Antique Alley weekend

This past weekend was Antique Alley, the fifteen mile long (well, more now that they added Maypearl, but they don't have much there yet) garage sale that comes twice a year around here.  I always look so forward to it.  When we first moved here nine years ago, I ran a booth for people at church.  I became known as the chicken lady, because that's what I brought.  Sometimes there would be people already lined up to buy chickens from me when I got there.  One weekend, I made over $600.  But after a while, people learned where I live, and now they come to my house, so I don't have to lug everything out to Antique Alley.  And that's nice!!  Now I get to SHOP!

This weekend was rainy, though.  It was cold in the morning, but the afternoon was nice, not to cold, not too hot.  I found a lot of good stuff: books for the kids, including the big ones, linens, an old birdcage (see previous post about cages!  :o)  )  And two beautiful flowering plants that even pleased my teenage daughter.  Max found golf clubs, Beau found fishing poles.  A lady from our homeschool group who is an amazing artist was doing face painting, so of course we were sure we made a trip to see her:

My beautiful butterfly, and...

My toothless kitty!

My boys declined getting their faces painted.  Luke had a traumatic experience when he was younger and a face painter showed him a picture of a really ugly monster and asked him if he wanted to look like that.  He still hasn't recovered, and there's no way some lady he doesn't know is going to turn him into a monster!  And Tommy, well, if you don't know Tommy, don't expect to be trusted by him, either!!

Too bad we had to wash it off for church the next morning, but that might not have gone over well...

Angel-Leah found what she thought was the most beautiful treasure (although her mommy thought it was pretty gaudy) But it was only $5 and this is supposed to be fun, right? So this angel now graces her bedroom dresser, and is the new night light. And once we got it home, to her great delight, she discovered that it not only lights up, but moves, it's hands waving the light gracefully. Just lovely, huh? But the smile on my human Angel's face was worth it all!


Luke didn't have as much luck, but he got leggos, and lots of looks at REALLY expensive metal cars and tractors that looked like toys, but weren't:

Tommy got a cotton candy that turned him into a smurf. And made mommy not want to hold his hand anymore until we could get ahold of a washcloth. And wasn't on the Feingold diet, which we paid for later with some amazing meltdowns (but it was a confirmation that we are on the right track with the diet). And like I said before, this is supposed to be fun right?

There was a man with a big dinosaur that moved and purred.  Tommy was so amazed by that, and really stressed the man out by grabbing it over and over.  He finally let the kids sit on it for a picture, and then we had mercy on him and dragged Tommy off to get ice cream from the Weaver's wagon.  If you look, you can see Tommy's hand grabbing, and the man watching him in the first picture.  I don't blame him, that dinosaur looks really expensive!  Thankfully we had at least cleaned Tommy's hands by now!

Sister Kathy had a booth the next day, so I brought some stuff and sat with her. No chickens this year, a man came the night before and bought everything I had except for what I was saving for another friend, and keeping for myself. And it poured rain the biggest part of the time. Kathy made a little bit, I lost money after we bought hamburgers. But that's okay, that's all part of it.

Now I'm looking forward to Antique Alley next September!