The end of 2014

Well the end of the year is almost here and looking back, it's been a great adventure. I have had so much fun doing this! I still can't believe the amount of stuff I've managed to save from the landfill, and the amount of perfectly good items that people have thrown out. I have also met many cool people this year while doing this...people who helped me sort through the things they were throwing out, people who helped me when I had car trouble, people that just gave a friendly smile or wave, and people who who were also doing the same thing I have been doing. I'm hoping the new year brings many new finds and many new friends :)

So let's take a look at some of the finds that finished up the year...

A bag full of Halloween decorations, some still unused..

and a bag full of clothing

This vintage chair. At first I wasn't sure about grabbing it.. it's solid, but the varnish has worn away a bit in places. However, when I looked underneath it with my flashlight, I saw an older makers mark for a company called Krug, and a small metal plaque saying it belonged to The Bell Telephone Company of Canada. The chair company still exists today, and still makes chairs, so I have emailed them asking some questions about the chairs history. Hopefully I hear something back soon!

This picnic basket sat on a pile with a tag still hanging from it.

Yup, completely unused.

A Radio Shack remote control truck. Taking a look online, these were really well made and rather expensive. It's missing a rechargeable battery, but that can be ordered online as well.

A painting. Perhaps it wasn't someones taste, but it was professionally framed, so the frame itself was probably rather expensive.

A beautiful little entry table

 A big box that was full of complete games.

 An over the door basket ball game with a ball return chute. It has a small break on the grey square on the left as if something busted through it, but a little glue and a clamp and it's good as new. My kids love it.

Nice leather and suede purses, shoes and bags

2 working baby toys (I didn't even need to put new batteries in) that my youngest enjoyed for awhile until they went to the second hand store .

At this pile, it looked like someone decided to give up on their wine making hobby.  Looking back at this picture, I realize I never checked what was in those big boxes. D'oh!

I don't really know anything about wine making, so I wasn't sure if any of the stuff had any "value", but I did grab this corker as I'm sure it could be a quick sell.

 I also found this DVD player with a dvd of Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked, and a disk of The Chronicles of Narnia without a case. There were also various gospel and jazz CD's

This ObusForme heat and massaging cushion is going to make my garbage runs much more comfortable in the future! It felt a little odd at first, the heat made me feel like I was peeing in my pants! LOL But the massaging part is great, especially on my lower back. It currently sells at Canadian Tire for $89.99

The following jackets were just gorgeous, but unfortunately a size too small for me. They went to the second hand store and I'm sure someone will be very happy with them.

 3 laundry baskets filled with more clothes...

 

Including this beautiful holiday dress 

And this pristine baby snowsuit

This bag of throw pillows were in great condition so they went right to the second hand store as well

Mr. Pumpkin also went to the second hand store, but I'll be keeping the decorative vines for a future crafty project.

This Litter Maid system was sitting at the curb still in the box...

As you can see, there is still a zip tie through the plug, it's never been used, but it was deemed garbage. I don't get it.

Sorting through more of the loose stuff, I found...

A few household items, including 9 pairs of scissors

Lots of kids toys including books, Lego, and a little electronic Leap Frog toy.

Odder items were these bongos and a vintage french bible from Belgium printed in 1957 in a leather case.

There was lots of crafty fun stuff, a giant seek and find book, scrap book papers, googly eyes, sparkles, and even Akon and Beyonce  CDs

A few make-up bags -one was full of unused sample sized products, some full sized shampoos and other hair care products, a silk tie, kerchief and cuff link set, 32 (!) hairbands, unopened soaps and a cherry coke lip gloss, and what looks like a paintball mask.

These beautiful men's hockey skates that didn't even look like they've been used

And tonnes of jewellery. Most of it was costume...

But amongst it all was a gold bracelet, and several .925 silver items

 This giant Stewie sat on top of someones garbage can waiting to be adopted..

 Another awesome suitcase thrown away for no reason. The tag translates to "No, it's not yours!"

I stopped at a farm house where they had a bunch of feed bags at the curb that looked like they had some interesting bulk and shape to them. They were unfortunately tied up with twine, and the bags are impossible to rip even a small hole to peek into. I managed to stand there and untie one bag and spotted a Barbie camper inside, so decided that the other bags were worth a gamble and I threw them all into my car to cut open at home.

Inside I found some missing pieces from the camper that I snapped back on, Barbies corvette and an old Barbie lunch box. The sticker on the outside was pretty damaged, but everything inside was fine. I brought the camper and car to the second hand store, and then threw the lunchbox in there as well in case someone wanted it for nostalgia sake.

 Inside the other bags I found a really heavy glass blender attachment, 3 cans of unused coloured hairspray, an unused car cup holder ashtray (I guess they weren't smokers and took it out when they bought their car), a very vintage make-up mirror and case, a soap/bath set, vintage glass canning jar lids, a decorative hanging corn bouquet, a small change purse, a pool cleaning kit still in the package and an old Kodak camera set.

There was also a box of these absolutely adorable vintage paper dolls

These metal decorative baskets sat on an old discarded chair at one curb

At another curb I found a box full of dish type items...3 different serving/snack trays, some Christmas themed place mats (and a plain wreath), a set of 4 glass tumblers, 2 wine glasses, and several bowls. The stack of 8 bowls on the left are Corningware, and on a recent trip to Wal-mart, I spotted them sold there at $3.98 each.

Another box contained a bunch of Christmas decorations that I brought to the second hand store, but I saved this old vintage Christmas wreath for myself :)

An espresso machine. It works, so I'm going to have to figure out how to use it or try to find a manual online.

This pendant has a makers mark on the back but it doesn't say it's silver. The front has some greenish tarnish on it so I'm not sure what the metal could be. I don't think it would have a makers mark if it was just some crappy junk jewellery.

This fan looked in perfect condition, so I took a chance in grabbing it as one of our fans is on it's last legs. When I got it home, I found the reason why it was thrown out...the pull chain was broken/missing. Since I'm a bit of a Miss Fix-It, I rummaged around in my husband's work shop, found another piece of chain the same size, opened up the fan, replaced it and...it worked! This fan is amazing, it's really heavy so you can tell it's good quality, there are 3 speeds to it, and speed 3 is practically tornado-like wind! It's going to be awesome having it for the hot summers!

I spotted this giant play kitchen at the curb in the afternoon while doing some shopping, but I had my kids with me so it wouldn't fit in my car. I went by later that night and it was amazingly still there. This time I was able to put my seats down to fit it in. These kitchens sell for over $150 new, so I'm sure I'd be able to sell it quickly if I put a good low price on it.

Here was all the stuff I left at the second hand store. There are a few things in this pile I never got pictures of... a few baby toys, a Winnie the pooh kids table that just needed some paint cleaned off with a magic eraser sponge, and an old vintage telephone table.

To end this post, I'm going to show you one of my favourite finds of the year that I haven't posted about yet. A few months ago, I passed by a pile that looked interesting. I went up a few houses and found a good driveway to pull into so that I could turn around to check it out. As I pulled in, I noticed this houses garbage can lid was propped up by something inside. It looked to be the top of a lamp of some kind, and since at the time I was looking for an older vintage lamp for our living room reno, I decided to quickly hop out of the car to check it out.

I ended up pulling out a vintage rain lamp that was popular in the 1960's & 70's. It was pretty dirty, everything had a good coating of brown grease on it, but once I brought it home, I got to work on cleaning it up. I removed everything I could and soaked it in Dawn dish washing detergent. Everything on it worked except the pump. I was really bummed about it, but a few days later my parents came to visit, and my Dad had a look at it. He brought it home, took it apart, cleaned it up and got it working again! Thanks, Pop! I get my tinkering and fix-it abilities from him :) I got the pump back home and installed, my husband got a new piece of flexible piping for it from work, we put it back together, turned it on, and it worked! I filled it with mineral oil and hung it up in the shower for a test run and it rained!

I now have it proudly hanging up in my living room, it's such a cool piece. Everyone who sees it comments on how neat it is. Incredibly, these vintage lamps are worth well over $100! From the road, I never would have noticed it, it was just such a serendipitous find :)

If you have made it this far down, I wish you all an amazing new year with lots of cool finds and treasures of your own. See you again in 2015!