For about the past five years the sales I go to on the first weekend of December are the last good sales of the year for me. There is usually a church sale in a town near me and a school sale where I have pretty good luck and it was no different this year. I went to the church sale first. It started at 10:00 and the lady had us waiting in the lobby. At about 9:59 sirens started going off and I thought – oh great. The fire alarm. Now we have to go outside but it was only Santa. Then she had to talk for 5 minutes about Santa and the sale and the charities it was all going to and I was getting antsy. It’s hard when you’ve already been waiting and then you are waiting some more when you’re supposed to be going in.
I went to the toy area first which was a little smaller than usual but I found two vintage puppets from Germany. I love puppets so I was excited to find these even though my son found them so creepy he told me to burn them.
After that I went into the part of the church where they sell everything else. I was walking around when I spotted this black Catherineholm pot high up on a shelf. It was marked $4. I love these mid century modern pots from Norway and they sell well. I also have a small collection in my dining room. The colors I collect are yellow, orange and red. The funny thing was that earlier in the week I found a yellow pan at the thrift store which I decided to keep. I haven’t found many Catherineholm pieces in all my years of thrifting so I was surprised to find two in one week!
I found a zip lock bag for $1 with six charming angels playing instruments. They reminded me of Erzebirge figures from Germany. After researching I discovered that they are by an Italian company called Sevi. The learning never stops!
After this sale I went to a craft sale at a school where they also have a tag sale room. It appeared as though there were a lot of toys before I got there but you can only get to one sale first. I still picked up a few items including a Sesame Street play set and a blue Dansk teapot.
At another small sale I went to I picked up a few vintage toys including a Betty Boop cloth doll and a prize from Coney Island which is a dog that looks a lot like Snoopy except in red.
Finally I found a few pop culture items including a sealed figure from the Cartoon Network show Adventure time, and a figure from the show South Park.
As the days grow shorter the sales in the northeast become scarce. Time to start getting ready for the holidays and focusing on thrift store shopping instead!
New England Finds and Fancies 