Can I call it a garage sale triathlon if I went to three different neighborhood sales in one weekend?  I’m going to say yes.

My friend opK and I started out this past Thursday at the Spring Lake Park citywide sales.  They provided a fantastic map that made it easy to find all of the sales.  I believe there were about 30, and we found all of them!

It was definitely a good day for toolboxes and ‘statues’.

I had chosen the first sale of the day from their list of sales because the description included ‘statues’.   Well … that cherubic guy on the far right is from that sale.  Not sure I would call that a statue.  Here’s the official Oxford definition of statue, “a carved or cast figure of a person or animal, especially one that is life-size or larger.”

These definitely aren’t life-size, and they are also pretty dated looking, right?  But I plan to use Dixie Belle’s Patina Paint to give them the rusty look which I’m betting will really improve them.  You’ll want to stay tuned to see whether or not I’m right about that.

The toolboxes were fairly plentiful in Spring Lake Park too.

I came home with three of them for less than $10 total.  I recently ordered some of the newest I.O.D. transfers, plus another of their Rose Botanical transfers.  I’m looking forward to using them on these toolboxes.

I’m also going to use them on this box once I get it painted.

I also picked up a couple of vintage tablecloths.

And an old shop stool.

I plan to paint that up just like the small stool I painted last fall.

Stay tuned for that project as well.

On Friday opK and I headed to the Bayport citywide sales.

We found the most stuff at the very first sale we stopped at.  They had a lot of antiques at very reasonable prices.  Granted, many of the items were not in great shape.  For example, I purchased this desk for a mere $4.

Now, I should point out that the drawer was in working order when I bought it.  But then it fell out while we were trying to load the desk into the car and broke into a bunch of pieces.  Ooops.  I’ve already sent it over to Ken’s workshop, he’s good at putting Humpty Dumpty back together again.

I’m going to give this desk a mini-makeover, and then I intend to use it to create displays for my occasional sale.

I also found a sled at this sale, I’m always on the lookout for reasonably priced sleds.  I often see them priced at $50 and up, and I pass those by.  But this one was only $12.  It will get a makeover for the Christmas season.  opK found a sled for me a couple of weeks ago too.  So now I have two waiting in the wings.

I also purchased a really pretty vintage gold framed mirror in Bayport, and another mirror with a lovely old black painted frame at a sale we passed on the way home.

Finally, on Saturday my sister and I headed to the Nokomis neighborhood sales in Minneapolis.  We always try to get to this one because it’s the neighborhood where our parents grew up.

But honestly, much like a lot of the Minneapolis sales, this one has gotten a bit too popular.  The sales that do have vintage items tend to have really high prices on them.  I saw quite a few lovely things, but they were all priced too high for me.

In the end I only made two purchases.  I bought some white and purple bearded iris from one seller, and I bought a pair of faux pumpkins from another.

I plan to give these a rusty makeover too, like the ones I did last year.

In the end, I’d call Nokomis pretty much a bust except that I did get to see my grandmother’s peonies (and if you didn’t read about that on Sunday, you can find it here).

Oh wait, I almost forget.  I also picked up a small bucket from someone’s ‘free’ pile at Nokomis.  I’ve already given it a makeover with the newest I.O.D. paint inlay called Floriography.

This was a bit of an experiment for me.  I didn’t want to paint the bucket because I liked its worn patina.  So I simply used a coat of Dixie Belle’s flat clear coat in place of paint when applying the inlay (you can find full paint inlay instructions here).  Otherwise I followed the usual procedure.  As you can see, it turned out great!  I plan to do more of this in the future for sure.

Speaking of buckets, I also added one of the new I.O.D. Home Sweet Home transfers to another bucket that I found a while back at a garage sale.

Both buckets are perfect for big bouquets of peonies fresh from the garden!

So I’ve made a start on some of my upcoming projects, but I have lots left to work on.  I’d better get out to the workshop and get going on some of them!