Peter and I had our yard sale on May 23 – exactly a week before we moved. Overall we would say it was a success. In eight hours we made about $800. This, paired with the previous craigslist selling of single items – mostly furniture – rounded out our profits to about $1,300. Not too shabby, and it was plenty to pay our gas for the trip and go toward our rent on the temporary place we’re staying in Portland.

May is a very unpredictable month in St. Louis regarding weather (though all months in St. Louis are, really). Peter and I married in May and barely escaped rainshowers for our outdoor wedding so we know this all too well. We watched the weather closely for the day of the sale, and the outlook was good. Weather.com and Accuweather agreed that rain wouldn’t fall til mid afternoon. Since our sale was for 7am-3pm, this was great.

Well at 8am a clap of thunder sounded and it rained on our stuff for almost an hour. Peter had the foresight to erect a canopy over our sale table so we ran and put a bunch of stuff under the canopy when it started raining. There was quite a bit of furniture, however, and we had to scramble for tarps and towels to cover them with, as well as the boxes of books and movies.

So, the most important ingredient in preparing for a yard sale is: time. It takes a lot of time to go through your stuff, categorize everything and sticker it. For several weeks leading up to the move we designated our guest room as the “yard sale room”. As we packed items into boxes and ran across things we wanted to sell, we would just stick them in the room. As it got closer to the yard sale date, I started categorizing and pricing.

Other important things to have on hand: Trash can, plastic bags (we saved em up for several weeks for this purpose), a chair to sit during down-time. Markers, Tape, Scissors, etc come in handy when you want to go change prices or if a pricetag falls off. Packaging paper was nice to have at the table to wrap fragile items that people purchased. The towel was used to wipe down items that got rained on. And like I said, a canopy is great for where you are sitting. It shields you from rain and keeps you from getting cooked in the sun.

A few people we asked said we should have a lot of change on hand, which we got at the bank the day before. But we never actually needed any of it. For the most part people paid with exact change and small bills. Of course that’s because we had the change – you know if we hadn’t gotten change people would’ve paid with large bills! So I am glad we had it for back-up. Rather than use a change drawer, I purchased a 99¢ tool apron from Lowe’s hardware store and kept money in there. I periodically went in the house to put away money so I wasn’t carrying around a bunch. But it was very nice to have the money on me at all times and be mobile with it.

We bought a few signs to stick in the ground to direct people to our sale. Here’s a hint you can learn from our mistake: Buy a sign that has two stakes, not one. Because we had some signs with one stake and a gust of wind would whirl them around. Not too good for a directional sign. We stuck the signs out on the Friday night before the sale. About 5 days before the sale I put a notice on the Craigslist yard sales section with a description of some items we would have as well as the enticement of the FREE STUFF Box I promised would be there (which we did have!).  I made sure to put “No Earlybirds” on the ad and signs. I have heard that people will show up absurdly early or even days before to try and get first dibs. We were preparing til the last minute so I didn’t want this. Actually we were preparing past the last minute and well into the day, as I was still pricing stuff and putting it on tables. Here are some more photos:

Tables came in handy! We had to borrow one from a neighbor also.

Clothing was what we sold the least of. Maybe our prices were too high? Or maybe there were so many clothes it was just overwhelming to go through. Not sure. I did categorize them by type and size on the hanger rack though.

We had no issues selling plastic clothing hangers!

This is one of my favorite memories of the day. Peter was making a sign directing people to the back of our house where the furniture was. He had a brain fart and misspelled Furniture, so I added an apostrophe and some fancy cursive and made it, uh, foreign. Classy. Hilarious.

People actually bought my old trophies!

Other highlights included our friends sitting and chatting for awhile to pass the time, a kid buying a painting I made (now I’m a professional artist!), and the day finally being over. It was a lot of work!

The next day I boxed up all the unpurchased items and took them to my friend Karen’s house, who so kindly volunteered to give them to a charity she donates to.

As you can probably guess we’ve been busy!

We had a yard sale on Saturday which went great. I’ll do a write-up on it shortly.

In the meantime we’ve been packing up a storm… while St. Louis storms. It’s been thunderstorming all week. We did take a break yesterday to celebrate our 2nd wedding anniversary :)

Peter and I like to randomly wave our iPhones at each other with this countdown on it to remind each other how close we are getting. This application is called Big Day Lite. It’s free for the iPhone and iTouch, and you can customize the background picture to suit your countdown.

So we have been trying to figure out all the legalities of owning a scooter out in Portland, OR. So far it is my understanding that if it is above 35cc you have to get it insured and registered with the state. The problem is that since Janet and I will be living in a temporary house while looking for a permanent address, we wont really want to get a Oregon drivers license until we purchase our home. I talked with a scooter dealer out there and the dude said that he was still sporting a drivers license from California and all he needed to register his scooter in Oregon was a valid mailing address that proved he lived in the state.

I am wondering if anyone can confirm this. I am pretty certain on the 35cc issue (since that was right on Oregon’s State Website), but any other tips would be greatly appreciated.

Once we figure all this stuff out you will soon see me driving this beast in your fair city.

Yamaha Zuma 125

Lucy decided to help with packing. This is as far as she got however… I guess she figures there is a place for everything and everything in its place.

I wanted to share this article I read this morning by the New York Times: Frugal Portland. I’m getting used to reading articles about the charm of Portland, but this one talks about the affordability too and highlights some great options on things to do and places to eat if you’re on a budget.

We’re at 3 weeks from moving day. The POD is in front of our house… yet to be filled but we’re packing up a storm. We’ve scheduled a Yard Sale for May 23rd, so if you’re in the St. Louis area mark your calendar!

This week I made a lot of calls changing our address.. seven magazines, two catalogs, several bank/finance accounts, etc. Remember if you change your banking address you are also changing your billing address… something to consider when you make a lot of online purchases like I do, since your order won’t validate if that information isn’t correct.

One thing we’re trying to figure out now is drivers licenses in Oregon. We are bringing our (49cc) scooters with us. In Missouri, if the scooter is 49cc or under you don’t have to get it licensed or insured. However in Oregon you have to get it licensed and insured if it’s above 35cc. The thing is, we know where we’re staying when we get there is temporary. If we go and get drivers licenses the second we move to Portland, the address on it will be wrong within a few months. And if I call my insurance company to get insurance on the scooters, I’ll have to change the address for all our other lines of insurance… which, again, will have to be changed within a few months.

My preference would be to wait on all of that til we find our permanent home. But we want to ride our scooters when we get there… it’ll be perfect scooter weather. I wonder if there’s any way to avoid the hassle above and still get a license plate for the scooter. Like, can I get an Oregon scooter license plate without an Oregon drivers license? Anyway, that’s where we’re at on that.

Portland Tattoo © ohhh_yeah808