Yard Sale Heaven!!

Well, I think today might have been the luckiest day of yard-saleing I have ever had. Ever! Really!

One of the very first yard sales that we stopped at this morning was an older couple who recently cleaned out their attic. They had BOXES of their 40-something year old son's toys for $0.25 each. Each BOX. We totally cleaned up at their sale. And yet my dad and I have been saying all day that we should have bought all of their stuff! Look at what I got:

A shoebox FILLED with these tiny vintage toys... I think a lot of them were cake-toppers?? Maybe? I'm sure the Snow White and the Seven Dwarves ones were...I've seen those before, here.... there are a ton of tiny little Disney characters, some other cartoons, and other litle guys like cowboys, a wrestler, a baseball player, and a scuba man.

A close-up of some of the Disney littles and an army of Gumbis

Another $0.25 box that we got was filled with these: a bendy Popeye, Gumbi and 2 Pokeys, a plastic Peter Pan and an astronaut, and the complete set of Pogo characters. (Just for reference - we paid $0.25 for the entire contents of the box. I just checked on Ebay and those Pogo figurines are selling for about $15 each). I'm definitely going to be setting up an Ebay account this weekend.....

My mom got this little guy, but I secretly want him. He's a pull-turtle, with a little string that you pull him by, and his little feet wobble and jingle as he goes. So cute! Maybe she won't notice if I keep him all for myself.....

My dad got a whole box filled with vintage, never-been-used, coloring books. Lone Ranger, Swiss Family Robinson, and a whole bunch of others. I'm thinking those might bring in some Ebay-cashola too....(if I can convince my dad to part with some of them!). He paid $1 for the box.

Included in one of the $0.25 boxes was this set of rubber stamps. I love the little gunslinger and scuba guy the best! There were also a whole bunch of numbers and letters.

My mom also got a bunch of stuff for her classroom: a really cool wooden car-ramp playset for little matchbox cars (it even has a litle wind-up elevator to take the cars to the top of the ramp!) that she says she's seen in teachers' catalogs before for about $20. She paid $1... and some wooden blocks and stuff. I regret not buying EVERYTHING at their yard sale!

We went to a bunch of other sales but I didn't really get too much. My dad bought a Yamaha stereo-receiver for Chris that he says would have retailed for about $800 when it was new. He paid $10, which is awesome because Chris has been looking for one, and my dad knows everything about electronics and stuff, so it was a great deal! Chris is going to be thrilled.

My grandma picked this adorable little guy up for my mom for her classroom, but I swiped it (and mom didn't want it anyway).

Princess kisses the frog, and....

POOF! A handsome prince!

(Its one of those turn-it-inside-out, 3-dolls-in-1 deals. Love it!)

That was the bulk of what I got. A few vintage books here and there (which I have been coveting of late.... though sadly, I didn't find any more Beatrix Potter books! But I still have hopes.), including this Walt Disney's Stories from Other Lands...

(Its a bad picture, but that's a little picture of Snow White and some of the dwarves repeated all over the cover. Its very cute!)

The afternoon dragged on, and the yard sales started wind down, and people began to pack up. We went back up the mountain, dropped my mom off at home (she was getting tired from walking so much), and my dad and I went down the other side of the mountain to a ritzy community called Penn National for their yard sales. The signs said they ended at 1:00, and by this time it was almost 2:00, so we didn't expect much. Boy, were we wrong!

A lot of houses had put their remaining stuff out at the curb with FREE signs all over it! So we went "Dumpster Diving"!!! Haha! We made out like bandits, too!

This stuff all came from one heap of discarded treasures!

Some really great books.... I think the Childrens' Foods one will be a new favorite... its not necessarily for children, its just simple and fun recipes, usually made in the shape of something cute. Love! And how could I resist another copy of The Old Man and the Sea? That's my most favorite book ever.

My dad found this one - it was a cracked, ugly old binder. But when we opened it up, its a wealth of sewing-knowledge! And heaven knows I can use some! ;)

And this, adorable childrens' book written in French. How sweet!

We filled a whole bucket up with free treasures. I found a planter, a little watering can, a huge sheer curtain that I can cut up to make at least a pair (maybe 2 pairs!), and a whole bunch of martial arts belts (obis) that will make really nice bag-handles. Yay for free stuff!