Gaining Wisdom

Or losing it?

I finally bit the bullet and had to have my wisdom teeth removed. "Why didn't you do this when you were like 18?" Is what the oral surgeon asks me right as he's giving me the gas and I can't think of a good reason other than I just plain didn't want to do it!

I went for all four of them and was awake and shaking with fear and pain the whole time. I was seriously ill for 2-3 days and my husband was a rockstar helping me and taking on full time mom duties while I was laying on the couch completely out of it from pain meds! I am just about a week out from surgery now and finally feeling a lot better although my jaw still is all bruised and hurts I can chew small bites and usually only have to take pain meds at night after a full day of use on my jaw. It has been frustrating and miserable and I HATE having work done on my mouth so its been a rough week.

I had big plans for the week too, painting furniture and frames in prep for my new Antique Store booth (that is going to finally be opening on May 1st!) and lots of eBay items to list and photography work to finish up. I haven't been able to get much done and I hate feeling this way so hopefully after this weekend I'll be back to 100% and have a couple of solid work weeks ahead of me!

Sales have been steady and so so, quite a few international items lately I've noticed and lots of plush which is good and easy to ship! I have put myself on a buying freeze the rest of the month just because I need to prep for my booth and clean out all the stuff before I add more stuff.

My goal the next 2 days is to get all my unlisted online inventory listed and to gather all my vintage items into one area of the house so I can begin to tag them! I can't wait to start this new venture even if it isn't a huge money maker its going to be nice having all this stuff I've been storing out of the garage! I will be sure to do a post with lots of photos when it opens at the beginning of next month as well. I've been doing a lot of repurposing projects in hopes that they will be good money makers to cover the rent and then all the vintage items will be icing on the cake!

Anyways, here are some fun plush items that have sold in the last couple of weeks!

 Disney Store Finding Nemo beanie plush - Paid $1 and made a $7 profit after fees and shipping!

Lotso Huggin Bear from Toy Story 3 (Which is currently on for the 2nd time today, my son is obsessed so I'm surprised he didn't adopt Lotso when I brought him home. Instead he called him Mean Bear and wouldn't have anything to do with him!) He sold internationally the other day so I'm hoping he makes it safely - I paid $1.09 for him and made a $14 profit after fees and a higher than expected international shipping price.

 

Characters from Spirit are still and always will be on my BOLO list! This is Rain, Spirit's girlfriend and she sold for $40 after I paid just $1.09 for her about a month ago, $25 profit after fees and shipping, wahoo!

 

Another thanks to the show Thrift Hunters. I have started keeping my eyes out for funky men's shirts again thanks to them, read my last post if you have no idea what I'm referring to! I was a little worried about this one because it wasn't the big boy size just a large but it was a funky print, Hawaiian style and made in USA so all of those combined made for a great sale!

I paid $5.45 for this shirt at a "Thrift Boutique" aka a we charge more store. I priced it high and accepted an offer of $40 a week later netting me a nice profit of $26 after fees and shipping! What man doesn't want a shirt covered in Sushi?! haha!

Thrift Hunters

Have you guys watched this show on Spike TV yet? It is a new series on right after Auction Hunters and it features 2 dudes who do what we do, yard sales, thrift stores and antique shops then they bring it all home and sell it for a profit! I like seeing what they find and sell things for and I've even taken a few pointers from the show! It's on Saturday nights I have no clue what time probably 9:30 but I always DVR and watch it when I get time!

You can watch episodes on the Spike website HERE!

One of the good pointers I've taken is the episode where they get advice about craft kits. I've always known they do well but never knew why. It's because the mom & pop craft shops are all slowly disappearing and the big box stores aren't carrying some of the kits now so some of them go for insane-o money online! BOLO for Dimensions Gold kits and kits that are made and printed in the USA.

Taking these tips I stopped by the craft area on one of my VV runs a couple weeks ago. There was another lady seriously hoarding the kits with her phone in hand and staring rudely at me so I figured she'd take them all and I got lost. Well I randomly walked by the area again on my way to check out and noticed she left a couple behind. I grabbed one, looked it up and gladly paid the $3.99 asking price!

This isn't the gold brand but Dimensions none the less. Paid $3.99 - sold within 10 minutes of me listing it for $39.65! Profit of $27 after fees and shipping. So strange this sale - I listed it at $39.99 with Best Offer and got the offer 10 min later for $39.65 --- why?! I'd have probably accepted anything over $30 but why not just do the BIN for the .30 more? Maybe they had exactly $39.65 in their Paypal account? I thought maybe the person had made a mistake and I would get an email saying they had but then they paid so I shipped!

I've since bought a few other kits but none have sold yet so its definitely going to have to be one of those things I need to be picky about because I don't want to end up being a hoarder of craft kits!

Thanks to the show I've also gotten back into men's Hawaiian shirts. I don't know why because none have sold yet but here's hoping... Clothes are easy to list, cheap to ship and generally make a good profit but can be boring to sell and usually I end up with way more returns so we'll see how this goes.

March was my best month of the year so far but sales have completely tanked in the last week, maybe because of spring break? I'm hoping they will pick up again soon. We go on spring break this next week and are taking a trip to Idaho to visit my pops. I love this trip every year because where he lives has about a million tiny little thrift shops and my dad loves to thrift with me so I usually can find some interesting things! Hopefully the kids behave well, my hubs has to stay home to work and take care of our aging golden retriever, Max. There is a pool at the hotel so I'll tell them to be good at the stores or no swimming! Fingers crossed....

This is my first baby Max, I am not sure I've ever posted a pic of him before on here! He's almost 10 but still acts like a crazy little puppy!

Happy Spring Everyone!