Happy 2006

Happy New Year. Ok, I know I still have a little of 2005 left. I am glad that 2005 is almost over. Will always remember 2005 as the year that my Dad died.

I am looking to make some big improvements in 2006. In case you haven't figured it out, I am a big packrat. I really have to declutter and have some mega yardsales. I also have to get my house is better order. I used to be very organized, I would match all my receipts to my credit card statements every month - then save the entire bundle forever. But sometime in the past few years, I've been slacking off, so I still have all the receipts and all the statements, just that now they are not matched up nicey nice. I need to start shredding. There's no way I need to look at my Discover card statement from October 1992 and reminisce about what I bought back then. Or look at my cable bill from August 1990 and see what I was paying. But right now, I could. I hold on to too much crap!

On Christmas Eve 2005, I told my brother and my SIL that by Christmas Eve 2006, they are going to see a much thinner Chris.

One good thing that happened in 2005 was the big improvement in the message board program I use for my website. We started off with the usual crappy board I had for years at bravenet and in May 2005 I switched to a different board, which turned out to be totally unreliable. We suffered with that board for 4 months, until September when I found the super awesome board system from Spreebb.com . You can see my actual message board by clicking on the link to the left.

Did a little bit of bargain shopping at Target today, Christmas stuff is 75% off. Also got a bargain the other day at home. I went out to get the newspaper and saw found a dollar bill in my yard.

Happy 2006 everyone!
Chris

Happy After Christmas Bargain Shopping

We spent Christmas in upstate NY - including our dog. I was hoping my dog's other family would watch him but it didn't work out. So we took him to my mom's. Didn't really want to take him to a kennel - since boarding prices are high plus, I would have had to take him to the vets for a kennel cough shot beforehand (another expense). In the past I've also hired a local Dog Nanny to come to the house but the last time I did that my dog ran away (to his other family) and I still had to pay the dog nanny every day regardless. Also in the past I've used a reliable teenager too, but they moved. Taking the dog to NY worked out pretty good I think. My mom lives on a busy road so we couldn't let him off the leash (plus he doesn't listen anyways) it gave us a good reason to get out of the house a few times a day for some fresh air and exercise. Which we need - the above pic is of the yummy cookies made by my cousin Kathy.

Hey, I'm gonna add to this post, but gotta run now and watch Criminal Minds. Will finish this post on Thursday.

--ok, it's Thursday now and I am back to finish my post.

Whenever I visit my hometown I always visit two thrifts - a Salvation Army and a community based one called Captain's Treasures. At SA I bought myself a $1.99 Saratoga Springs t-shirt and a $1.99 vintage Adidas shirt for ebay. Also bought for .99 a vintage melted plastic pellet Santa decoration. At Captains I bought a bunch of new in package Covergirl makeup for myself that I love, only $1 a package. A $1.75 black Aigner purse (for myself), two books for .25. Also a vintage Napco ceramic Christmas sleigh in perfect condition (no chips, cracks etc). It was only marked $1, and the cashier didn't see it when she was ringing up my other items and when I asked her if she rang it up, she said no and said that I could just have it.

My son got to go to Chuck E. Cheese twice (didn't spend a thing there). When a child walked in, they got a mystery sticker that revealed X number of free tokens. The first day he got 10 and the second time 15 free tokens. Plus I had a ton of free tokens from all the specially marked .99 Koolaid Koolburst packages I had been buying.

Also stocked up on stuff at Aldi's and Dollar Tree. I love Aldi's - I wish I had one close to me. At the Dollar Tree, I mainly bought $1 packages of Panasonic C & D size batteries. All those Kacie the Kinderbots I've been buying lately need Size D batteries and they are expensive at regular stores. We use a lot of rechargeable batteries for AA and AAA. I tried going to a Pepperidge Farm outlet store that I went to over the summer to stock up on Flavored Blasted Goldfish crackers for my son, but it wasn't there anymore - they must have moved their location.

After Christmas I went to a few Targets and also Walmart and CVS. Went on Monday with my mom to her Target and she bought a lighted star window decoration. They only had one and she wanted two. But she could live with just one. Spent most of the day Tuesday driving in the car so no shopping on Tues.. Anyhow I told Mom I would check "my" Target and on Wednesday I bought the last one they had, so now she'll have two.

Bought several bags of Dove chocolate on clearance $1.49 each - will give to my husband for Valentine's Day since Dove chocolate is his favorite. (The package does say it's good until May 2006). At CVS, I bought two half priced Celine Dion perfume gift sets. One to give to my mom for her birthday and one either to keep for myself or sell on eBay. Also bought a sale Mary Kate and Ashley perfume set to give to a niece.

Also on Wednesday I went to VV. I bought 4 pieces of clothing for .30 each and some games. Paid $1.50 for The Game of Cub Scouting (for ebay) and some games for my son.

And lastly I went to BJ's Warehouse. My free membership is expiring at the end of the month and I don't plan on paying for a membership. I stocked up on birthday cards to last me thru most of 2006 for people I send BD cards to (greeting cards are half-off the price printed on the cards). The one I like the best (and bought a few of) was a card that said: I looked all over for a nice gift for you but I all I found was crap - then when you open it it says: maybe I should have left the house. LOLOL!! how true!

Nothing much going on. Just busy thinking up a ton of resolutions for 2006!

Happy Ho-Ho-Holidays

I barely got my Christmas cards (bought last year half off of course) mailed out before Christmas. My friend from high school has to show me up (again of course ! LOL) by sending out her custom handmade Christmas cards that have at least 4 layers of acid-free paper and a string "embellishment" for the reindeer reins. All this done of course while tending to her 5 month old twins. She is totally nuts! But she thinks I'm nuts for buying other people's junk.

I'll be busy for a little while, so I may not get a chance to post again before Christmas. Today was a good day at Smile - everything half off. I bought several Hallmark ornaments for .25 each and a few things that I intend to give this year (a new Old Navy stationery set for .50 for a niece, and also a hardcover cookbook (.50)by redneck Jeff Foxworthy to give to my mom.

Til next time,
Chris

My Papa John's pizza bargain yesterday

Didn't get a chance to post yesterday about my Papa John's pizza bargain. I mentioned this in a previous blog posting about how our local Papa John's gives free toppings on Mondays depending on how the Redskins did the following day. Well this past Sunday's game they made 5 touchdowns so that means we can get 5 free toppings the next day. Wait, there's more...if they win, the amount of free toppings is doubled. So yesterday was a 10 free topping day! It's hard for me to come up with 10 toppings that I like, so on a pizza for me I did double pepperoni, double cheese, double onion and bacon. And I still had "free" toppings leftover! On the pizza intended for my husband, he got 3 different kinds of peppers plus every kind of meat.

And remember me talking about bargain in buying the DVD, March of the Penguins? Well yesterday I saw there is a $3 rebate on Minute Maid orange juice. So I will send the rebate in - will do it in my niece's name so she'll get the $3, afterall, I did have to cut off the Proof of Purchase.

If you shop on Amazon.com

Here is another shameless plug, if you do any shopping at Amazon.com, I would appreciate it if you would get to Amazon.com by going thru my link. Thanks!

Went to Smile today and it was a half priced day. Every once in a while they'll do a half priced day and it's great. I bought about $15 worth of stuff. Most expensive thing was a $4 Sony Dream Machine clock radio. For myself I bought a $2 black Liz Claiborne purse. And of course, a bunch of other junk.

Been doing some Christmas shopping lately in real stores where they sell new stuff. Today I bought a March of the Penguins DVD as a gift and at one Walmart it was $19.99 and at another one it was $14.98. How crazy is that!?

I've been using some of those $10 JC Penney's coupons that I mentioned in a different post to score some bargains. Here's my JC Penney's buy of the week: spent .53 to get my husband 7 new pairs of Adidas socks. The socks were on sale for $10.50 so after the coupon I paid .50 plus .03 tax. And the package has a bonus black pair of socks, so it was 6 white pairs plus a black pair, for a total of 7 pairs of socks.




Today at the grocery store I saw something that makes me wish my cellphone had a camera. It was this HOT guy and guess what make him even HOTTER? He had a white envelope and he was sorting thru his coupons! I NEVER see any guys carrying coupons in a grocery store, let alone a cute one!

I haven't checked the newspaper ads, but I'm guessing there are no yardsales tomorrow. But that's ok, since I know there are going to be tons of people at the malls and other stores buying high priced stuff to give to people who won't want it and it will end up at a yardsale this spring for cheap! (Am I bad or what??) But it is the truth since I've often bought stuff at a yardsale that still had remnants of Christmas wrapping paper on it.

Till next time, happy saling,
chris

Well on Friday I didn't go to Smile (I couldn't - haha) We had a little bit of snow/ice so they closed schools. So when schools are closed for bad weather, so is Smile.

My husband really outdid himself this year as far as my Las Vegas souvenir. Man, this gift makes me WISH I got another shirt advertising a strip club. I got a paper towel. You read that right. He said while at the bathroom at the Venetian, the paper towels in the men's room were so nice that he had to bring me one. I'm hoping at least it's one that he picked up AFTER he washed his hands, but I can't guarantee it.

Hey, if you are on JC Penney's mailing list, check your mail for their $10 coupon they are mailing out. I got one yesterday. It's good for anything over $10. Earlier this year, I got it and got some great deals on socks. I think I even blogged about it.

Got the software from Estore.com. A word of advice, don't buy the Candyland computer game from them. It sucks. It did not hold my 5 year olds attention at all.

Went to Smile yesterday and today. Also went to Vintage Value. I need to start paying more attention to the books at VV. They are only .10 each. I bought a stack of about a dozen Dr. Suess books in very nice condition ($1.20). At Smile I found yet another Kacie the Kinderbot robot ($2) so I bought it. I figure it will be good for resale eventually. And I got lots of nice t-shirts (.50) for my son, including a I heart NY one, which I heart since I am originally from upstate NY.

Today I bought two pillows that match our sofa, a nice magnetic "chores chart" thing ($1.50)for kids made by Lights, Camera, Action. A bright orange vintage looking metal watering can ($1 - it's brand new, but has a vintage design, I figure I can spray paint it).

I just remembered another neat thing I got at Smile yesterday: a pink Serta sheep stuffed animal. A few years ago I bought a few Serta sheeps at a yardsale and then found out there are people who love those things. They are the counting sheep that appear in the Serta commercials. At the yardsale, I bought #13, which is a desirable number for the collectors. I think I paid .50 for them and they sold for about $25-30. The one I got yesterday is the #3 pink breast cancer awareness Serta sheep. I checked ebay, and I think I will have to hold onto this one until the #3 sheep gets harder to find. Smile sells bags of toys for $1, so the sheep was in a $1 bag along with some other toys.

I got a bargain buying my brother's Christmas gift. There is a seller on ebay (ebay seller name: Elenahume) which has cheap magazine subscriptions. Right now she is offering a 3 year subscription to the Sporting News (a weekly sports magazine) for only $5.99. That is super cheap compared to what it normally sells for - at the Sportingnews.com website, they sell a one year subscription for $19.97 and I got my brother a THREE year subscription. He used to get it all the time, so I know he will love it (I checked with his wife and he doesn't have a current subscription to it).

And that's not where the bargain ends...There is a 10% off eBay/Paypal coupon code that is circulating around the net, so I entered the coupon code at the checkout and I ended paying just $5.39! I'm not going to post the code here since it's going to expire in a few days, but if you really want it, it's posted on my message board in the Reselling Forum.

My husband got back from guy's trip to Las Vegas last night. I wonder if he brought me back any souvenirs - he has quite the track record for souvenir gifts. One year after a golfing trip he gave me a plastic cup emblazoned with "The Witch" on it, (apparently The Witch was the name of the golf course or the drinking establishment at the golf course). Another year on a golf trip he brought me back a t-shirt from the Crazy Horse Gentleman's Club in Myrtle Beach. Just what I wanted.

I gave up going to Nashville last weekend (a relative was getting married) so my husband could take his annual Las Vegas jaunt. But don't worry about me, I think I need to plan a cruise trip with the girls, or else a world's longest yardsale trip! Also would love to go to the unclaimed baggage center in Alabama.

Anyhow, I wanted to mention, my sister had a celebrity sighting while at the Nashville airport - she saw and talked to Paula Deen from Food TV. My quick thinking sister ran into an airport newstand and bought a Paula Deen magazine and got Paula to autograph it for a surprise Christmas gift to my mom. So hey, if you are reading this and know my mom, don't say anything! My sis said that Paula was very nice in person and smaller and thinner than she appears on tv.

My bargains for the week

My bargain of the week was getting a huge dying pine tree cut down (and most of it hauled away) for free. The guys who do the tree trimming for the utility company are trimming the trees in our neighborhood and when they got to my house they asked if we wanted the big dying pine tree to be cut down for free. Of course! The above is a view of it from the front yard and from the back. It's totally cut down and they mulched up the branches and just left us some big pieces to deal with. We have a large back yard so we have plenty of room to let the big pieces decay on their own. I don't think pine is a good wood for burning. Also I asked the tree guys what they do with the mulch and they said they just dump it wherever they find a good spot, so I told them I could use some and so they dumped a few large truckfulls on the edge of our property.

I know cutting down a large tree like that costs a lot of money so I'm glad the utility tree guys did for free. I wanted to get rid of that tree for a long time.



My other good bargain of the week was finding a Longaberger basket for .50 at a thrift store. The handle was broken but I just sawed it off. In Longaberger baskets, I prefer no handles or swinging handles rather than the "fixed position" handles. The "fixed" handles make the baskets look too Easter Baskety for me. The basket I just bought had a fixed position handle so actually I'm glad the handle was broken so I don't feel bad about sawing it off. I also found a vintage felt Christmas elf ($1) for my collection. I will have to take a new pic of my elf collection (I think there's a pic of my collection in my blog archives).

At Vintage Value, I bought myself two nice Liz Claiborne tops for myself (.30 each) and a pair of Michael Jordan sneakers (.50) for my son. And at Smile I bought my son a nice winter jacket for $2 (made by Boardgear). His coat that he has been wearing is a size 6/7 and it's a little big on him. This "new" coat is a size 6 so this one fits him better.

I finally planted my free Stargazer lilly bulbs that I mentioned back in the blog in September or October. I planted 4 in the front of the house and 2 in the back. About a day after I planted them, I saw that some animal (a squirrel maybe?) dug it up but they haven't gotten the others. Geez, you would think that they'd be happy with the sunflower seeds and cracked corn I give them.

I bought my son a bunch of kid's software this week. I buy it from www.smart-estore.com I've bought from them before and it's good software, but you don't get jewel cases or any instructions/paperwork with it, you just get the disk. Anyhow, early on I've realized that you have to be "smart" when buying from smart-estore. If you go their regular website (www.smart-estore.com), you see software for $5.95. But I've found other links within their website that offer the SAME software for $3.95 or even $2.97. To see what I mean, check these out: $3.95 Smart E-store and $2.97 Smart E-store If you do order any, at the check-out you can use coupon code GET10 to get 10% off.

Sunday

Well I never finished my post from Thanksgiving day. There was more that I wanted to say but I never got back to the blog that day.

I forgot to mention my buy at my regular VV store on Monday. In their toy bin I saw my son's current favorite toy: Kacie the Kinderbot robot. I bought one (new in box for $3) at a yardsale a few years ago, and so now we have a "backup" and it was only $1. When they were at Target, they were $39.99

Well in my previous post, I said I wasn't one of those crazy early bird Black Friday shoppers. Well I guess I lied. I was at a Staples at 5:30am on Black Friday waiting in line to buy a 19" flat screen monitor for $199 for my husband for Christmas. But at least I am not one of those tent people camping out at Walmart. I steered way clear of Walmart that day. So while some of you may think I am super cheap because of all my yardsale buys, I don't think I am since I *do* spend money at regular stores (but I just like to get a great bargain). Also bought my husband a 512 MB MP3 player (off ebay) as a gift recently.

We live about an hour away from a regular indoor shopping mall so I didn't go to a mall on Black Friday but didn't manage to hit these: Staples, Giant (grocery store), Target, Bath & Body Works (twice), Belk Dept. Store, JC Penneys (for free mini snowglobe), CVS, VV (yes, they were open and they even had a sale - fill a huge bag of clothes for $3), BJ's Warehouse, and Ace Hardware (for their One Day sale).

I had two coupons for Bath & Body Works: free item (up to $12.50) with any purchase and save $10 off $35 purchase. Well on Black Friday they had a sale on their fancy room deodorizers for $5 (normally $12.50) - but they don't call them "room deodorizers", they call them "Wallflowers". So I used both coupons and I bought a bunch of the room deodorizers as gifts plus a candle (to give to my sister in law). As I checked out, they gave me another $10 off $35 purchase coupon. So then after I left, I started thinking about what am I going to do for gifts for my son's 5 teachers (1 teacher, 2 assistants, 1 Speech Therapist and 1 Occupational Therapist. So I thought what the heck, I'll give them "Wallflowers" and I went back and bought more and used the coupon they had just given me a little earlier.

Today I got "my" Christmas gift from my husband - a Sony S90 Digital camera. It was no surprise since I'm the one who saw it on sale at Target ($199) and he told me to buy it. We had seen that model before at a different store and liked it. My current digital camera is held together by duct tape (I dropped it and the battery compartment won't stay closed on its own).

Oh here's something I forgot to mention the other day, I did a phone interview with a writer from Better Homes & Gardens magazine. They are doing an article about yardsale safety in their April '06 issue and I should get a mention of yardsalequeen.com in it. Knock on wood.

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving. It started off pretty rough for me - wasn't feeling well last night or this morning. But I snapped out of it and I'm feeling better and cooking a turkey breast.

I plan on doing a little bit of Black Friday shopping tomorrow - but I don't plan on going crazy and set my alarm for 4am or anything.

Yesterday was the only day this week that Smile was going to be open but I didn't go (actually I couldn't go and it drove me nuts. My 5 year old son had off from school and I won't take him to Smile anymore since he is not a good shopper). I did go to both Vintage Value stores on Monday though. They have two stores and I normally don't go to one since it's a lot smaller and further away, but I went on Monday and found several nice tops for me (and they also have .30 days so my new-to-me clothing was .30 each, Liz Claiborne, St. Johns Bay etc).

My buys this past week

Went to my thrifts this week. My favorite buy was this Espirit purse for .50 at Vintage Value - looks brand new, no marks or anything inside. Since I went to VV on a .30 day I also bought some clothing including a new looking Johnny Knoxville Jackass shirt (probably for me) and a Ralph Lauren short sleeve buton down shirt for my husband (each were .30). At Smile I bought my son a Fisher Price tape recorder with microphone for $1, a reversible talking Veggietale Larryboy plush (for ebay) and bunch of other little stuff.

I had to stop at Walmart for something the other day and I wish I had had my camera in my car. I parked my car next to a grassy patch and when I got back to my car, I see someone had parked their Amish horse and buggy next to it. Acck...with all the car traffic at the Walmart, I feel sorry for the horse who must be scared.

Bought two turkey breasts (.99 lb) at the grocery store for Thanksgiving. We'll have one next week and save the other one for later.

My buys

My favorite buy this week at Smile was this great vintage picnic basket for $3. The manufacturer's label depicts a Native American Indian and the politically incorrect name Red-Man Quality Baskets Peru, Indiana. I just love it because of the design and the fact that it will be great for storage. With all the stuff I buy, I gotta have my storage! As I was walking around the store with it, one lady came up to me and said "wow, what a great basket". I love it when that happens, it just reaffirms that I think I have a good eye for junk.

I also bought some other stuff, a Boy Scout uniform shirt (for ebay) that was .50, a very cute battery operated dog (called Artlist Collection dog) that barks and wags his tag furiously ($1). Plus other stuff.

Today was another beautiful fall day and there were two large outdoor yardsales, one at a school and one at a church. Bought some Christmas sock monkeys at $1 each, an old green handled egg beater $1, a Smokey the Bear ashtray $1 and two sealed boxed sets of the 80's tv show Five Mile Creek at $3 each (pictured above). I had never heard of it but knew that the boxed DVD sets of any program usually sell for $25 and higher. I put one of them up on ebay already.

My husband took off half a day and we went out to lunch to a Lonestar. Then stopped at Target to look around. Just bought one thing. They had electric 6-sheet paper shredders on clearance for $2.48, normally $9.99. It fits over a trash can. Or in my case, I'll shred whatever needs shredding into our paper recycling bag. (I'm a big recycler). I don't think I'll need to do a lot of shredding, but as it is now, I tear up credit card applications etc.

It was a beautiful Fall day here in Maryland. Found lots of yardsales but I had my son with me so I just went to a few and was home by 10:30am. The best buy was a set of 4 like new patio cushions for $5. If you've ever priced patio chair cushions, you know they aren't cheap. Of course I bought a bunch of other stuff, but nothing to write home about.

Forgot to mention that a year ago yesterday was when I got filmed for movie "Zen in the Art of Yardsailing" by
ThUnderground Films The last I heard they were still in the editing phase, I'll probably get edited right out of it - LOL! Here's a photo of me with the director and the sound guy. My house is a mess as usual, but they did rearrange somewhat for the filming.

My buys

First let me say that the Message Boards are back to normal (they were only out of commision for a few hours the other day). If you haven't checked out the boards, please do, the link is there on the left.



On Wednesday, I was at a CVS store and they had all their Halloween Candy priced at .50 a bag. The above pic is a small sampling of what I bought (I ended up buying 16 bags, but gave a lot to my dog's other family. Long story, my dog lives part-time with another family). The previous day at Walmart, I got some other candy. I bought bags of Hershey Kisses and some other stuff. I think I'm going to make those cookies with the Hershey kisses in them. But if I had known I was going to get so much candy at .50 a bag at CVS, I would not have bought the candy at Walmart.

On Wednesday at Smile, I bought several bottles of nice perfumes at $1 each. Sunflowers (Elizabeth Arden), Velocity (Mary Kay) and Calyx by Prescriptives. I had never heard of the Calyx but I knew Prescriptives is an expensive brand name.



On Thursday at Smile, I bought myself a Jack Daniels cowboy hat. It was only .50 and it looks brand new, and it's my size. Now I just need to find a rodeo to wear it to. A while ago, a regional shopping mall had a phrase in their ads "Buy the dress, the party will come". So I guess I could say something similar, Buy the cowboy hat, the rodeo will come.

The Mary Moo Moo that I bought last weekend for .10 bit the dust. I accidently knocked it over and it fell about a foot and a hefty chuck broke off. It surprised me how easily it broke.

It's going to be a nice day tomorrow, so there should be lots of yardsales. I'll have my son with me, so I may not get to a whole lot.

Message Board problem

My message board is having technical difficulty...hopefully it will be fixed soon. I'm not going to start up a back-up board until I hear news about how long the downtime will be.

Buys last few days

Went to a few yardsales yesterday (Friday yardsales are very rare here). And bought this fish windsock decoration. It was brand new and never assembled - the original price was $26.99, I paid $4. And bought another Little Tikes wagon ($10) for my son, it's nicer than my other Little Tikes wagon. At Smile I bought two old (1940's) University of Maryland college yearbooks. $2 each. I never see yearbooks for sale, so I felt compelled to buy them.

Today went to a few yardsales and an estate sale. I bought a nice lamp for .10 - yes, .10! It doesn't have a lampshade though (but I'm sure I can find one cheap at a thrift store). Also bought a Mary Moo Moo figurine for .10 and a cow bobblehead for .10. The bobblehead is a particular brand that my mom buys at gift stores, so that was a good find. And at the estate sale I bought a bunch of full bottles of various cleaners for $1.50 - cans of Scotchgard, Shout, Armstrong floor cleaner, Spot Shot, Rug Doctor Pet Stain remover, full can of Lysol etc - all for $1.50.

In the afteroon, I took my son to a trick-or-treating event in a local park Ann Marie Garden . They get about 50 vendors to set up booths along the trail and give out candy. The admission cost is $1 per child or a can of nonperishable food. The park is affiliated with the Smithsonian Institute, so they do have a bunch of sculptures on loan. Admission is free, except like today, when I had to bring a can of food.

Missed out on a pizza bargain...

I really don't pay attention to football much at all. But in our house we root for the Vikings, not the local teams (the Redskins or Ravens) - but shush don't tell anyone, I don't want my house TP'ed on Halloween! Well anyways, at our local Papa John's pizza, every week during football season they have a promotion. For every touchdown the Redskins get during a game, the next day you can get a free topping on a pizza. And if they win, the toppings are doubled. Well anyways, because of all the touchdowns last game, on Monday I could have gotten a 14 topping pizza for the plain cheese pizza price. Can you imagine 14 toppings on a pizza??? I was reading about it, and Papa Johns was telling people that getting all 14 toppings would result in an inadequately cooked pizza. I will have to pay attention to the Redskin scores from now on.

And speaking of the Redskins, I met a Hogette today and got a free autographed poster and football card - LOL! For some reason, the Hogette that lives in our little town was at Smile (in full Hogette regalia), making an appearance and giving aways posters. Had him personalize the poster to The Yard Sale Queen and the card to my son.





Heck, even when I actually met a pro football player in person I never thought to get an autograph. Many years ago when I was flying first class (I had a free upgrade coupon), I sat next to Dave Meggett when he was with the New York Giants. Very nice - he even ordered a rum and coke and gave me the rum bottle to stick in my purse for later. I love my rum and cokes! Actually what was pretty funny was that my husband was actually sitting back in coach at the time (he didn't have an upgrade coupon) and here I was chatting away with a pro football player.

Anyhow, didn't buy much today. Bought a .25 spoonrest to replace the one my husband broke and a $1 baby sling for ebay.

Spent $17.50 yesterday

Went to Smile yesterday and spent more than usual. Above is a few things I bought, $1 McCoy planter and two pairs of Easy Spirit slingback shoes ($2 a pair). No, they aren't mismatched, I bought a black pair and a tan pair, but only took a picture of one of each. Also bought a navy blue blazer/jacket for my son. It was more than I normally spend ($5) but it was in perfect condition and from Nordstrom. It's too big for him now, but will fit in a few years. I always buy things like this for him and put away for the future. I'm sure he'll need to dress up occasionally when he's older and I think its good to have some items like this on hand, so I don't have to run out and pay full price. Also bought a fancy Christmas dress for a little girl ($3) for ebay. I know this doesn't add up to $17.50, but I can't remember what else I bought.

No plans on doing any shopping today.