Fishing for Hugs

Headed first thing on Friday to the sale of a friend of a friend (hi, Jeanne!). Where we took a picture of Judy in a hat

and then broke our hearts over the perfect-for-Judy’s-house wooden screen door – that was the wrong size. Like six inches wrong, which means you can’t fudge it to fit. Dang!

Heading for our next stop through a residential neighborhood, we halted at a stop sign. A youngish man across the street immediately headed for us, carrying a fishing pole. We had the top down on my car and he came right up to the passenger side. “Hey,” he said. “I need some help.” He pointed to the handle of his fishing pole. “I need something sharp to cut this off.” I’m not sure what he was pointing at, but something about the scene made me nervous.

“Sorry, don’t have a thing,” I said brightly, and put the car in gear. “Nothing?” He seemed incredulous. “Nope, don’t have a pocket knife or anything.” I pressed the gas and slid around the corner, accelerating. Judy and I glanced at each other. “Yeah, right,” I said. “Let me hand you a knife, weird guy on a street corner. As if!”

At least he didn’t ask us for a gun. Sheesh! I know, he was probably harmless and actually concerned with his fishing pole, but no need to stay and find out for sure. Besides, I’m on the side of the fish.

The rest of the morning was just fun. We found the annual sale of some ladies at a posh house with posh stuff. It’s always one of those sales that even if the prices are higher than I will go, they have cool stuff that’s fun to look at. And I actually bought something I love, in fact I have it on right now – a shawl or wrap in two shades of green

 

that is so soft and cushy I think it is probably a cashmere blend. It weighs about as much as a feather and is perfect for a cool morning or to throw on when I go someplace with over-enthusiastic air conditioning.

At our next stop I noticed several quilt books with patterns to be made “in a day.” I asked who the quilter was (nice older lady) and then inquired if you can really make one of these quilts in a day. “Sure,” she said, “if you work on it for 24 hours without stopping.” We both laughed. “Seriously, you probably could complete one in a weekend if that’s all you did.” We chatted about quilts as I looked around, and I was thrilled to find one she had pieced but never finished…for $1.50.

I think with some simple finishing it will look swell on one of the guest room walls. Or I could always give it to that cat.

Her sale also yielded some movies and music

and a Kitchenaid mixer bowl that I think I can resell.

“I had that mixer for forty years and it finally died. I still miss it. That bowl has seen hundreds of loaves of bread dough,” she told me. I’ve had my Kitchenaid for over thirty years and hope it will last sixty more!

One of the big Catholic churches in town had their annual rummage sale, and rummage we did. There are usually treasures at these sales but you do have to wade through uncountable pieces of utter crap. And this particular church doesn’t price anything; they want you to make a donation – and then every single person gets a guilt trip to try to get them to donate more. I really do prefer the other churches who price things and/or let you fill a bag for X dollars. But I did rummage and find some good stuff - and survived the guilt trip!

I picked up a cute linen shirt (Judy and I both are enamored of linen these days)

and a couple of visors to shield my aging eyes in the convertible

and a wonderful French tablecloth (my eyes bugged out when I researched how much these things go for in a store).I pulled this from under a pile of sewing notions -

a completed Erica Wilson crewel design. Wasn’t she an amazing designer? Look at the personality in these faces!

And buried deep in a box of sweaters I saw a flash of color, so I dug, and I pulled, and out came this beauty (which I’ll be reselling in the winter).

It’s by Icelandic Designs, and if you don’t know their stuff, it’s absolutely wonderful. Fabulous materials and beautiful details. I don’t think this was ever worn.

When we left the church the day had grown hot. I looked at my GPS and realized we still had 11 sales on the list I’d programmed in – and there was no way I’d last through them all. So we headed for the street that was supposed to be having a neighborhood sale, which turned out to be all of two houses participating. But we had a great time at one of them. Two women, retired teachers who had team-taught second and third graders for many years. Lucky kids; these ladies were great. I was telling one of them about my search for a tiny shelf to go on the wall between the two windows in my office, and she gave me the exact thing I needed.

And we even got it put up, and now my phone extension is off my desk, but still handy. There’s even room for a notepad. Hmmm, looks like I need to move Zoe’s baby picture up so it’s framed by the shelf.

When she handed it to me, I was so pleased I commented, “I suppose you’d take it amiss if I kissed you?” and she said, “Yeah, but I’m Italian so we can hug!” And we did. It was a great end to a morning that started with a weird guy with a fishing pole!