Miles and Miles of Frogs

I went out to the mall today for my usual Friday fluff of the booth -- it really needed it!  I'd sold a cart earlier in the week and the employee had mistakenly emptied and taken the wrong table up front.  When they brought it back it was just put in place of the cart, but nothing returned to where it had started.  The booth was trashed!

Since the mall is about 19 miles from my house, I went to garage sales out there  and farther out.  I went into parts of southeast Michigan today that I'd never seen before!  I drove for LOTS of miles on dirt roads and saw alot of this:

For those of you who live in other states (or countries) and who thought you'd misread the previous line -- yes, I did say dirt roads!  We've lived all over the midwest and I've never seen as many dirt roads as we have in Michigan, including lots of them with big, new houses on them.   The roads get really rutted and washboard-like in the summer and the dust is everywhere.  The old Kitschy Vintage van really got rattled and dirty today!

I went to lots of froggy sales -- all with signs that read HUGE SALE (4 card tables and an old door on sawhorses) or BARN SALE (even people who don't have a barn advertised this).  One was listed in the paper as a 'picker paradise' and literally was items spaced far apart on 6 tables.  No picking there!  All of the sales were far apart, too.  I have a friend who lives closer in to the city and can hit 30 garage sales in a morning and only drive 6 miles, but it's nothing for me to put 60 miles on the car going to sales around our area.

The last sale I went to was unadvertised and just a sign at the crossroads on the way back to the mall.  It turned out to be a true barn sale with a real barn, some good picking through really dirty stuff and good prices.  Here are the few things I ended up with today:

Some old canning jars and milk bottles

Galvanized coal scuttle

A small (4") souvenir ashtray from the 1950s -- some general store in Fredericksburg, VA (because I'm a sucker for vintage souvenirs!)

A perfect, working (though dirty) Fisher Price pull toy

The treasure of the day (drum roll here...)

A 1960s microscope kit -- complete with instructions and slides!

It's all in here!

 One of the most enjoyable parts of the day was a constant stream of text messages back and forth with my friend Kally who was going to a WONDERFUL estate sale in the Minneapolis area.  We had looked at estatesales.net together last night (via the wonders of the the phone and internet) and scoped out everything she'd want to look for.  The sale was really big and jam-packed with great vintage items.  She and her friend got there at 8:30 for the 9:00 sale and she was number 95!  She got in about a half hour after it started an then the texts started flying -- in the end she got some real treasures.  She has another sale in mind for tomorrow.  If she keeps doing that, her husband won't let her talk to me any more!

Tomorrow I'm going to Williamston Antique's July sale & flea market with my friend Bargain Hunter.  It should be a fun time!