La Voix De Son Maitre

This time around I found out a reason why some people may throw out so many good things. Frustration. As I was doing my usual rounds, I came upon a pile that had out some framed prints and a wooden baby gate clear as day in front of the pile. I stopped of course, loaded them into my car and then went to check out if there was more good stuff in the bags. As I was doing that, the homeowner came out. This always makes me a bit nervous, because you never know how anyone is going to react to your scavenging. I looked up at her, smiled and gave a little wave as I usually do when I see homeowners watching me. 

She asked me what I was looking for and I told her "Anything really, what I can't use myself, I sell or donate" She then told me she was so glad, because she had all this stuff packed up to donate, and she had called places to come pick it up but they never did. She said she was so frustrated, the stuff had been sitting around her place and she needed it out of her house now. It seemed she thought the curb on large pick up day was her last resort. She went through all the bags with me showing me the stuff saying "Do you need clothes? Look at all these clothes. What about stuff for the kitchen? Here look..." I ended up taking almost her entire pile, just leaving behind stuff that unfortunately broke, or was missing pieces.

Here is some of the stuff I brought home..

This wool and cashmere 3/4 jacket/coat

These 2 beautiful and funky embroidered wool coat/sweater/jackets

This is one of the large framed prints that were out. The other one was horse themed so I gave it to a friend who has horses before I could take a picture of it.

and this is the baby gate which I very quickly sold for $20

Other stuff from the pile being tossed...

Various candles

This large cookie jar

This costume jewellery necklace

A box full of large gold Christmas ornaments

and Santa!

This woven throw blanket

And a faux ice bucket wine chiller (It's insulated in the bottom) The wine is mine though :D

Various small appliances

All in all I ended up with 2 big boxes full for the second hand store from this pile alone.

Moving on to another pile! :) I stopped at this pile because there were some open boxes out and some suitcases. The boxes contained a few small kitchen knicknack things like bottle openers and stuff that I picked out for the second hand store, but nothing special. Then on a whim I decided to see if the suitcases had anything in them as well. Usually I find suitcases don't, but sometimes people fill them like a box with more stuff they are getting rid of. I'll quickly check them out by lifting them to see if they are heavy and seem to contain anything. I usually don't stop at a curb if there are suitcases alone.

Both of the suitcases seemed heavy so I looked inside...

One contained these funky vintage Philips bookcase speakers. The plugs on the wires looked unfamiliar to me, so I think they are european.

and the other contained an amazing old record player from the 1950's. 

Look at how beautiful this thing is. It's got a European plug and from looking online, it seems this record player was made and sold in France. Unfortunately, I don't have a plug adapter at the moment, so I still haven't been able to see if it works.

 

 

  

"La voix de son maitre" Translates to "His master's voice" You may recognize it more as the logo title of the little dog peering into and listening to the horn of an old phonograph (record player) which has become a popular image.

 

at various other stops I picked up...

Another old fold up card table. It wasn't as nice as the last one I found, and had a few paint splatters on it. I'm too busy right now to remove the top and recover it, so I sent it off to the second hand store. It got there before the holidays, so I like to think that someone bought it, threw a table cloth over it, and used it as a kiddy table for their family Christmas feast :)

 

 

This skate board. It looked used, but still had plastic over some parts and a price tag of $19.95 on it. It's all dirty looking here because of course my kids grabbed it right away when I unloaded my car.

 

This bookcase sat at a curb still in the box. I peeked inside and it wasn't even assembled. However, when I got home, the hardware was missing. I emailed the company, explained the situation and asked if I could order a new set. They told me they'd send me a new set for free, and it came by courier a few days later. How awesome is that for customer service?

 

Unassembled with new hardware :)

 I couldn't find the exact same model and style still for sale (It's sold exclusively at Toys R Us) but very similar ones go for $150 and up. Crazy.

 

Last but not least, this is what my kids really went nuts over. It's a little pedal go-kart. It was at the curb missing a pedal, but thankfully the people put the missing pedal right on the seat. I grabbed the kart and the pedal, and once I got home, I opened it up to see what the problem was. There seemed to be a little bracket that held the pedal on that had broken off in 2 pieces. So, I went into the work shop, got some wire, put on the pedal, wrapped some wire around the notch where the bracket fit so the pedal could no longer pass over and slip off, screwed it back together and bada boom, bada bing, now the pedal was secure and staying on :)

I knew this kart is still being sold in stores because I remembered seeing them at the toy store when we were last there in the summer, so I went online to check it out...

There she is...

 

I hope you guys all had a great holiday season, see you again in the new year :) 

Keep looking out for treasures, and happy picking!