Yard Sale Withdrawal

Toronto has experienced two consecutive cold and rainy Saturdays. Ugh! I want to shop and blog about it!

Instead, I will tell you (assuming this is actually being read by anyone other than myself and the odd glance it receives courtesy my yard sale addict parents) about one of my favourite yard sales from last year. I wish I had been blogging at the time. 

It was a beautiful Saturday morning. I had scanned the community paper and read an ad for a sale that was a long way from our house. My husband is not interested in yard sales in the slightest, although he enjoys a good rummage in an antique barn. He was working that day anyway, so there was no chance of blagging a ride. I strapped Duncan into his bike seat and off I peddled to a posh-looking enclave of East York or Scarborough. I'm not exactly sure where it was. It was a little bit tricky even getting there: we crossed a bridge and had to go up and down many a hill. When we finally arrived, I knew we had hit the jackpot. 

The yard sale host was a slightly older woman who was clearing out decades of clutter from her house. The items were spread out along the driveway and spilled right into the garage - a true garage sale! I love snooping around in people's garages: especially ones where you find old Simpsons bags hanging on nails. Amazing treasures were discovered in every nook of this garage and just about everything was for sale. I even unearthed an ancient wedding cake topper and a box of faded party decorations from the '70s. The woman told me that her mother was getting on in years and it sounded like she was about to be relocated to a retirement home. When I hear these stories, the items for sale all of a sudden seem poignant. I couldn't imagine selling off a lifetime of objects that had sentimental attachment. 

I kept finding stuff I needed, like a tasteful magazine rack, a vaporizer, a huge stack of vintage children's books, a giant bag of new plastic easter eggs. I can't even remember everything I bought, but I do remember my bike being dangerously loaded down. My basket was filled to capacity and I had plastic shopping bags dangling from the handlebars. I had to keep checking to make sure Duncan wasn't being suffocated by my overstuffed knapsack. I don't know how we made it home. I'm just glad we didn't get pulled over by the cops. Thinking back, I was totally crazy, but we're still alive and I have this amazing old timey milk request sign (above) as a reminder of this terrific sale. It only cost a quarter. I'm sure it is worth a lot more than that, but when we are finally finished renovating our kitchen, I will find a special place for it and it will be treasured always.