Moving On In Life

We finished up yesterday doing what is becoming a big tradition in many places. We had a big sale in one of our out buildings. After a couple of years of discussing it we finally took action. It was a decision to begin downsizing. Our son is happily married and living in Tennessee. Our house is just huge for two of us. The upstairs was filled with a lot of clutter and it was time to see if some of our “junk is another persons treasure” as the saying goes. We went through things and if it hadn’t been touched in a long time, it was labeled to go.
Yes, there were memories with a lot of the things. Our son’s stroller and swing chair brought back happy memories of his younger years. Pat and I put many miles on the wheels of his “carriage” walking around the west side of Grand Rapids where we lived at that time. Once he started to walk the stroller wasn’t as happy a place for him. That didn’t go in the sale but we hope to find a happy home for it with someone else to have good times with their child. A lamp table that was my parents went very quickly. It was in the living room for many, many years. An early model digital camera which took pictures at our sons wedding went. Thanks to it we had immediate pictures of the happy day. Model train equipment also sold. Books which were read a long time ago went to new readers to hopefully enjoy. People also inquired about the history of the building we were using as it is a pretty unusual one in this day and age. It is a quonset (kind of half rounded) shaped building which was put up shortly after World War II and has served well ever since holding our farming equipment and now housing our storage business. In recounting the history many happy memories of growing up came back. It wasn’t an easy life on the farm, but we really had our happy times and it supported us fairly well financially. However there does come a time where you need to let go and move on to a “new season” in your life. It turned out to be a pretty good decision.
I went out to begin the sale on Friday morning not really expecting much action as we definitely live in a rural area. I took plenty of entertainment with me to pass the time. Boy, was I wrong! There was a gentleman waiting for me to open up. My husband told me he had already spoken to another person who wondered if we had any antiques. I’m sure there are some in the house, but a number of them I didn’t want to part with as they were my grandparents, family heirlooms. I took the plastic off the tables as he was looking around. I made my first sale about ten minutes into the day. The second sale was shortly after that. It was a steady stream of cars pulling in all morning and it was very heartening to see. I was busy all morning and things were going well. My husband, who was inside completing his work week at his home office, came out to give me a break around noon. I told him, “We’re going to have to bring more stuff out of the house to make this sale go for two days the way things are going.” We started thinking of more things to haul out. We considered this a good problem to have.
Filling out the designated portion of the building with sale items became less of a problem a little while later. Our neighbors came over to visit and I said something about we’d have to bring more stuff out of the house. They went home and shortly thereafter came over with a large trailer filled with things to add to the sale. We quickly became a two family sale. The building really began to fill out. We scrambled to find room to display the “treasures”. Things were kind of all over the place. Even at that items did keep going out. This also gave company for running the sale which was a good thing, too. Things began to bustle. We ended up staying open later than planned as more people stopped in to look. We shut down for the day at about six o’clock. More things did come out of the house that evening as we did more sorting. It was a very successful first day.
We opened up for the second day. Things started out slower as far as people dropping by. It was an off and on stream throughout the day. The nicest things went pretty quickly. A little later another family friend stopped by and added a few more things to the sale. Ter's Dad came out bringing a few things to the mix. The sale shut down shortly after five as planned. Our neighbors brought their trailer back over and what was left over was loaded to go to the local Good Will donation area. The building is now pretty empty again and we will finish cleaning up during the coming week. A tiring time but our mission was accomplished. Get rid of things, make a little money in the process, and the rest hopefully going to help others. Will we do it again? Probably, as this one went pretty well. We ascertained more of what people might be looking for. We also learned more of the work involved in a sale the size we had. Could we have made more? Perhaps. We sold things fairly dirt cheap. The point wasn’t to profit heavily. It was to price so the things would move. It definitely was a time of letting go and trying to move on to a new phase in life and I am glad we did it.