Encores

The past few weeks of my life were in many ways consumed with this little {ok, big!} kids' consignment sale. This is the fifth sale our church has done as a fundraiser for our moms' group, BloomingMoms. I've been on the planning committee for every sale and every sale I always think I'm crazy for doing it again, but every sale I still love it. It is a lot of work and there are always hiccups along the way, but we still have fun pulling it off. 

This turned out to be our biggest sale ever with over 9,000 items, 70-some consignors and over 600 shoppers over Friday and Saturday. As you can imagine, all those people have LOTS of stuff to sell. However, it never ceases to amaze us how much goes out the door with the shoppers. Our consignment works out that each seller prices and tags their own stuff, but then keeps 70 percent of the amount that sells. We keep 30 percent to fill out the budget for our moms's group. This sale allows us to offer free brunch, free childcare and free crafts and speakers at our twice monthly BloomingMoms meetings. It's a great deal all around because we do all the setup, advertising and tear down and all our consignors do is bring us their stuff. 

My favorite parts of the sale are getting to work with some dear friends, using some of my skills in organizing and event planning and then of course shopping for great deals for Liam. I actually found almost everything on my list this year, including a decent Ergo carrier for $30 for the new baby. I was pretty excited about that since they usually retail over $100 new. I was a little bummed that we don't know the sex of this new baby because the clothes are adorable, but I did buy one little pair of overalls and two hats for the new baby. All purchases were based on my hunch that we're having a boy and not twins like Liam is predicting...! 

To give you a scope of the sale, I took a few pictures. 

Large items -- strollers, furniture, riding toys, etc. 

The main floor area. Tables of toys, blankets, room decor, feeding, books, accessories, etc., etc. 

Anyone need some toys? Most of this was gone by the end of the day on Saturday. 

Girl clothing racks. We take sizes from newborn through juniors. 

Boys racks. 

I'm still slowly recovering from the weekend. It's taken me a little while to bounce back from this sale because it's hours on my feet. I had lots of people telling me to take care of myself because of the baby and I really tried. Thankfully, Liam went to the Bedinghaus' for Thursday through Saturday and that was a HUGE blessing. Just knowing he was well cared for and that I could come home and take naps on my breaks was wonderful. Rob got the short end of the stick, mostly summed up in my meal plan for the week which read, "Encores - Rob alone." Poor guy. I think he lived like a bachelor most of the time and ate at least one meal at Taco Bell. 

We went to Cincinnati on Saturday afternoon to pick up Liam and celebrate a milestone birthday for Lori (I won't give away her secret!). It was a quick trip since we decided to come back late Saturday night and avoid the predicted snow storm Sunday morning. It made for a very late night Saturday, but it was worth it to wake up in our own beds on Sunday, be at our church for Palm Sunday and get to take long naps on Sunday afternoon. And watch IU barely win against Temple....

Now, it's back to "real" life. Real life meaning things like Liam spraining his wrist and losing Bow Wow...but that's for another post!