Monday Morning Musings. . .

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Good morning everyone! I am sitting here watching the leaves drift by and listening to the birds signing. Kinda quiet and refreshing I must admit. Grateful for all the blessings of this day and this season of my life!

I have been drawn lately to vintage and antique lamps and lighting. Rather fascinating. I found a Gone With the Wind Type Lamp recently that could have been Fenton but is not marked and so I was hesitant to say for sure. We also have some other lamps we recently listed. Stop by and check them out. If you enjoy searching for and collecting lamps we would love to here of some of your finds or thoughts.

As always comments are welcome.

***Our Store: http://stores.ebay.com/eStuffMart

***Twitter: http://twitter.com/eStuffMart

***See us on Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/25db8gq 

Does Age Matter??

Since I just had a birthday last weekend (yea, I am entering a new phase me thinks) I have pondered on age. Age seems less and less important to me these days unless of course your talking about antiques or vintage treasures!! I have friends who are many years my senior and still as active and productive as many younger counterparts. I am thankful God has protected me and held me in His Hands all these years. I was born a tiny 3 pound "blue baby." In those days being born in a small local hospital the chances of a preemie making it were rather slim. My parents were estranged and my mom really did not want another "mouth to feed." Well, not only did I make it I feel I have had a very productive life, married a wonderful man, have 2 incredible children, 7 amazing grandchildren, blessed beyond belief and certainly not done yet! Okay, enough about me - thanks for reading my tidbit.

We attended an estate sale last evening of a local doctor (dentist to be exact). They had some beautiful items. We purchased an elegant blue art glass, embossed vase. This has sent us on a search to see if we could identify the maker or pattern. We have established it is not Blenko since they do not do cold etching of any sort. We will be adding this to our collection to offer our cherished buyers plus a Federal Glass Carnival vase, 4 nesting Cinderella Pyrex mixing bowls and more!! Adios - gotta get back to listing now.

Thanks for following and as always comments are welcomed!!

***Our Store: http://stores.ebay.com/eStuffMart

***Twitter: http://twitter.com/eStuffMart

***See us on Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/25db8gq

REFLECTIONS ON CHANGE!

A cruise last evening on our lake

After a wonderful day yesterday with our kids and grandkids (including an evening cruise on the lake, see pic) I have a few minutes this crisp Sunday morning to ponder some things! I was thinking about how hard change is sometimes but how necessary. I wonder if the caterpillar wants to be stuck in a cocoon for 2 weeks to months? I really don't think that caterpillar knows what the future holds or what the metamorphosis will bring. Then VIOLA a beautiful butterfly emerges. I think we become so used to the routine and so comfortable there. Well, change can sometimes be refreshing.

With all that in mind - We are doing some research into some new venues, different products, new places to find our treasures, meeting and connecting with new friends! Please check back to see how this METAMORPHOSIS unfolds. Enjoy your week.

Finding Treasures!

Believe it or not there are still valuable finds and money-makers at garage sales!! For us the challenge is the "hunt" in "saleing." A few tips:
1. Try to get there early. There is some truth in the early bird gets the worm. Sometimes I just simply cannot make it early so I go later and on those days I have found some items that were marked down a lot and found some worthwhile bargains.
2. If it is a busy sale pick up and hold on to the item you are considering. That way you know it won't be purchased before you finally decide. You can always put it back.
3. Ask if they would "consider taking less." Be polite. If you anger the seller they may just say no because of the way they are asked.
4. Recently I came across a garage sale that was actually an estate sale. BINGO! I found handpainted glass lamp shades, vintage bakelite jewelry, Murano glass. They only regret is that I only purchased one set of jewelry and I should have made an offer for the box. They were selling them for 50 cents a piece. The piece I purchased (bracelet and earrings went for $67). DUH!!
5. Sometimes I see something and am not sure how much it would sell for. I use my cell phone to look up completed listings on eBay so then I can buy with more confidence knowing what a similar piece actually sold for on eBay. The seller thinks I am texting or something and they do not realize I am checking prices. :))

Happy Saleing!!

http://stores.ebay.com/eStuffMart

Internet Withdrawal!

Good morning,

Our internet had been down almost a week and yesterday it came back up! I had serious withdrawal. Amazing how dependent we are on our on-line activities. My husband and I both have home offices and work from home. He is a VP of sales for an internet company. I manage our eStuffmart ebay store and auctions. He does our fabulous shipping and we both search for unusual treasures. I also am an RN and now do medical transcription for a national transcription company. Soooo, you see all we do involves the internet. I guess we were supposed to spend the Labor Day weekend with our family and not WORK. Fun but somehow does not pay the bills :(. Well, I did get the enjoy our kids and grandkids, play on the lake, eat and eat and eat. Hope all of you had a great Labor Day weekend.

We do have some new items to list so stay tuned for more vintage, antique and collectible items! Thanks again to our faithful followers and buyers. We have made wonderful friends and appreciate each one of you.

We welcome and enjoy feedback so feel free to post thoughts or comments.

What should I sell on eBay??

I already mentioned finding things around your house to sell. Think of some things you enjoy collecting or doing. I like crafts and had a craft business in the past, so I have a lot of supplies related to that. I gathered up some items I no longer needed or used and sold them on eBay. You would be amazed!! Things you think are not worth much will actually sell. I had quite a bit of fabric stashed away. I sold it in 'lots' or several pieces together and they went pretty well. I used to do latch hooking and had the latch hook and several unopened kits - they went well. I had inherited my mother's crochet supplies including vintage patterns and hooks - those went well. If you take the money you earn by selling some things around your house and invest in buying some more items to sell it will grow. The key is to buy low.

I would enjoy hearing about your 'stories' of eBay selling and how you found things around your home to sell. I think our readers would enjoy that too!! Just post them as comments to this blog post. Thanks.

Diana

You Gotta Jump In To Learn To Swim

I was thinking about the Winter Olympics - timely eh?? Those Gold Medal swimmers had to get in the water before they could learn to swim and then excel. I would image they could come up with many, many reasons why not to jump in like it's cold, I don't have that kind of energy, what if I fail, people will make fun of me, I will look funny, too many other good swimmers and on and on! It's that way with any venture and especially eBay or any other on-line business. You really cannot know how it will go until YOU JUMP IN. You cannot learn by just merely sitting on the bleachers.

A couple thoughts about eBay. When you sell online you are really only limited by a few things:
1. Your ability to find more merchandise to re-sell. 2. Your time. 3. Your negative self-talk.......

Wow! I'm excited about the future of online auctions and marketplace. I see them as a huge wave that we definitely want to catch. Hop on the board with us - there is room.

Off to do more listing!!

Why eBay?

The question I want to address today is why use eBay to launch out in an at-home business? Ebay gets a lot of bad press but still research into various different auction websites revealed that eBay attracted almost 60% more bidders and 30% higher prices than identical items on any other online auction. So, it is a very big pond with lots of fish. Ebay buyers spent over $59 billion last year! That is nothing to sneeze at and we believe you can have a piece of that pie.

The first step to selling and developing an on-line business on eBay is to Register (if you have not already done so). The registration process is pretty simple and self-explanatory.

Well, off to list more INCREDIBLE 99 cent AUCTIONS!!

Feel free to follow us and ask questions or comment. That helps us know what is on your mind. :))

Do you really want a Home-Based Business?

Did you know there are 1.3M or more full-time eBay sellers? In the last post I stated we would talk about the title but actually I think there are some preliminary steps we need to cover before the title. One of the first questions to ask yourself is, "Do I want a home-based business?"

Some advantages of a home-based business are: Personal freedom; You get to keep the money you make; Increased opportunity; Less risk; Tax advantages; More time for friends and family; Less stress; Opportunities for professional growth; Increased productivity; A creative outlet.

Some disadvantages: It is easy to neglect your family; Work is never finished; Sitting too long at the keyboard; Financial stress during start-up phase; Handling interruptions (this is a huge one).

Okay -- You decide. I really think it depends on your commitment to working at home. I find I tend to be a workaholic and spend way too many hours sitting at the computer and probably neglect my family. Interruptions are difficult for me to deal with. All-in-all I still choose working at home versus going back into the work force. I am an RN and worked many years in hospital and clinic settings. I choose being home.

Getting Ready to Sell on eBay - First Days

We decided to start selling on eBay but really did not know where to start. We began looking around our house and picked out about 10 things we no longer were using but thought they might be worth trying to sell. Before evening signing up to sell we did some searches to see what might be popular. If you go into eBay and find the Advanced Search near the main Search bar at the top. In the first box enter how you would search for the item you are doing research. Such as: Vintage Hull dish, then check the box completed listings, hit enter or search. You will have a list of completed listings and see the ones in green which have already sold. In the Sort By drop down box to the right choose highest first. You will then know if the vintage Hull dish sells and how high. In the next post we will talk about some things to include in a title.

Thanks for dropping by our blog. Stay tuned for more!!!

Diana
eStuffMart

How we got started selling on eBay.

We had a brick and mortar shop in Colorado and decided to put our store experience into an online presence! We have had a great time and met so many wonderful people through selling on ebay. We are now in the developing stages of our own website. We will be blogging about some ideas to help you sell and make money on eBay in the future. Check back often.