I Heart Craig's List

Have I mentioned lately my undying love for Craig's List? Not only did we recently purchase the fabulous overstuffed chair, but we also recently got a beautiful entertainment armoire. Why pay full price when I can get much nicer stuff then I could normally afford at a fraction of the price.

I also love CL because we are making a bunch of money selling our unwanted stuff. This week alone we made close to $300. Granted this is an unusual week since we're trying to downsize. It's so exciting to see stuff walk out the door to find a new home with someone that will appreciate it, while pocketing the cash that we desperately need for stuff in our new house (curtains, paint etc...).

I'm now trying to pass on the love for CL to the next generation - namely Ian. He decided that he wanted a new bike with training wheels - he's officially outgrown his tricycle. So, I said "ok - if you want a bike then you have to find some toys to sell so that you can get enough money to buy a bike." I figured I could kill two birds with one stone -- help him learn the value of money and get rid of some of his unused toys at the same time. So, he decided to sell his wooden train tracks and accessories. I figured we would be able to fetch a pretty penny for his collection and I was right. I listed it for $50 and we got that much this afternoon. Honestly, he probably could've gotten more, but I wanted to sell them fast and I knew that this was a very good price. You wouldn't believe how expensive wooden train tracks are. Most of what we had was used (I bought a big box from a friend), but I did buy one piece in the store and paid $2.19 for that ONE piece of track.

It's been a tough wait for Ian the last few days. How do you explain to a 5 year old the concept of posting something online to sell and then waiting for someone to respond. That first day he must have asked me every 3 minutes if it sold yet or if someone was going to come pick it up now. On Saturday the questions were spread out to every 30 minutes to an hour and today I honestly don't think he's asked me at all. We'll see if he notices that they're gone when he gets up from his nap. I hope he doesn't because I don't know when we'll be able to go shopping for a bike. I've been trying to search on CL, but it looks like they're doing site maintenance today. Not only that, but we have plans this evening anyway.

I'm sure he'll get his bike soon enough and I hope that this is the first step on the road to learning the value of money. I guess the next step will be to give him an allowance, but for now I'm hoping that I'll just be able to get him to pare down his "stuff".