This (well, yesterday) morning I went with Sarah and Graham to check out the Eno Valley Elementary School yard sale. Graham very cooperatively slept through the entire adventure, peacefully oblivious to the fabulous bargains Mommy was finding on his behalf. I spent a grand total of $2.35 in small change for various treasures. The moment of high drama for the morning was when I reached the vendor with several large plastic bins of VHS movies for 50 cents each and found that another customer had just beat me to the copy of Amistad. As I scoured the inventory for anything else that might be of interest, however, this customer changed his mind and returned Amistad to the bin. I swooped right in and nabbed it. Woo hoo!

For the serious treasure-hunter, there is an inverse relationship between selection and price. Garage sales beat out thrift stores far and away for value and serendipity factor, but they carry a highly increased chance of striking out altogether. This is why I prefer multi-household sales or moving/estate sales, which are more likely to have adequate volume to increase the likelihood of finding something worth buying. Church rummage sales also are promising. Garage sales are not an efficient way of finding anything in particular, but they can be full of surprises. You never know what you are going to find.