Swan Song to the Car Boot Season

Yesterday was a gorgeous sunny day - just perfect car booting weather, and a wonderful way to end the car boot sale season.  I didn't buy an awful lot - a few good books for re-sale, a couple of packs of double-sided tape (for card making) £1.50 for the two, excellent bargain, and a couple of other bits and bobs.  I shall be away next weekend and then P will be working in Hong Kong the following couple of weeks so we could say with absolute certainty that yesterday was the swan song of this year's boot sale season. 

It was quite sad really to know that I won't be avidly listening to the weather forecast on Saturday evenings, hoping for dry and not too windy weather, knowing that there won't be the wonderful anticipation of 'what will I find today' when I wake up on a Sunday morning.  And quite sad too that we won't be getting to enjoy the lovely drive out into the countryside every Sunday morning either.  But I've had a really good run this year - the season started for me in mid-March and has continued until mid-October - seven really good months of car boot bargains.  And there is the knowledge that in a few short months it will all start over again.

Whilst we were out that way yesterday morning we also called into the local farm shop where there are some wonderful bargains to be had.  Well, I say we, P had to wait outside as the place was absolutely crammed to capacity with both customers and stock, I'd never seen it quite so busy as it was yesterday.  Which either says a lot about the state of the economy or about the fact that we weren't the only ones who thought - right, the weather's glorious let's go to the car boot sale and, whilst we're at it, let's call into the farm shop and grab some food bargains too.  We spent £21.00 and could hardly carry the bags they were so heavy.

In some surprising news to me I discovered that our Oxfam shop is closing down at the end of the week.  I did wonder why they had large notices in the the windows saying everything was half price - which meant their prices were then about the same as most other charity shops in the town.  Anyway, lured by the idea of a good bargain I ventured in and found a nice (well, I hope she'll like them) pair of Next jeans for my sister - £1.49.  In some ways I'm not surprised Oxfam is closing down as their prices are very expensive and they never seem to do much of a trade in there but, on the other hand, I'm surprised that they're going, I thought charity shops had had a renaissance since the credit crunch.  Oh well, that'll be yet another empty shop to add to the growing number in our high street.  To quote The Specials 'This town, is coming like a ghost town.'

Comments

[Jennifer]

Sorry to hear about the shop closing, but great bargains at the farm shop.

[gill]

I always have mixed feelings at this time of year; although the boot sales are coming to an end for another season I quite like the idea of having more time at home on a Sunday. I want to make some cards and do some sewing and other crafty things so it's good to have a break from boot sales. And I'm more inclined to go to a jumble sale on a Saturday, I went to 2 last weekend and picked up some bargains so I had my thrifting "fix"!

[Caroline]

I guess I'm really lucky that the boot sales go on throughout the year down here in Devon. Glad to hear you enjoyed your last one, Elizabeth