Dear Reader,
We're celebrating 20 years at the book club!
One of most popular giveaways I've featured at the book club was the garage sale "find." My mother and her second husband were the inspiration for the idea. Below is the original column...
They lived in Wisconsin most of the year, but spent the winter months in Florida. Every winter-warm Florida afternoon around three o'clock, my mom and her husband, Ron, would pull into my driveway, open up the back of their van and holler for me to come out and see their new "stuff." I don't think the two of them had ever stopped at one single garage sale when they were in Wisconsin, but when the snowbirds landed in Florida, they became garage sale junkies.
Every morning Ron would buy a copy of the local newspaper, circle the garage sale ads, and make a map based on "location" and then they'd hit the road--my mother, Ron and their dog, Brandy. And every afternoon, the garage sale trio would return with more "stuff." It wasn't that they needed any more "stuff"--the fun was the "story" behind the stuff.
"See that cooler," Ron said, "we were looking around at a sale in Venice and when the lady asked me if I saw anything I was interested in, I spotted this cooler sitting way back in her garage. It didn't look like it was with the garage sale items, so I asked if it was for sale."
At first the woman said no, but then she seemed to get caught up in her own buying and selling atmosphere, "What would you give me for it?"
Five bucks was Ron's offer.
"Sold! And it's even filled with my husband's beer," the woman was smiling, "You can take that along with you, too."
What a deal. Ron was beaming as he was showing me the blue cooler filled with ice and beer. He didn't really need a cooler, or the beer, but it wasn't the cooler or the beer that Ron was buying, it was the story. And Ron must have told four slightly different versions of the "cooler" story, before my mother and he left my house later that evening. Knowing one person's junk is another person's treasure, I asked my visiting snowbirds to 'find' items we could give away at the book club--and the Garage Sale Giveaway was born.
Today's 20th Birthday Celebration giveaway is a garage sale find my husband and I found over the weekend. You won't want to miss taking a look at it, and you just might win it. To see the original Garage Sale Giveaway item (my mother and her husband found) and to enter today's Garage Sale Giveaway (you'd never guess what it is, but you'll want it), click here.
I promise, it will be a real conversation piece. Just imagine the great story you'll be able to tell your friends if you win!
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read (and party) with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com
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