Estate Sales Feb. 13, 2017

We only found 1 estate sale this weekend, but we visited it THREE times.  Crazy, I know.  It wasn't because they had a ton of good stuff either.  It was just that I had my eye on something in particular and I was biding my time....

We first went on Saturday, which was the opening day and got there about an hour and a half after it opened.  I hate standing in line for these things, so we went a little later and walked right in.  OMG, it was packed with people.  There were 3 floors to explore and we were there for an hour.  Here's what I picked up the first day....

A Jack Daniels commemorative whiskey tin with matching whiskey glasses.....

No bottle of Jack Daniels tho - LOL.   It would make a super gift for someone.  All they have to do is add their own bottle of JD.

Three brass belt buckles.  I think they should sell with no problem, especially the Chevy one...

Brushes which I go through like crazy...

A nice Jack Daniels tray.  This would go nicely paired with the above mentioned commemorative tin, don't you think?  Perfect for a man cave.

This tin canister is a first for me.  I've never heard of this company and I rarely find yellow tins.  Plus it's a square tin, which is sort of different...

A felt covered camping canteen that I don't think has ever been used, and 2 tin cups...

A Mirro 12 piece camping set, still in the original box, although the box has seen better days.  Everything in it needs a really good cleaning, but all the pieces are in great shape.  Wouldn't this be cute for a camper or lake house?

I've been looking for a 3 tier silver tray to display my bracelets on and this one will get a quick make over...

So as we rummaged around the house I came across a vintage steamer trunk, and you know how much I love re-doing old trunks....

And it was a big trunk, like the one I bought and re-did here.   That trunk turned out so nice and was one of my favorite ones that I've done.  Do you remember this one?

I had re-done the interior with vintage sheet music....

Anyway, this trunk was stuck in a corner of  the enclosed back porch and nobody was even giving it a second glance.  I pried it open and it was stuffed with old blankets and the interior paper was in bad condition, which is pretty normal.  The main lock was broken, but that's not a problem because Louie can drill them out and I can buy a new one.

So I sent Louie off to find out what they wanted for it since it wasn't priced.  He came back shaking his head, "$ 80.00."  Well there is no way in hell I am paying  $ 80.00 for a trunk so we paid for the other items and we left with me talking all the way home about how much I wanted that damn trunk.

Sunday we got up and headed back over there at 9:30 am.  The trunk was still sitting where I had originally seen it.  Louie went and talked to the estate sale guy and he told Louie he'd take off 50% today and he'd throw in the blankets that were inside of it.  Yuck, I did not want the blankets so Louie told him we'd pay $ 30.00 and we'd leave the blankets.  Well, the guy didn't want to take that deal so we left and I was sort of steaming.  Now I really wanted that trunk!

We went home and did some stuff around the house and at 1:00 Louie told me to grab my coat.  The estate sale was going to close at 2:00 and he wanted one more shot at that trunk.  When we got there it was still sitting in the corner where we had left it.  Louie walked into the other room where a different man was sitting at the register and Louie told him we'd take the trunk off his hands for
$ 20.00.  The guy didn't even bat an eye, just held out his hand and said "Sold!"   This was me doing a happy dance!

Do I have the best husband in the world or what???  The first order of business will be to completely clean this entire truck and then let it sit outside for a few days in the fresh air.  I cannot wait to start working on it.

My Cedar Chest Found a Home

Last summer I found an old Lane Cedar Hope Chest at a garage sale and I had to snatch it up.  It was in pretty rough shape, but we cleaned it up, took the sander to it, re-stained it and made it look like new.  You can read my original post about this work-in-progress here.

Last week we took the chest down to the lake house and it's now in the front room....

I always wanted a Lane cedar chest so I was very excited to get this one.  It's all the more special because I waited so long for it and because I refinished it myself.  I know I'll get years of use from it and it's spot at the lake house is the perfect place for it to be.

Refinishing 2 Cedar Chests

Chablis and I have slowly amassed quite the varied collection of furniture that we wanted to refinish.  We've been hitting garage and yard sales all summer and our garage is overflowing.  Crammed to the rafters with so much furniture in fact, that Louie finally told me that we had better start working on some of this stuff and get it out of there.  I gave him the sad face and before I knew it, a new storage shed was erected in the yard and all the furniture was moved out of the garage.  Chablis and I staged everything out in the yard to decide what we wanted to start on first.  Let me tell you - there is a lot of stuff!

With the weather forecast calling for a few days of cool temperatures and sunny skies, we decided to tackle a couple of projects this week.  We decided that the 2 cedar chests were first on the list to be done, because we could easily store other stuff inside them once they were finished.  Smart idea, huh?

I decided to tackle this Lane Cedar Hope Chest.  Other than being severely scratched and badly water stained, it was in really good shape.  All the wood was sturdy and intact.  I gave it a good sanding down and also removed and cleaned the hardware handles.

 

Chablis had finagled  negotiated a really good price on this antique cedar chest and she couldn't wait to start on it.  This one was in really bad shape.  It had several cracks in the wood, missing moldings, rusty hardware and really dirty all over.

Since we had the sander out, we decided to sand down several other projects right away as well.  After all, if everything was going to get saw-dusty, we might as well get that out of the way...

After the sanding we gave everything a good vacuuming and a thorough wash down...

My son had also just asked me to find him a small dresser for his room.  I picked up this one for free!  He didn't care for the wood finish, so I sanded it down and then he asked me to paint it dark brown.  If you look closely in the background you can see my new shed that is still crammed with lots more stuff to work on....

Here's his finished dresser.  Plain, I know, but it was exactly what he wanted....

Here's what the finished Lane Cedar Chest looks like.  Based on the serial number stamped on the bottom, I think it was made in October of 1974.   I don't know what I'm going to do with it yet but it sure is beautiful!

**  I wanted to add this after- the- fact discovery.  I contacted Lane Furniture and asked about background information on this chest.  I got an almost immediate response: " It was from the CACHE collection by Lane. Mounted on Hidden casters and made out of Oak veneers and had a dark oak finish.  It was also identified as being made in 1974."  I'd like to thank Susan B. over at Lane for helping me find the correct information on my chest.  I'd also like to highly recommend the Lane Company - they go above and beyond for their customers!  **

Chablis was thrilled with how her Cedar Chest turned out.  She put a ton of work into it.  She had to repair a crack in the bottom, removed a lot of the crappy trim and really cleaned up the hardware.  Then she stained it.  I love the color and the natural dents and dings.  It has a lot of character.  She said she's definitely keeping hers.

 The original hardware looks amazing!

We got railroaded by rain the last 2 days so our projects got put on hold.  We have lots more to finish up before winter hits and it's too cold to work outside any more.  Unless I give my husband the stink eye and worm another shed out of him to work in.  Hmmmm.........

I'm joining Craft Frenzy Friday at Obsessive and Creative and Sunny Simple Life's From the Farm Blog Hop.  Stop by and say hi!