Last week we were all emailing to figure out if we wanted to hit part two of the hoarder-ish patio sale. It started on Friday and all of us had time to check it out, but we weren’t sure we wanted to since the estate sale company’s email mentioned plush toys, more books, and that was about it. Especially with the books from last time around tending toward the yecch end of the spectrum.

But on Thursday night, the craigslist ad was posted, saying there were vintage clothes, tiki/Hawaiian items, and more. That was enough to motivate me, Meghan, and Karl to check it out. We met there a little before 10, along with a handful of other die-hards.

Well, there were plush toys all right.

And books.

There were also a huge amount of cat items.

I told Meghan that if those had been there the first time, in between all the owls and dogs, it really would have blown my mind. (It would have fit right in with our cat-tastic day in January, too.)

Most of the oddball housewares from last time were nowhere to be found. Sold? Thrown out? Who knows. There were plenty of new horrors in their place.

Can I pretend this says Clorox LadyMop? Because that would be awesome.

In the kitchen were a couple of racks of clothing — Meghan pulled out a couple things, passing on some great dresses that just had too much sun-fading. We all marveled at this kitty dress (or possibly a robe or long shirt — hard to tell what was going on).

I snagged a fantastic big-eyed Keane-esque cat figurine for a dollar, so at least this time I didn’t leave empty-handed.

We all went our separate ways, but I decided to hit another estate sale not too far away. It was in a fantastic ’50s house with a killer view, which is always a bonus. They also had some exotic items hanging around here and there, making me think the people had been travelers, or at least had interesting taste.

Right away I found two kids’ vintage Hawaiian shirts priced at four bucks each, so I snagged those. I debated whether to buy a big barkcloth curtain, but decided the pattern was too frumpy-’60s. Then I hit the Barbie room.

This is approximately 1% of the Barbie items they had. I don’t know why I didn’t take a picture of the whole thing. It was pretty crazy, with everything from packaged-up collectible dolls to ’80s fast food giveaway items. Then I found this 1961 record tote.

Meghan has collected these for years, but I wasn’t sure if she would want it — I thought it might be too pricey (at $17), she could already have it, or she might just be over the record tote thing at this point. I texted her a photo and asked if she wanted me to grab it. Then I made my way through the bathroom …

… the living room …

and the kitchen.

I didn’t find anything, but then I hit the basement. The first thing I saw were these beauties. Holy moly!

There were two more of them — pages from a 1970 Harold’s Club calendar. Tragically, the sellers were asking $20 each. I bade the ladies adieu (first sending Karl a photo) and scoped out the rest of the basement, picking up a few more items. Then I started looking through some old photos. I always dream that I’ll find something really crazy, but usually it’s just the standard wedding pictures, family portraits, and whatnot. At first that’s all I saw, but then I spotted some little yellow plastic cases for square photographs. The pictures inside were so amazing that they’re going to require a whole post of their own. For now, I’ll just tell you that they’re photos of some college boys in the early ’60s drinking and horsing around!

Karl texted back saying that he was going to come to the sale (I don’t think it was only to ogle the naked ladies), but I paid up and split before he got there, leaving the tune tote behind since I hadn’t heard from Meghan. It was only after I left that I talked to her and found out she really wanted it. Luckily we were able to contact Karl and he snagged it for her. Yay!

With only two sales this was still a pretty rockin’ Friday. I spent less than $20 but got more things I was actually stoked about than I have in quite a while. Frankly, I needed some good scores to keep me from getting burned out on what can sometimes feel like the yard sale grind. I was even inspired to go to more sales on Saturday. I’ll let you know how that turned out in my next post.