I preface you with that to say that performing a successful yard sale on a whim like that gave me a false sense that organizing this yard sale over the course of a month would be much easier than it actually was. A yard sale is just a yard sale, right? But they were totally different in that the first yard sale was comprised of stuff we didn't really need to take with us and the money was just an added bonus to getting rid of it, whereas the success of this yard sale depended on us collecting donations of things that others didn't need (in addition to our things) and the money that could be made was the whole purpose, not an added bonus.
When we decided to do a yard sale as a fundraiser, I was fairly confident that we would be able to gather up a decent amount of item donations due to a number of friends and family that had already expressed a desire to help us in any way. I felt even better about this when, before I even posted the first request for donations, two wonderful ladies (Stacey-a thoughtful friend from church, and Tori-a friend that I haven't got to see in a while who I met at UNA) contacted me to ask if I would be having a yard sale soon and to tell me they had stuff they wanted to donate to it. Those calls happened one right after the other, and I was overwhelmed that they thought of us. "Overwhelmed" and "thankful", by the way, seems to be two words I use an awful lot lately. I'm sure many are tired of hearing me say them or put them in Facebook posts when talking about our adoption. Maybe I will switch to "speechless". Or "awestruck". There just really isn't a suitable enough way to explain what overtakes my heart when people step out in love, care, and kindness to show support for our adoption in a variety of ways.
After I announced the yard sale, many of you did not hesitate to contact me to let me know you had stuff you wanted to donate. I was so wonderfully surprised to hear from some of you, because we aren't "close" friends, related, or part of the same church. You know who you are, and I cannot tell you how much your donations meant. I honestly thought almost all of our donated items were going to come from people that fall into those three areas of relationship, but it ended up being about 50/50. To those of you that donated and we aren't close... it meant more to me than I can express. You didn't dismiss our need for donations due to the fact we don't see each other or talk. Instead, you decided to contact me, even if I hadn't had contact with you in 1, 3, or 12 years. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. I can't express our gratitude enough. And to those who are close to us, our thankfulness runs just as deep. I hope you all know that, though I feel we can never show it enough.
We collected donations over the course of about six weeks as people contacted us. Some dropped by our home, others met me in town, and we drove to others' homes to pick up the things. My sister, who has a newborn, even sacrificed sleep to gather things to send with me the night before I left her house in North Carolina when I visited last month. Some gave a few items, knowing that every little bit would surely help, and others gave carloads of stuff. Every time a donation was made, we were thankful. We piled the boxes and bags and loose items into our once-empty office over the course of that time, and the room began filling up pretty fast.
The days leading up to the yard sale consisted of several last-minute donations, borrowing tables from friends and family, and lots of anticipation. On Thursday alone, we had four different friends make donations. Thursday also meant it was time to dig in and sort out the stuff. I wanted all of it to be categorized in some form or fashion. I personally would be less likely to buy stuff if I had to dig through random piles of things looking for something I could use. I'm going to use pictures to help me tell about the rest of our adventure.
Day 1 - Thursday, June 14
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| One of my best friends, Jana, came over Thursday morning despite the morning sickness she's been having (12 weeks pregnant!) and the many things that were on her to-do list for that day. Here she is with the mountain of adult clothing that she sorted out. |
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| The bins and pile of donated baby boy clothes. |
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| The pile of stuff that collected outside on Wednesday and Thursday because there was no more room inside. |
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| After meeting two friends who gave the final donations at 5:00 p.m, we drove through Chick-fil-a for a quick dinner. I couldn't help but smile to see this came in Brielle's kid's meal. I know that was God's way of encouraging me as I stressed over the amount of work that was left to be done. |
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| Organizing phase - Home decor, kitchen, and seasonal items |
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| This is what my living room looked like after we were mostly finished categorizing. |
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| One of my best friends, Jessica, came by after dinner and helped sort until midnight. Having her around was so wonderful, and it put me in a really good, less-stressed mood. |
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| Brielle was so excited about the yard sale! She wanted to help me bake cookies. |
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| Brett came across these super cool, blinking Spiderman glasses as we put stuff outside. |
Day 2 - Friday, June 15
Brett and I hit the ground running when our alarms went off. He put the signs out and we worked fast to get things arranged and ready. Just a few minutes after 6:30 we had several people looking around and buying things. They disappeared just as fast as they arrived, then more would show up either seconds or several minutes later. Brett helped me until almost 8:00, then he had to leave for work. He was originally going to take the day off, but he found out Thursday that he needed to make a trip to Birmingham. I was a little disappointed at first, but I knew it wasn't his fault and I knew that God would be my strength.
Just as Brett was about to leave for work, a lot of people started showing up. Two of them, a woman probably in her late 40s/early 50s and her daughter who looked to be about in her mid-20s, approached me and asked about our adoption. I told them a little bit about it, and then they told me that their son/brother works in Africa. A smile spread across my face as I asked what he did. He builds wells for villages. This made me smile even bigger. As you all may already know, the lack of access to clean water is one of the reasons so many children and adults are sick- and even die- across much of Africa. They are forced to either walk many many miles to collect fresh water, if it is within walking distance. If it isn't, they have no choice but to use whatever nasty, disease-ridden water is available. What a rewarding job to have, one in which your work brings life and health and hope, impacting one village at a time.
The mom/daughter duo continued to look around as I bargained with others and bagged up their purchases. I was feeling overwhelmed at trying to help everyone, paired with the emotions of realizing that the way I envisioned the yard sale and what was actually happening were two completely different things. That usually happens with any given event in our lives, doesn't it? I envisioned that many pro-adoption people would see our posters, newspaper ads, or hear about our sale through Facebook and come flocking to show their support. It was a rude awakening to realize that most had no interest in supporting us any more than they did in supporting any other family who were having yard sales that day. I came to this conclusion after having the following conversation (or something similar to it) with shopper after shopper:
Shopper: (picks up item) "How much for this?"
Me: "Would you like to make me an offer?"
Shopper: (staring at item, silent for a moment) "I don't know... just tell me how much you want for it."
Me: "Ok... how about three dollars? I think that is a fair price."
Shopper: (sets item down, shakes head) "No. Would you take a dollar for it?"
Depending on the item, I accepted their counter offer if it was something I felt probably wouldn't get much attention from other people over the remainder of the yard sale. But if it was something that I knew would be able to draw in the amount I asked, I tried to reach a compromise or was firm with the price I stated. I knew I needed to change my attitude, because I was finding myself slightly annoyed that nobody seemed to care that this wasn't a yard sale for us to make some extra money for ourselves. It is for our child(ren). Because always on my mind was that, even though I don't know the sex of our child(ren), their ages, or what they look like... they are right now an ocean away, living in an orphanage, and this sale is something we put together to get us a step closer to bringing them home. But a yard sale is a yard sale, and I could not let my emerging frustration take hold of me. I needed to remember that God is going to provide, no matter how circumstances seem at any given moment.
Back to the mom/daughter pair. They looked around for about ten more minutes, and then the daughter approached me with four books. I'd just had a bad bargaining experience with a woman where she talked me down on the price of every single item she had chosen because I was just too physically, emotionally, and mentally overwhelmed already and I just wanted to start bringing in some money. My vision of how the yard sale would go had already been smashed in the first 45 minutes, and now I was in survival mode. I smile at the women and look down at the books. Uncertain of a fair price for them, I asked, "How much would you like those books for?"
"How about..." the daughter begins, as she starts to pull her hand out of her little accordion file folder that she was using as a wallet. "This?" she says with a smile. There are five $20 bills in her hand. I tried hard to control myself but there was no way. I burst into tears and asked her if she was serious. I was expecting a $5 bill or something smaller! She speaks words of encouragement, reminding me that it is a wonderful thing we are doing and telling me that she plans to adopt one day. I start thanking her through my tears and try to compose myself, only to realize that all of the shoppers have stopped looking at the tables and are staring at us. "Now you've got me crying!" one older woman says as she wipes her eyes. Another woman agrees with her, and then a third. A couple of men look at us all like we are crazy. Brett stepped out of the house just in time to witness what was going on and he, through a smile, pokes fun at me for melting into a blubbering mess and thanks the daughter for her generosity. She tells us that it is the amount God told her to give, and I speak blessing over her that may her generosity return to her one hundred fold when she is raising money for her own adoption one day. Still shocked and trying to compose myself, I apparently said something like, "Please come visit, you know where to find me!" I think Brett thinks I was just being awkward (which it was an awkward thing to say, I suppose), but I was dead serious. And my invitation to her had nothing to do with the money she gave. She listens to God's voice and she has a heart for adoption. We could easily become best friends in my book. (Besides, I have never been the shy, quiet type.)
After that awesome moment was over, I finally managed to regain my composure and continued to assist shoppers. I felt different now though; God had used the timing of all that to give me a new vision for the yard sale. He reminded me (as He graciously does often, it seems) that He is going to provide but I must trust and obey every step of the way. This weekend, trusting and obeying meant I was to do my best to just love the people sent my way and to not worry or stress over anything. I could show love for them by being kind, not judging them for not seeing my yard sale as anything special or out of the ordinary, being as fair as possible with pricing, and being genuinely friendly.
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| Brielle woke up at about 10:30. Here she is writing down "how many dollars" the totals of each purchase. |
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After God fixed my attitude, He also sent encouragement in the form of friends. Pictured above is our dear friend John, who stopped by to see if I needed any help. (He didn't really want to be in a picture, but he was such a good sport about it!) Things were kinda slow at this point, so he decided to help by making the display of items more appealing. All those shoes were just in one big messy pile under the table when he first arrived, and he didn't hesitate to match them up and organize them without me noticing until he was almost done. He also moved furniture items onto the driveway so people could see them from the street. It was so great to have him stop by just to see if he could help in any way. He told me to call if we needed any help at all. I was so encouraged, but I wasn't too surprised though... that's just the type of friends that he and his wife are. We love yall so much and love our friendship with you, Rainey family.
In addition to John's surprise visit, I had two more:
My bestie Jessica (that had helped so much Thursday night) came over and hung out with me while her daughter and Brielle played. She picked out some cookies and paid more than their worth for them. I so enjoyed having her there with me. She stayed until it was time for her to meet her husband on his lunch break... But didn't leave without first offering to bring me back some lunch! Lunch? Eating had sorta slipped my mind. I was delighted with her offer, and even more delighted that she stayed a little while longer to visit when she brought the food back.
Another good friend from church (Rachel) stopped by with her precious family. It lifted my spirits yet again to see a smiling, sweet familiar face. After picking out a few items, she also gave above and beyond the worth of the items. I got teary eyed, but managed to keep my composure this time. Again, our gratitude for the support cannot be put into words.
At about 3:30 we brought everything into under the carport and Brett and Brielle laid down for a nap. As I was taking care of some things and getting ready to rest, my wonderful little sister Corvetta (we don't have the same parents, but we are sisters in Christ so I always call her my little sister... It confuses people, as you will hear in a story I will be telling in Part 2 about Saturday) texted to tell me that she hoped the yard sale went well and asked if I needed her help Saturday. After going a day alone due to not arranging for help Friday, I wasn't about to turn down anyone's offers! We made plans for her to just spend the night instead of waking up at 5 a.m. to go get her.
I also received two more pleasant surprises at about the same time:
Our dear friend Lanie offered to make dinner for her family, mine, and Corvetta and bring it over for us all to eat together. I was thrilled! What a thoughtful thing to do, and it was such a perfect ending to the first day. She is an incredible cook, and we love being around her, her husband, and their little son. After our 8 p.m. dinner, they stuck around for several more hours to help us re-organize and get things ready for the next morning.
Another great friend Christina called me and offered to come over to help get things ready for Saturday morning. Her and her husband came over after putting their seven (yes, seven!) kids to bed. They brought with them hangers, a fence pole and rope to make a bar to hang clothes on, and two folding tables so we could display more items. We laughed and had some crazy goofy times as Christina helped me figure out ways to display things to make them more appealing to the shoppers. Many times during our 9 pm - midnight preparations I thought of how grateful I was for all of these terrific people. I thanked God for them and their desire to help us over and over.
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| Corvetta and I worked on hanging up adult clothes that were previously just laying in boxes |
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| Christina working on baby boy clothes |
I know this is a lot, and I still have one more day of pictures and stories! I am being so very detailed because this is my way of journaling through our adoption journey, and so many things happened that I do not want to forget.
But before I go...
Our 2-day total was: $1,635.78
SPEECHLESS. THANKFUL. OVERWHELMED. HUMBLED.
THANK YOU, WITH ALL WE HAVE, TO THOSE WHO DONATED AND HELPED AND SHOPPED. THANK YOU.
We're getting closer.
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