The Semi-Annual Family Swap Meet

Saturday was our family garage sale. We do these a few times a year, and have garage saling (sale-ing? If I make up the word, I can make up the spelling, right?) down to a science. This ain't your ordinary run of the mill Garage sale, with our experience and my mother-in-law's background in marketing, we go all out. The tables have tablecloths, we use spinning clothing racks, our signs have vinyl lettering instead of just marker, and we serve free coffee. You would think that we were set up to rake in the money, but it doesn't always work that way.

This time, we had seven people contributing to the sale. The great thing about this is, we have a large sale with a wide variety of things. The bad part is, we have to look at everyone else's cool stuff while we are setting up, and we tend to spend our profits before we get them. Hence the nickname, the Family Swap Meet. We acquired a new air conditioner, a laundry basket, and I got a new leather coat. I made $45 at the sale this time, and spent $52. Not a real profitable day. However, our current air conditioner came out of the farmhouse that Marty grew up in, it is close to 30 years old. I'm sure the profits will be seen in next summer's power bill. Since it is our third garage sale this year, I won't complain too much. Now it's time to start the next round of boxes of stuff to sell next year!