Pastrami on Rye

St. Patrick's Day has come and gone. The little corner of our living room, neatly adorned with decorations celebrating St. Patrick, will be cleaned up by the last weekend in March to make way for the Easter decorations. Elves, leprechauns and shamrocks will be packed away. Plastic, ceramic and cardboard bunnies, eggs and lambs will emerge from other boxes and be carefully arranged to celebrate the first holiday of the Spring season. We hope it brings with it some warm weather. We have had the occasional glimpse of the weather we hope to see with April approaching but, for the most part, it continues to be a much colder than average March. 

Monica made a delicious corn beef and cabbage meal for us on St. Patrick's Day (with potatoes and Irish soda bread too) and there was plenty remaining for leftovers during the week. With corn beef fresh on our mind, we started talking about pastrami and how we had not eaten a good old pastrami on rye sandwich in longer than we could remember. We would have to seize that opportunity when we had a chance. 

For now, we had to put pastrami out of our minds and focus on Saturday morning saling. We also had to put last week's lack of success out of our minds. This week, we hoped, would be different. We narrowed our list down to six stops. Two looked more promising than the rest so we decided to go to those first. We were anxious and we were excited!

We arrived at our first stop, a sale run by a very small Estate Sale Company. They do not run too many sales but we are always happy to see the owner. His sales are not well advertised but we have gotten some great things from him, over the years, at a very, low price. There was nothing in the ad that caught really caught our eye other than his name. That was enough.  

******We interrupt this post for a very important message. Many of the pictures taken on this date were not of the highest quality. Rob left the camera's setting on "night" which was how he set it when he last used the camera. He completely forgot to re-set it. His mind must have still been thinking of "pastrami on rye". We apologize for the picture quality. ****  Now...back to our post

The house had a main floor and basement to search. There were many signs of older times. The television has probably sat like this since the 1970's...on a metal stand and with aluminum foil on the antenna to enhance reception! We found a few treasures amidst the debris and took home a few Christmas items, an old box of shoe polish and some other items of interest, all for $5. It was a good first stop but we were ready for the next one. 

We arrived at our second sale and we were excited. Not only did the word "hoarder" in the description of the sale excite us but we ran into a friend at the sale (pictured above with Monica). He works for several different tag sale companies as a helper and he is always entertaining.

The front door gave us a good feeling about the contents inside. Look at the door. Monica is peeking through the glass

Look at that starburst doorknob! There was one on each side of the door but they were not for sale at this time.

There were an incredible number of rooms inside. This was the basement floor. We had four messy rooms to search downstairs and we spent an hour and a half in just the basement alone! 

This section of the basement had some great old cabinets and boxes upon boxes to search on the floor (and in a nearby closet). Monica was pretty happy! 

The room was once used as a downstairs kitchen and it had a cool old stove built into the wall!

There was an old bar in the basement and Rob searched its contents thoroughly! 

Laying amongst the rubble was this great kitchen room divider cabinet...

...with a great countertop! 

There was an old pink bathroom on the main floor. There's Monica in the back searching the cabinet drawers for hidden treasures

Look at the floor in the bathroom!

This was a great stop. We were here for 2 1/2 hours and found lots and lots of great things amongst the rubble. Christmas items...Easter items...books and magazines...vintage greeting cards...and much more. It made up for last week! We were so satisfied that we decided to skip the remaining four stops on our list. None of them looked very promising anyway and the nearest of them was 30 minutes away. Rob had a different plan. 

 As we drove in the general direction of our house, Rob had his eyes open for a place that looked like it might serve pastrami on rye...and we found one. It was a nice delicatessen with tables and chairs inside. We got our sandwiches and had a leisurely lunch. Saling, pastrami and spending time together...it all adds up to a great day. 

Here are some of the things we brought home:

One record. This cover made us laugh

Some vintage greeting cards

Some books and magazines

Old Dennison booklets, a Howard Johnson's children's menu from 1960 and cardboard cut-outs of Pebbles and Bam Bam, dated 1968

Some old Christmas stockings

More Christmas stockings. Made in Japan and unopened

A New York World's fair kerchief from 1964-1965

Sealed packages of cowboys and indians (though Rob refers to them as "cowboys and Robs")

Some great "ponytail" teenager items for Monica

Some new hats for Monica

Some vintage Easter stuff. The Easter basket in the back center is still in its package and marked Japan. The Paas set on the back right is unopened. The books in front are Paass books

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Playing cards from United Airlines, green stamp books, a spoon rest made in Japan, Halloween trick or treat bags (newer), a New Year's Eve noisemaker and a vintage set of activity books

A vintage plastic coconut glass,a Hamburglar glass from 1978, an old netted outdoor candle holder, a honeycomb pumpkin, a tiny plastic baby, two Christopher Robin giveaways from 1970's cereal, a vintage pig walker toy, a Schlitz salt and pepper shaker, a vintage pony squeak toy, some Christmas dancers and a pair of vintage St. Patrick's Day elves.

Art-ee-fun set, a vintage Thanksgiving plate and "super crayons" (which Monica had as a kid

Lots of vintage Christmas items

More vintage Christmas items

A Garage door cover in its package and made in Japan and a vintage cookie mold set, still in its package

More vintage Christmas items

It was a great week for saling....and always a great week because we spent it together.

This was our adventures for Saturday, March 22nd. Our account of March 29h is comng soon. Spoiler alert...we did great!