrift store, but I've seen people asking a lot more for this stuff at garage sales! This is being stashed away for later.

I got this cute wood music table for $3!

This Bob the Builder "Ready Bed" was $6.  Here we are pumping it up in a hotel a few weeks ago.  It's like a sleeping bag with an air mattress inside, and it rolls up and fits nicely into a little bag.  We'll be taking this on our trips away from home now for Sammy. He loved it!

This "digger tractor" as Sammy cost it was something he bought with a quarter I gave him.  It was in a big box of sand toys, marked $0.25 each.  We were on our way to the beach at the time, and it was a blast to play with in the sand!

This little pop-up tent fits into a small, flat bag and springs open when you pull it out.  It cost a whopping $4.  Worked great on the beach for us this summer and both boys could even lay in it to get out of the sun!

YOU can find these great deals too!  If you try any of these tips and get a great find, leave a comment and let us know!  Or, if you have some of your own tips, please do share! :-)

ID Mommy Bargains: Garage Sale Finds of the week(s)

It's been a little while since I've bragged about my latest garage sale deals.  I haven't been able to make it to quite as many sales as usual the past few weeks, as I've been more busy earning money than spending it.  Bittersweet dilemma...yes.  I know you've been just DYING to find out what I bought for a fraction of the original price in nearly new condition.  I know, I know, calm down.  Here it comes.

I've been looking everywhere for the tray that goes on a Bumbo chair.  By everywhere, of course, I mean everywhere but stores that sell them new for full price. ;-)  I got the chair years back for Sammy at a garage sale for a couple bucks.  This lady was selling a whole chair AND tray in the original box for $5.  I asked and she was willing to sell me just the tray for $2. Score! The tray plus chair goes for about $50 bucks new.   I would have bought the whole set but didn't want a pink chair for Toby.  It's bad enough that he has this purple one...

A week or two ago I picked up a really nice Kelty kids backpack carrier...the kind you put your kid in to carry them around on your back.  We have a much older one I got when Sammy was little for $7.  THAT was a steal...and I got this much newer model, WITH a bag accessory that zips on the back for $3.  Yes, you read it right, THREE dollars.  The cheapest I've seen these for at sales, this new and in this great condition, is $75-$100.  They start at about $200 new.  Below you can see the one I just got, and a picture of my hubby lugging Sammy through the north shores of Minnesota a couple years ago...

That old teal and purple one was SO yesterday.  Now Toby will be hikin' in the latest styles and I can probably sell the "old" one for a lot more than the $7 I paid for it!

I also found this bag...no idea how much it is new.  But, it was brand new with tags on it for $1.  The base is insulated so you can pack your lunch in it.  The top half can zip completely off if you want to separate it.  The whole thing has backpack straps on it, and there's another smaller bag with it.  I used it today to haul our picnic lunch and all the swim gear to our local splash pad for play group.  Worked great!

I picked up this book today for $1 called "365 Days of Creative Play."  I'm sure it's an old edition, but it is full of simple creative ideas and activities for your kids...one for every day of the year to be exact.  Next time we need to keep busy on a rainy (or snowy) day, I'll be pulling this book out!

This was actually a thrift store find, but I was pretty stoked about it!  I got Sammy a couple nice Automoblox cars for his first birthday, so I knew what these were (below), but I found these mini Automoblox in a baggie in pieces at the thrift store for $1.99.  They run about $10 each new.  The larger ones are around $25-$35.  They are very well made toys, and the wood blocks come apart so you can build your own vehicles.  Super fun. 

Last but not least, another nice Melissa and Doug wood toy.  This is a set of shapes, and you lay the pieces on the boards to match up with the 10 designs included.  I think it was a buck or two...they run about $14 new.

That's all the bragging I will do for now.  I will go ahead and spare you the photos of me on my belly of the original '80's slip-n-slide I got for 50 cents last week!  (I always wanted one of those!  Oh yeah, and Sammy had fun with it too!)

Happy bargain hunting, friends!

Thrift Store Makeover: ID Mommy's Barn (Re-)Raising!

A few months ago I picked up this wood barn at a thrift shop for $15.  It needed a little TLC...as you can see there was a baggie of broken pieces taped to the roof. It has nice handles on top for carrying, and when you release the hook latch on the front, the side opens up on a hinge to reveal a couple cute sliding stall doors.

Upon further investigation, I found that there were not only broken pieces on the doors, but also some pieces missing.  So, it was a little bit more work than I thought, but still a fun challenge. I love fixing up something that somebody else got rid of, and even more, making it better than new!  I always enjoy an excuse to get out in the garage and fire up some power tools.  So, I made some replacement parts for the missing ones, and had to re-build a couple of the wood hinges as well.


I couldn't just leave this thing plain, unfinished wood.  Being an Industrial Designer, my most favorite part of the design process is making super realistic scale models that can be photographed to look like the real, full-scale thing. Most clients do not want to put the time and money into physical models these days, being that they can get photo realistic computer renderings pretty quickly too.  But, there's just something really cool about having a real 3-D representation in your hand. (click here to see the latest scale model I built of a retail display, and here, here, or here to see some of my older product and package models to see what I mean!)

Anyway, I digress...but my point is that the barn kick started that love of model making in me to the point where I wanted to make it look more realistic.  It turned into a fun little side project for my favorite clients...my kids! (okay, and maybe to re-live my own childhood, just a little bit)  First I primed the whole thing with white spray paint.  For the roof I used a dark gray textured spray paint (after taping off the rest of the barn), which gave it the look and feel of real shingles.  I went to Home Depot and picked out just the right barn red paint swatch, and got one of their little tiny sample sizes to paint the red.  Then I painted the bars in the windows silver.  And, now we have a much more realistic barn! I mean, I can't have my boys playing with a less-than-real toy barn, now, can I?!

If I had paid the full $60 to $70-something they charge for these new, I probably wouldn't have wanted to paint it.  But, being that it was cheap and in need of repairs anyway, I figured I didn't have much to lose.  In the end, I'm glad I gave it a makeover and made it look more like a real barn!  I got out my old Breyer horses from when I was little, and Sammy has a blast playing with the "horsies."  I love a good way to keep up my model making skills for the benefit of my kids while in between freelance projects!

ID Mommy Tip: Cleaning Up Garage Sale & Thrift Store Finds

You already know I'm big on garage sales and thrift stores...I love the thrill of the hunt, and not knowing what little treasure I might find.  But, another one of my favorite parts about garage saleing is restoring old, beat up items and making them look all shiny and new again.

Last week I posted a home recipe for tarnish remover, which has worked great on some of my tarnished silver finds.  Today I'll share a few more ways that I clean up old stuff.  Unfortunately these items are pretty much the opposite of my tarnish remover post when it comes to eco-friendliness, but they really do work great.  If anyone has any good (safer) home remedies to replace these, I'd love to know about them!

I usually start with just a sponge and water, but when that doesn't cut it, these are a few of my favorite things:

Bestine - This is something I only know about and own because I'm a designer.  It's made to thin rubber cement, and you can get it at art supply stores, or online.  My last can lasted me 10 years, and I just recently purchased this can.  It works great to remove sticky stuff like price tag goo.  It's really nasty, cancer-causing, flammable stuff, so keep it away from the kids.  But, it works great.  You can also find other cleaners that do the same thing like Goo Gone.

Steel Wool - This stuff is great for removing rust and bringing back the shine on your steel or even chrome stuff.  For a couple bucks you'll have enough to last your whole life, unless you're shining up something huge like a car.

Magic Eraser - They aren't kidding when they call this "magic."  It's my favorite thing to use on beat up toys...it'll remove the little colored lines you see on toys that were caused from crashing into other toys.  Here's an example of what it did on a great vintage Fisher Price schoolhouse I got for $0.50 cents:

Just be sure to wash off the toy well after using the eraser, and keep the Magic Eraser out of your kids' reach, because it does have a chemical inside that will burn your skin!

The Dishwasher - When it comes to cleaning and sanitizing little plastic toys like Legos, I like to either dump them in a big bowl of hot, soapy water and then rinse them in a colander, OR, just put them in a mesh laundry lingerie bag and run them through the dishwasher.  Those little bottle baskets work well to for small items.  The dishwasher works great for larger items too, and you can do the "sani-wash" to kill any cooties.

The Laundry Machine - Of course I wash all clothes that I get for the kids.  But, I also put anything and everything of the plush variety in there...stuffed animals, toys, blankets, you name it.  I have lost count of how many toys I've run through the machine that are labeled, "surface wash only," and have yet to actually wreck anything.  Many baby item's I've purchased like my swing, bouncy chair, strollers, play mats, and bassinet all have been designed for the fabric to be easily removed and washed, making them look like new!!


Batteries - You'd be surprised the great toys people get rid of, which their kids stopped playing with, just because they never got around to changing the batteries.  I wouldn't either, if I didn't have rechargeable ones, because they do add up with all the toys.  I found a TJ Bearytales bear in a big box of $0.50 cent stuffed animals, asked if it worked, and they said, "yeah, it just needs batteries."  I took it home and popped in some of my rechargeable batteries, and now we have an awesome, expensive toy for next to nothing.  It was worth the gamble to find out at home whether it works, as they quit making them...you can find them new on Amazon for around $150-$200! (or much cheaper used on Ebay or CraigsList!)

Super Glue - All moms learn the value of super glue from the moment their baby starts moving.  From this moment on, things will break, and you will be expected to fix them.  Now you can not only fix the stuff your kid breaks, but the stuff other people's kids break, too!