Where I've been

So I've been negligent in my blogging for the past few weeks, so I thought I would show you what I have been doing instead. Okay - other than the usual. I know you don't want to see pictures of piles of dirty dishes (oh- wait, Mike does those), piles of laundry dirty & clean, children at the table waiting for meals, me driving the kids around in the van, me sweeping the floor, kids eating meals, kids eating snacks, hmmm, I'm sure there' s more... But on to what was taking up so much of my time these last few weeks - JBF!

Just Between Friends is a big consignment sale that happens twice yearly. There are sales throughout the US, but the one in Fort Worth is one of the biggest (yeah for me!). This is where I buy the majority of the kids clothes. And where I have started to sell some of the clothes they have outgrown and some of the baby equipment/toys. It's a great thing - I save money & also lots of time. I can't imagine having to go to the mall and do all the shopping for them! And it's great fun, too. The ladies that own & run the franchise here are great (Pam & Joannie). If you want to get into the sale on the first night, you work volunteer hours during the sale (a minimum of one 4-hour shift). I worked 12 hours during this last sale & did one job at home, so I was pretty busy. You price and tag your own clothes (they have an online system where you enter your tags and then print out barcoded tags) so that also takes up lots of time! Mike was great this time - he had all 3 kids by himself most of one weekend and then maybe 3 or 4 weeknights, too, but he never complained. Here are some pictures of the girls helping me get ready for the sale (funny thing - I noticed after taking the pictures that they are both wearing outfits I bought at previous JBF sales):







Yes - I make my children do my work for me. But as Clara shows in this video, they really enjoy themselves. She was just busy entertaining herself as she cut out the tags.



She didn't even know I was taking this video. And I have to say, she must have been cutting tags for a good half an hour. I wasn't thinking when I split up the pile & I gave Big Sis & Little Sis the same amount. But Clara kept at it & after I had pinned tags on the clothes, Gracie sorted all the clothes by size for me (by reading the tags). We had quite a system going - they helped me get all 113 items ready!

So here's why I love to shop the sale (beyond the fact that it's fun & I have good friends that I always see at the sale):

This is mostly the baby stuff & toys:


And here are the clothes:



The space they rent is the size of 2 football fields! More fun and better than a department store any day!

Their website is jbfsale.com and that will direct you to any sale in the U.S.