Yard Sale and Garage Sale Buys - Reselling them on eBay

Just a quick note - the yardsale queen message board is smokin' hot! Just in the past two weeks we had board members with some great ebay sales. For stuff that was bought at yardsales and garage sales! One auction was for a pair of coffee tables - they went for over $1000. A clock went for over $700, and a pair of used old sneakers went for over $900!! (ok the sneakers weren't found at a yardsale, but at 20 years old, they could have been!)

And I recently sold a cereal premium freebie - you know a free toy that comes in boxes of kid's cereal? I had lot of 6 of a particular freebie toy go for $41! And something I bought at an indoor yardsale this past Saturday for $3 is up to $50 already! It's pretty exciting! That's why I am using so many exclamation points!

To read the rules of the message board and to join, click here a small portion of the message board can be pre-viewed here. Members who are signed in can see the whole thing.

Bingo, Tag Toppers, Oatmeal, Yardsales & Etc.

Ok, time to finally catch up on what's been happening in the past few weeks. Nothing too exciting but haven't really had time to sit down and write up a bloggy post.

I ate oatmeal yesterday. For the first time in my life. Don't get me wrong, I can eat oatmeal cookies all day long, but cooked oatmeal for breakfast? Nope. You know what changed my mind? Getting a coupon for a free oatmeal at McDonald's (it was in last Sunday's coupon packs.) I can't turn down free food, even if it's oatmeal. It was ok I guess, since I don't really have anything to compare it to. But the price was right.

And in my previous post, I said I was recovering from playing bingo. That is a whole nother way to waste a day. But that also included free food and I won $50 so I can't complain. The only reason why I played is because of pretty much why I do anything in life - because I had a coupon for it. The coupon was good for $25 worth of bingo cards plus a free dabber. So why not? And it came with free soda, danish, lunch and more free soda. I left my house at 8:30am and got home around 3pm. And that $25 pack of bingo cards didn't even include all the games. There were bingo employees circulating around the tables saying things like "Quickie, $50 Cherry, Day at the Races, U-pick-Um" which were special bingo games that they sold cards for. I resisted since I had a hard enough time keeping up with the regular games, which of course, most times were not regular bingo games. Games like double bingo, triple bingo, crazy 7 bingo, crazy kite bingo etc. I came home stressed and exhausted. But full of free soda. And that's what's important - getting my fill of diet pepsi.

At lunchtime, there was a quick break for lunch - which they provided for free. Pulled pork sandwich and a glob of chocolate pudding.



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Then the other weekend, the clubhouse in our 'hood had a mini version of Antiques Roadshow so I went to it. For $2 admission you could bring as much stuff as you wanted and a local antiques dealer would tell you what he thought about your junk. Here's what I brought:



I am currently selling the cake dish for a local elderly woman who is downsizing. I mainly wanted a second opinion on it (to confirm that what I thought it is - an emerald Fenton cake plate). I've had the KISS lunchbox for a good 15 years - I have it displayed with my other lunchboxes in my kitchen. The dealer estimated it to be worth around $100 - and I just recently sold it on ebay for $150. I would rather collect money than have it collect dust. The chopsticks with mother of pearl and the silver thing (it's an Occupied Japan smokers set - ashtray, place to store cigarettes, matchbook holder) are things my dad bought as souvenirs during his service in the Korean War. Never knew why he bought the smokers thing since he wasn't a smoker. The pocketwatch belonged to my husband's grandfather, the dealer estimated it at about $150. And the thing that says "Solomons Island Maryland" is called a tag topper. People would put them on their license plates as decorations. I plan on keeping it (I paid .50 for it at a flea market), but the dealer said if I was to sell it, not to sell it for less than $150.

At the antique roadshow event, it was very low key, just people talking about their junk and eavesdropping and hearing what the dealer thought stuff was worth. It was the next best thing to do besides going yardsaling, of course.

Here's a pic of something I thought was interesting that someone else brought in - Presidential and Camp David cigarettes:


Speaking of tag toppers, I went to an indoor yardsale last Saturday and bought one and have it listed on ebay. Lots of people have looked at it but no bids currently. There is a link to my ebay auctions over there to the left.

And finally, Jacob and I spent our last free night at the hotel for a while. Finally scored a free room on the top floor with a better view. Normally the free rooms are on lower level with limited view.

View from the room:


Ok, two minutes before I took this picture, I had just left the indoor heated pool and ran outside soaking wet to take this picture. So you better enjoy it:


Jacob, of course, playing computer in a new location. The other rooms we've been in, haven't had an ottoman so he had to try it out instead of the computer chair:



p.s. Coming soon, to a grocery store checkout near you, me in a magazine. Nope, not the National Enquirer. Stay tuned for details.

Been Busy

I know I know, a day without a blog post from me is like a day without sunshine. Sorry for the lack of posts lately. I will rectify the situation shortly. I hope.

I am still recovering from playing Bingo on Tuesday.

Talk to you soon.

some random pics for Valentine's Day

Happy Valentines's Day - to those who celebrate.


This is why I am glad I just have a basic, regular ole top loading washing machine. I'm sure this thing cost a crapton and a half when it was new. Here it is, needing some sort of belt, for $20 at the thrift store. I opened it up and it smelled mildewy.



Had lunch with DH at a Chinese buffet place last week. I have no idea what this is (I did not try it), but whatever it is, I think it could called pitted eyeballs and served at a Halloween party.



Jacob at ten years of age, is already tired of the paparazzi.


That's all folks, nothing much new to report. Oh but I did do something fun on Sunday, which I will have to blog about. If you can't be out buying junk, the next best thing is being out and looking at other people's junk.

Snickers and Moes

Originally I had planning on staying home all day today and being good and working on ebay. Oh well, I can always try again next week. I did write up some new ebay listings but then remembered that I better go out to lunch at Moes and use a $5 gift card that was going to expire next week. (Every December Moes has a gift card deal that if you buy a $25 GC, you get a free $5 GC but that $5 GC will expire in the middle of February). And I wanted to use it today, to get the most bang for my free $5 buck. On Mondays, my Moes has a lunch special for $5.99 (includes a burrito, chips and drink). Otherwise on any other day you are paying $7.18 for the same huge burrito and $1.89 for the drink). So using my $5 gift card today, I only paid $1.05.

Then went to Food Lion, for some necessities. 6 Snicker bars. They were Buy 1 Get 1 Free (but at Food Lion, they essentially just ring up at half price: .49) So then I used some Buy 1 Get 1 Free coupons which scanned at .99 off. So total paid for 6 candybars: .15

Kapoosh and ShamWow!

I'm not sure if I mentioned it again or not, but again this winter, the local hotel gave us free rooms to use again. So this morning after checking out of the hotel, we did some shopping in another city about 45 miles from the castle).

First on my To-Do list was to go to a home improvement show being held in a local arena. I wanted to go for a few reasons: it was free to go. It was pretty close to the hotel location. And I had never been inside the arena before and wanted to see it. Only downside is now I am going to be bombarded for the next 12 months with timeshare opportunities and people wanting to update my kitchen cabinets. But that is my own fault for giving my real name and # on their entry blanks.



Then onto a Honda dealer to look at the CR-7 cars. DH felt cramped in it, so it's not going to make the cut. If you remember, we started looking for a new car last July. DH doesn't like to rush into things, plus, I still wasn't sold yet on replacing my Mazda MPV.

So cutting the CR-7 off the list, there is just one car left. Chances are my new vehicle will be a Toyota Venza. The Mazda CX-7 is being axed since in comparison to the Venza, the Venza is nicer inside. I've never had a Toyota before. Of course, in a perfect world, I would go into a time machine and bring back one of the best cars ever - a "new" a 1988 Plymouth Sundance, with 0 miles, in baby blue.

Then, onto Bed Bath & Beyond. I wish there was one closer to me, I love that store. When I visited my sister in December, she showed me her Kapoosh Knife Holder and I loved it. She had the one in the wooden block and I immediately went and bought one while in NY (since of course I carry my 20% off Bed Bath & Beyond coupons everywhere I go, just in case). But when I got it home to Maryland, I realized the stainless steel one would be better for me. So I returned it last month to the Annapolis Bed Bath & Beyond store. But they were out of the one I wanted. It's $39.99 at BB&B (less 20% coupon, I didn't pay $57)

So I was happy to find it at their other location today. Plus I bought other things, like how could I pass up ShamWow! towels for just $5.99 (less 20% coupon, of course). They also had Christmas food gift sets, like Knotts Berry Farm Boysenberry syrup/waffle mix sets for $3.99 (less 20%). Originally $19.99. I bought 2.

You probably already know this if you are a regular Bed Bath & Beyond shopper, but save all your 20% off coupons that you get in the mail. Even though they have an expiration date, you can used expired coupons. And you can use one coupon per item. I bought 6 things today and I handed the cashier 6 coupons.

Picture from this morning - a gray day on the bay.

Too bad I don't like pastrami

My deal today was on pastrami. Too bad I don't like pastrami. But I bought it anyway since DH will eat it. It's meat and it doesn't live in water, so it's fine with him.

There are two Food Lion grocery stores within 3 miles of my house. The old one and the new one. The old one is considered the old one for a few reasons. It's been around longer. And it's where all the residents of the nearby retirement community (and me) shop. Lately I've been noticing it has better deals than their other location. Like their *manger specials* at the deli. Plus, since it not as busy as the new one, so lots of things tend to get marked down a lot more frequently than at the other store.

Clutter on Wheels | Valuables Circa 1991

I may be selling my clutter wagon soon (aka my Mazda MPV) and getting a new vehicle that I can clutter up. So the search is on for where I put the MPV's title. Today I totally emptied it out. (I know not to keep the title in the car, but it had to be emptied anyway). It's all cleaned out except for a nickle that is lodged between the center console and the seat but I can't reach it, and that bugs me. Of course I didn't actually clean it out as I went, I just threw everything in a big plastic stripey bag. (If you don't know what a stripey bag is, you need to start shopping at more flea markets.)

I remember looking for the car's title a while ago and didn't find it, but I figured I would check the safe deposit box at the bank one more time. It's where we keep all of our valuables. Except for car titles apparently. And since all of our valuables cannot fit into an actual safe deposit box due to size issues, a while ago (1991) I took pictures of our valuables. So in case of theft or hurricane or something, I would have something to show to the insurance agent. We lived thru Hurricane Hugo in Charleston SC, so I've seen the devastation that a large hurricane can do.



Just look at how awesome our entertainment system used to be. It's where we kept all of our VHS and CDs. And of course we had cable tv, (the cable tv box is under Homer & Bart). Jacob looked at the picture today and asked how old he was when the picture was taken. Like negative 9.

p.s. And I just want to note that my CD collection is much larger now. Since of course, CDs will be around forever, just like my cassette collection.

My impressive centerfold spread

As promised, here is my centerfold spread. See where that pen is pointing to? Yep, it's me and the boy in the centerfold of the exclusive freebie local newspaper.

The other week when we were staying overnight (for free again) at the hotel, the next morning there was a fundraising polar bear plunge, so we had to go watch. And not plunge.

This woman had the hairiest armpits:


I think if the Guinness Book was there, they could have classified it as the world's smallest polar bear plunge in history.


Here's a short video


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We had a dusting of snow last night, so of course schools are closed today.

I totally missed Joey Fatone's yardsale

Ok, so I am totally bummed. Not only couldn't I go to Saturday's Clean House yardsale out in California, I also missed Joey Fatone's yardsale in Orlando.

I will just have to drown my sorrow and think of better times. Like the glorious day I spent at David Cassidy's garage sale. That makes me feel better.

Oh and I was recently in a centerfold. I can cross that off my bucket list now. More about that later.

Annapolis on the Cheap / Turning into a Groupon Addict

I think I've turned into a Groupon addict. One day last weekend, we had planned on going to Annapolis for the day to do some shopping. Annapolis is basically a town where every other car on the road is either a Lexus or a BMW. It's not exactly known for its bargain shopping. Unless of course, I am there. It turned into a day of using coupons, groupons and deals. Annapolis is a good 45 miles away and a real pain for us to get there (mostly on a 2 lane road) so we only go once in a while.

Since I knew we were going to Annapolis, during the previous two weeks I bought two different Groupon Coupons that were good for stores in Annapolis. Our first stop, was at a bakery where I was able to get $15 worth of yummy bread and muffins for $7 (using the groupon coupon). I love all things bread.

Then *shock* we went to the shopping mall. DH is strange in the way that he likes to buy books that haven't been previously owned by someone else. So he got a book at Borders (using a 33% off coupon that I had gotten via email).

At Bath & Body Works, I bought a $2 clearanced Wallflower fragrance thing (I use them) and got a free travel sized item (using a coupon I found on the A Full Cup website.

Then Jacob was hungry, so for a snack, we went to the food court and I got him a free kids meal at Chick-fil-a using a coupon he received thru school for a good report card or something. It took sheer willpower not to order a Chick-fil-a sandwich for myself.

Then went to Toys R Us and bought Jacob a new bicycle. I know, I know, I'm sure I could have eventually found a good used one at a yardsale. But I thought it would take a while to find the "right" one. He needs a medium sized bike, not a kiddie bike but not an adult sized bike either. So since I had a bunch of Toys R Us gift cards to use, and plus for Christmas he got money for a new bike, he got a new bike. We have a Toys R Us Visa card that is always sending us gift cards based on the amount we charge. And if it's a monthly bill, such as the electric bill or cable, it's gets billed automatically to our credit card. We religiously pay our credit cards off - in full - every month.

Then had a late lunch at TGIFriday's I get the TGIfridays emails, and they had sent me a coupon to "Buy 1 meal, get 1 half off", so we used that. And I showed my TGIFriday's frequent diners club (or whatever they call it) and got free chips and dips as an appetizer.

Then afterward, to keep us hydrated for the ride home, we got 4 smoothies from Robeks. I paid $10 for a groupon coupon for the 4 smoothies (which would have cost around $24 if we had paid out of pocket).

If you haven't already signed up for Groupon, please please please use my referral link below.



I haven't made any major purchases using Groupons, but when there are some good deals for $10 or so, it's a great way to save money and try out different stores. I even subscribed to get the Groupon emails from my old hometown. There was recently a restaurant deal at my brother's favorite restaurant in upstate New York. So for $12 I got him and his wife a $25 Groupon gift certificate to use at the restaurant. They are not really computer people so chances were very slim they would have known about the deal themselves.

Clean House Yardsale

I found out when the next yardsale will be for Style's Clean House. It's this Saturday 1/22/11. Where: 1612 N Leeds Ave, Ontario, California. From 9a-1p. Unfortunately I cannot make it to this one, but if you can - bring a large sign that says "visit www.yardsalequeen.com". Or you can just yell it very loudly and often. Thanks.

Only thing missing is a banjo player. Ten four that.

This was in our local news recently.



And apparently we were also terrorized by a unicorn.

Tree Decluttering (for free!)

Long story short - a couple of years ago, the tree trimmer guys that trim the trees around the power lines came by and lopped off the top of a cyprus tree that's in our yard near the power lines. They generally don't cut down cypress trees for some reason or another. Well after that, one of the big branches started slowly drooping down over a flowering cherry tree and also birds started a nest.

Well the birds are gone and not making babies this time of year so I figured what the heck, I'll call the power company and see if they will remove the tree. The worst they could say was "no". Since I think by lopping off the top, it made the tree weaker and droopy. Plus, I didn't want to pay some tree company a few hundred dollars to remove it. Even though when we bought our house it was brand new, it's in an older neighborhood where the power lines aren't buried.

So I called last week, and ta-da, they showed up today, looked at the tree and came back with their bucket truck, chain saws, chipper and shredder and removed the tree for free. You know I like free!









p.s. and see that scary cloudy sky? Oh boy, I'm scared. Yep, schools were closed 2 hours early today because of a chance of snow. It did not snow.

So many deals, so little time (for blogging)

Well I guess I blew my own personal new years resolution to not go more than a few days without blogging. Oh well, there is always next year. I've been quite busy in the past week scoring a lot of good deals at CVS and Walgreens.



But here now for your viewing pleasure is the multi-phallic Christmas castle that I passed on buying while at a thrift store in NY after Christmas. Original thrift store price was $9.99. But when I saw it, it was marked 75% off so it would have been $2.50 had I felt the need to own it.

And also during my trip to NY, here is something I took from my childhood home, with my mom's permission. (It was still being used, so I bought and installed a generic .50 light switch replacement from Lowes.)

I remember this from my childhood and thinking how fancy and special it was. Now that I got it home and look at it all cleaned up and in good lighting, I see how cheap it is! LOL! It's made by Hartland Plastics. But I've never seen another one in all my travels and yardsales I've gone to. So even tho it's probably not valuable moneywise, I still like it and will find a place to use it here at the castle (which ironically, actually does look similar to the one picture above - haha).


And finally, I've discovered the reason behind my love of diet coke (and diet pepsi). As a child, it was given to me medicinally. Of course this bottle is still in the medicine cabinet at my mother's house. Why wouldn't it be, the bottle is only about 40 years old and still has some left in it. So now I won't feel guilty about chugging my endless bottles of diet coke and diet pepsi - I see it as basically a healthy beverage with medicinal qualities and I should drink even more.

Back in the land of Mary

I am back from my post Christmas / New Years Eve trip to upstate New York. Very successful trip, I didn't have to visit any car repair places nor did I have to show my spanking brand new driver's license to any uniformed people. (Yes, I bit the bullet and shelled out $20 for a new replacement license. I think I will hold on to this one, the DMV woman scared me when she told me that if I keep losing it, eventually I would have to visit the main DMV office 75 miles away. Since after a certain # of replacements, they start suspecting people as running some sort of illegal alien/driver license scam.

No pics of my travels yet. But just wanted to do a quick post. I will be attending my first yardsale of 2011 this coming Saturday. It's an indoor church yardsale, it's always the second Saturday in January.

I did do some bargain shopping when away, got Christmas deals at CVS, Target, Walgreens etc. My deal was CVS was awesome - will post about it later. And did some food shopping at Aldi's. I browsed the local Salvation Army but did not buy anything, even the multi-penis shaped Christmas castle. pics soon.

Jacob's Television Debut with the Platt Brothers

For those who blinked while watching American Ninja Warrior recently on G4, here is Jacob's television debut. Very impressive, isn't it? Don't answer.



And of course, here's a shot of me going incognito, with my trusty Sony Cybershot.


It snowed all day yesterday. I put out some of my homemade birdfood today and it attracted a bunch of cardinals.


And this huge bird. Which I think is not a vegetarian.


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If you live near a Chick-fil-a, make a reservation to get a free spicy biscuit next week Get Spicy Biscuit. You know I did.

If I don't blog for a bit, don't be worried. I got some places to go and people to see. And stuff to buy.

Merry Christmas, part 2

Our Christmas is pretty low key here at the castle. It's not until later when I will see a bunch of friends and family. Anyhow, I was just checking my overstuffed email box from fans wishing me Merry Christmas and I was thrilled to see one from my boyfriend David Cassidy, wishing me a beautiful holiday. And in the email he quoted "the late, great Maya Angelou." Ooopsy, someone better go check on Maya Angelou.

Crap. No yardsales today. Merry Christmas.

I hope you are all having a Merry Christmas or a Happy Saturday (for those who don't celebrate Christmas). No yardsales today and all the thrift stores are closed, but don't worry about me, I am having a great Christmas. I am thinking about all those gifts being opened up today that are the wrong size, the wrong scent, the wrong whatever that will show up at the spring yardsales for $1. And I got all those after Christmas sales to get to soon!

And more good news, Christmas won't be on another Saturday until 2021!

Happy Festivus

I don't have much time to blog, since I am busy performing feats of strength, but I wanted to wish you and yours a Happy Festivus.

I spent part of today at our local Chick-fil-a getting free food (using coupons and redeeming my free nugget tray win). MMMMMMMM Chick-fil-a.