Just a little over one year ago my sister Debbie moved here from New Jersey.  She was presented with a great opportunity to transfer jobs within her current employer, but there was one small catch, she had to move about two months earlier than she had planned.  So last summer she lived with Mr. Q and me for those two months of May & June.  The timing was perfect for her introduction to her other new job; garage sale wingman!

I’ve been training her in for a year now, and I have to say that she has the job down pat.

Yesterday we went to the Linden Hills neighborhood sales in Minneapolis.  It just happens to be the first neighborhood sale she joined me for last year after she moved in.  I knew back then that she was hooked.  Wandering around a gorgeous neighborhood tucked between Lake Harriet and Lake Calhoun, admiring fabulous gardens and really gorgeous houses built nearly 100 years ago, enjoying the festive atmosphere.  They even have live music with this wandering jazz band.

What’s not to love?  Finding great bargains is just the icing on the cake.

So a year has gone by since Debbie’s first introduction to the neighborhood sale and in that time she has made herself indispensable as my garage sale wingman.

First of all, she is willing to drive!  And she has an SUV!  That alone qualifies her for indispensable status.

In addition to being willing to drive and having the perfect vehicle for garage saling, she also has parallel parking skills, a definite bonus.

She also has suburb vehicle loading skills.  That comes from many years spent as a girl scout leader where she had to load tons of camping gear into her SUV.  We had that thing loaded to the top yesterday.  Everything that you see in these photos is from our 3 hours in Linden Hills and it all fit into the back of Debbie’s vehicle.

Including this sweet little washstand …

And this giant vintage game board that is 4′ x 4′.

I really liked the graphic quality of this game board, plus the size.  Wouldn’t it be fun hung over the sofa at your lake cabin?  Obviously it is some sort of dart game, but I have no idea how it is played or what the purpose of the numbered wheel in the upper right corner is.

I’m not lucky enough to have a lake cabin, so this giant game board will likely end up at either Reclaiming Beautiful or the Carriage House sale unless someone wants to snatch it up sooner.

In addition to those qualities, my sister is also uber prepared (perhaps also a result of girl scout training).  When I realized I’d forgotten to throw some kleenex in my bag this morning, she said, “no problem, I have some.”  When my hands started to get grubby after an hour or two of pawing through people’s cast offs, she whipped out the moist towelettes.  When I got a little hungry, she pulled out the candy that was also in her bag.

And she always seems to have an extra dollar when I’m buying something that costs $3 and I only have two $1 bills and a twenty.

So yes, all of these qualities make her the perfect garage sale wingman and I’m so lucky to have her!

And she’s catching on to the idea of refurbishing items from garage sales for her own home.  She found this lidded trash container yesterday …

She plans to paint it and either add a stencil or maybe some Cricut vinyl wording.  She needed a more attractive container for her trash and I think this is going to work great.  Plus it was only $5!  I’ll be sure to share an ‘after’ with you when she gets it done.

How about you?  Do you have your own garage sale wingman?