Estate Sale Finds

After a recent dry spell, we had several estate sales in one weekend. Here are a few of my favorite things we found.

My mother found this book in amongst a bunch of others stuffed into a closet. I hadn't gotten there yet when she found it or I'd have probably spotted it first. It's a portion of a correspondence course on home appliance repair ca. 1970.


The book is full of diagrams and instructions featuring common brands of household appliances such as this one for servicing and repairing a Mixmaster. The diagram they use shows a Model 10. My mixer is a Model 12 and still similar enough to use their diagrams for servicing.

After finding that, my father decided to go online and order the complete course. The NRI (National Radio Institute) doesn't exist anymore but we were able to order the full course for about $15.00. Now he has service and repair instructions for vintage toasters, coffee pots, washing machines, blenders, mixers, etc.


I love children's books and fairy tales so bedtime story books are always a favorite for me. This is a vintage copy of Uncle Arthur's Bedtime Stories with the latest copyright of 1941. Arthur S. Maxwell was a spokesman for the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Britain, but in America he is well known for his volumes of Bedtime Stories and Bible Stories. His stories all teach a morality point related to scripture.

Interestingly enough, although there are a few drawings, most of his "illustrations" are photographs from recent events or copies of biblical paintings.



My mother loves vintage board games, especially with fun, bright graphics.

She found this one that she'd never even heard of. It's ca. 1970 and has the colors to show.


At one sale my mother found an entire shoebox full of stir-sticks. Vintage ones - we're guessing most are from the 1960s. They did their traveling mostly in Seattle and Tacoma Washington, with trips to Hawaii, Reno/Lake Tahoe, and Vegas. She knows I love barware so she felt compelled to bring them home.

These are some of my favorite ones for styling, color, etc.

My mother has always wanted a souvenir pillow cover. She loves the ones from Hawaii especially and never thought she'd be able to afford any. We refrain from purchasing many things on Ebay and the only time we've ever seen one at an estate sale it was far too expensive.

We found two of them at one sale and waited until half price day to buy them for $1.50 each, a little bit surprised that they didn't sell.



I love aluminum tumblers and am always looking for them. I found these for $0.50 each. Don't they look lovely with my pitcher?

Lots and lots of apothecary jars for storing lots and lots of things. We paid anywhere from nothing to $1.00 each for several, even more than are pictured.

This is the best deal we made all weekend: A Bogen 3001 Tripod for my camera! (Picture borrowed from ebay; ours is very similar) My mother has been looking for a tripod for months now and hasn't found a thrifted one that was any good (usually the legs won't lock properly). This tripod was only $12.00, but Mom wasn't sure it would work with our camera. The woman running the sale very generously told us that we could take it home for the day and try it out and, if it didn't work right with our camera, bring it back the next day.

We brought it home, it worked perfectly, and we did the research and found out that it's a very popular tripod, very high quality, made of aluminum and sells on Ebay for around $60.00. Needless to say, my mother is glad she didn't find a functioning plastic tripod sooner.

I hope you found as many wonderful sales as we did!

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