Yard Sale Time!

This is a busy week at our house as we are getting ready to have a yard sale! The last yard sale we had was when we moved cross country about three-ish years ago and sold pretty much everything that wouldn't fit in the moving truck. It is amazing how much stuff we have accumulated since then in a relatively short period of time.

We are now in a position where we need two big things before the new baby arrives.....money and space! Even though I am having this baby "frugal style" there are still things we need to make and purchase since this will be our first baby since our other children were adopted as young children and not newborns. When hubby and I sat down and put the pencil to the paper to figure out what minimum we will need to tackle the must do baby projects and to purchase the must have baby items, the number shocked us. Add the need for money with the need for more space and a more streamlined household and the perfect solution is a yard sale.

Growing up my family had a yard sale pretty much every summer. My mother and aunts would pool items to make a fantastic sale. I think my favorite part about it was sitting around visiting with everyone all day. Even though we lived in rural setting we still always had a crowd and sold out by the end of the day. We hung our sign at the church and the one tiny gas station down the road and it always seemed to bring in just the right amount of people to make the sale a success. A few times my cousins and I operated a lemonade stand as well, which is exactly what my daughter is hoping to do at our yard sale. Yard sales hold a lot of nostalgia for me and I am excited to be having one again.

One thing I am NOT excited about is the prep work for a yard sale. The week before a sale seems to turn my house inside out, piles and stack of items sorted through and priced take over. The kids have been instructed to go through every nook and cranny of their rooms and pull out anything that doesn't fit, is broken(for the trash not the sale) or they simply don't want anymore. As motivation for this we let the children keep all money made from selling their own items. This often results in big unorganized piles like the one pictured below, in various areas of our home.

This is my daughter's unsightly pile of clothes and misc toys and such she has decided to put in the yard sale. I did warn her that all clothes will need to be freshly washed and pressed before the sale so she still has a bit of work to do. lol

As for myself, I have lots of clothes to get rid of as well as books, home decor items, a few electronics and crafty stuff. I am struggling quiet a bit with my collection of pyrex and other glass kitchen items. I have sooooo much of it but since our kitchen in this home is so much smaller than previous ones, I simply don't have room for most of it. So, I am spending a lot of time this week trying to decide what to keep and what to get rid of.

All items that don't sell will simply be donated.

Yard sale week is a time where I relax my pickiness about the order of the house and just let it be since we don't have an extra space to just process yard sale items. It will be worth it when the sale is over and I know none of these things will be coming back into my house and I have a little extra cash in my pocket.

Anyone else planning a yard/garage sale this summer?