WORLD'S BIGGEST GARAGE SALE COMING UP SOON

Yesterday my sister Catherine told me the World's Biggest Garage Sale is coming up in about two weeks! She was thinking about renting a booth to sell stuff this year.
My sister and I both love this event and the past couple years she has been working the door there and hasn't had much of a chance to look around and shop for herself.
It is a great opportunity to scour through tons of stuff and dig up some neat collectables.
Last time I brought along a camera and took some photos and I plan on doing the same thing this time.

The World's Biggest Garage Sale is held at the National Cattle Congress Grounds (Waterloo, IA).
Lots of vendors set up tables of various items and are ready and willing to negotiate prices. It costs $1.00 to get in and you can spend all day looking around.

 



One of my favorite booths last time had tons of vintage action figures and video game systems/ games.





My sister Catherine found a bunch of vintage glassware and stuff for her wedding.



We tried to get a couple random people to take a photo of us but it didn't work out so well. Maybe they didn't know how to zoom in?





I had to leave after a bit to get to work but I took some more photos at work that day of the stuff I bought.

I found a whole bunch of California Raisins figures that I traded to my friend Caruso for Gumby figures.











I found this Thundercats figure which I gave to my nephew Evan who loves Thundercats.



I got this Donald Duck Marx figure for 10 cents?!



Two Shirt Tales die-cast vehicles.



Two Rice Krispies cereal prizes. Recently I found the third at a garage sale so now I've got Snap, Crackle, and .....Pop!



I got a Chip bendy figure from Chip 'N Dale's Rescue Rangers.



I found this little sky-blue rubber figure. I still haven't figured out what it is. (anyone know?)



Last of all I found a handful of Tomy wind-up toys.



Anyway, I'll be sure to post some photos of the upcoming sale and my purchases. If you are in the area it sure is a fun sale!

GARBAGE PAIL KID KNOCK-OFF SPIDER

I look forward all week to garage sale Friday and the treasures I might find. Yesterday I hit the jackpot.
My wife told me we should skip a garage sale on friday that's sign read "Crafts, Housewares, and Furniture".
I decided just for the heck of it to stop by on Saturday.
The sale was pretty lame as described but just as I was about to leave I saw a shoebox with some items in the back of the garage.
I was digging through when I found this odd plastic spider. I thought it was a Halloween decoration until I wiped off some of the dust and saw it's face. It was a freaking Garbage Pail Kid!!
I bought it for a quarter and the old ladies at the sale giggled at me for buying it. I took it home and washed the dust off it. I kept looking at it over and over examining it. It was labeled (1987 DAKIN INC. MADE IN CHINA). I knew the company Dakin but as far as I knew they only made stuffed animals. It looked too much like a Garbage Pail Kid to be anything else and I was pretty sure they wouldn't make a Cabbage Patch Kid spider with fangs.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-08-19


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-08-19


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-08-19

I am a huge Garbage Pail Kids fan and I know that the only figures that were produced were the cheap toys figures and pop-ups. I buy GPK collectables on Ebay and I had never seen anything like this before. At first I was going to run a contest on the Funtime Blog to see if any of my GPK collector friends could identify this. I figured it HAD to be some kind of a knock off of the GPK "DIDI T." the face sculpt was just dead-on GPK and the date would have been right around the time of the 7th Series of Garbage Pail Kids.

After a little looking I found the answer on Wayne's GARBAGE PAIL KID REFERENCES one of the best sites for online info on Garbage Pail Kids. It is indeed a GPK knock-off and an extremely hard to find fake!

http://www.wgpkr.com/

By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-08-19


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-08-19

I can't believe I found this thing. It is the coolest thing ever for a GPK collector like me to just run across. After I cleaned it up it looks fantastic black and shiny. And the most awesome thing of all.....


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-08-19

I really want to add it to my large GPK collection but I have to see if any of my GPK collector friends will give me an offer to buy before I list it on Ebay.
If it has to go I want it on display in a fellow collectors collection. I'm sharing this post on Facebook and the GPKUG which is the biggest Garbage Pail Kid collectors forum online.
To make me an offer you can e-mail me at spotter1977@yahoo.com


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-08-19

UNIDOME ANTIQUE SHOW 2012

Here in my hometown of Cedar Falls there is an annual antique and collectables show held at the Unidome, which is a huge sports arena next to the University of Northern Iowa campus.
I found out it was going on when I took my daughter Sam to a local store in the afternoon called 18th Street Vintage. The guys at the store happened to mention it was going on and had hoped that some of the people that came into town would visit their store also.

So Sam and I decided to hurry over to the antique show since we knew there would be a lot to look at and could take quite a while. Thankfully I had the day off work. I've been to this show a few times and I knew it could take hours to look the place over.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

Sam and I scoured the place and saw all kinds of excellent stuff. I took some photos of the stuff I thought was cool.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

I've seen these old Mr. Potato head sets online before, but never one up close.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

Here's Mr. Potato Head's pal Frankie Frank.

Here is a neat Howard the Duck glass from 7-11.




By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

This magazine was a Mad Magazine knock-off that never made it past the first issue. When I went back to the booth to buy it, someone had beaten me to the punch.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

A fat Albert figure I'd never seen before.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

A non-talking PeeWee doll? I have one of these that was supposed to talk but the string broke. I saw another one of these at the show that was larger with a ventriloquist dummy mouth also.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

These wind-ups were $2.50 a piece. I tried to talk the lady down to $1.00 but she refused.

I found all these Evel Knievel dolls still in the original package.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

I also ran across three pieces of Pixieware which was popular during the late 50s and early 60s. They are jars and dishes with pixie heads on them. there are some really awesome ones if you get a chance to Google it sometime check out Howard Holt's "Pixieware".


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

I saw lots of vintage Marx figures including Nutty Mads, and my favorite classic monsters.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

Here's a pic of a California Raisin puppet I'd never seen before.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

I sold some stuff to a couple dealers there which was nice and I made $50. I only bought two things. I got a Topps garbage candy container, and I paid for a whole box of Star Wars ships just to get a gremlin figure that I saw in there. I came out quite a bit ahead.

When I got home and sorted through everything I found some neat figures down in the box including a Dungeons & Dragons figure, a Star Wars Taun Taun, and a dusty old Evel Knievel doll.


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


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By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18


By mrpottersfuntime at 2012-03-18

Overall it was a great time and a nice "daddy-daughter" day.