My version of 'spring' cleaning

It seems that this year it will be 'fall' cleaning. I've gone through all the cupboards and drawers in the kitchen, dining room, library and most of the bedrooms. I also went through most of the holiday decor (except Christmas...hoping to tackle that beast this weekend). I still need to go through closets as well, thinking maybe next week. Hoping to get the twins' stuff organized. Like going through their keepsake boxes and adding some stuff to them. Deciding what all they want to store and what they want to get rid of. Corynn and Evie are pretty well organized- surprise surprise!

Cleared out all of our baby stuff. Kind of sad to see it go, but totally ready to be done with that part of our life.

We had a garage sale a few weeks ago which really kind of spear headed the whole 'cleaning and organizing' whim I've been on lately. Between the sale and listing things on local Facebook consignment groups- I have some moo-la to show for it to, which is always nice. I had the garage sale at my home- I really haven't had one in over 6 years. They are a lot of work! A few friends brought some stuff over to sell too. We ran it Friday and Saturday. And basically this is what I learned.

• Always mark your item up 20% from what you really want for it. I would say 80% of the people who came bargained down the price. Which for the most part I didn't mind- I really did want to just purge and get rid of stuff. But on the other hand I feel I marked things well. So when people kept offering less- it bugged me. I finally had to take John's advice and remarked things a little higher. 
• Bundling is a popular tactic. Not only are they trying to get a deal on something, but multiple somethings. So they pick three or four items and offer a low price to take all of them. Like I said- I was wanting to get rid of stuff. But it was still annoying. Partly because I feel liked I marked things fairly and if I wanted to give things away I would have just donated them, got a receipt and filed it with my taxes. 
• Listing your sale on Craigslist is a great way to go! and it's free! I also listed it in the paper (which is freaking expensive by the way!), but I think most of the traffic came by way of craigslist. Good signage is also important...so the people can actually make it your sale and buy your stuff. I didn't really learn this at my sale but the next weekend my mom came down and we went rummaging. People had really crappy signs! Couldn't find half of them. 
• Be proactive in your selling. List things on your local Facebook selling group. We have several here in our town. When the sale started slowing down, I started listing things on these pages. I sold probably a $100 worth of items this way. Just stipulate in your post that you want them picked up that day during your sale hours. It worked great! 

And finally, I learned that THAT was most likely my last garage sale. I am not a people person and a great majority of the people who came to the sale annoyed me. It was a lot of work and in the end I decided that 1) I'm done buying 'stuff' and 2) donating to a worthy non-profit is more awesome! 

Now onto those closets!