Just Amazing!

First off, let me just say, I had no idea just how exhausting a yard sale of this magnitude could be!  I'm not a complainer, so I'm going to drop this in a minute and never re-visit it, but for those out there that are thinking this yard sale thing looks like easy money.....think! again!  You will earn every penny.  Was it worth all the lost sleep and pulled muscles?  Yes!  Because every dime is going to help bring Asher home.  But, I would not do this just for fun, I tell you!

All that said, our yard sale fundraiser on Saturday was AMAZING!  Just amazing!  Of course, it started weeks ago, when we began taking in donations.  It was exciting to see the stuff coming rolling in and know that it was going to bring in cash for our fund!  Then Friday was spent getting a little bit organized.  Isabel made signs for her concession stand.  That girl loves a chance to guilt people out of their money sell something for a good cause and she knows it's hard to refuse a little cutie like her little self! 

The boys hauled folding tables and set them up around the drive and walkways.  We moved our cars and brought out some of the larger things and then covered them with tarps to protect them from the dew.  Friday night ended around 1:00am on Saturday for Paul and me.  Saturday morning?  Yeah, that came way too early!  5:15ish.  Even the three older kids were up by 6 o'clock.  There was a garage and two rooms full of stuff to get out!  Everyone worked.  But, it wasn't fast enough.  Is it ever?  The yard sale that was advertised to begin at 8:00am, had it's first official customer at 6:45am!  She bought just about all the wood furniture.  Loaded it in her truck and drove away before we even had the other half of the stuff out of the house! 

If these pictures look like they were taken in the dark, 

it's 'cause they were!  I tried to snap these before that lady ran off with everything.  You know, I wanted to document how much stuff we had.  But, here she was buying it all up.  Thank Goodness!   



We had so much that we were stashing it in the garden!



Yes, someone donated tubs and trash cans.  And they sold!

Most of what you have just seen, is gone.  SOLD!

And yet, we have a curious amount of stuff still piled high in our garage and sunroom that did not sell yet.

The grand total from the yard sale (insert drum roll)

$1330.87

Not in my wildest dreams did I expect to reach $1000, much less exceed it!  Especially after all our "big ticket" items walked off before 8am and we only had about $200 to show for them.  Only God could  have done the math on Saturday!  Some how, some way, He pulled it off! Paul is still scratching his head, trying to figure out HOW we could have made that much money on the stuff we had and still have a garage full. 

Well actually, he's not.  We gave up trying to figure it out around 11pm, when we collapsed into bed on Saturday.  We have also taken in another $100 in cash donations. 

Fundraising




Update Fundraiser Thermometer Here

Not so scary now, are you little thermometer?   HA!

As for the big guy over there in the right column.  Well, I made some adjustments to that guy.  I had a few of my figures wrong because I had too much coming at me at once.  I've sorted out the agency stuff with the agency.  I had one fee too low and Asher got a grant attached to him from my agency {YAY!} so the agency fees worked out to be $200 lower than I had planned.  That is always a nice mistake!   Then a friend helped me see that the travel fees were estimated too high.  She booked all her own travel last time she went, about a year ago and will help us this time.  So the BIG thermometer is updated to show the total of what we need from now until Asher is home.  And it shows what we {with your help} have raised to be sent in and applied to those fees!