Hi!

Happy Spring, Easter and Passover! I am hoping that your sales on eBay have been off the charts just like ours have been. We are having a record year so far with sales exceeding $10,000 each month! It has been such a blessing.

I believe a big part of this success has been the 50% off sale I have been running on about 8,000 of our oldest items. Here is one of those items that sold recently.

Click here to see this auction.

It is with a very heavy heart that I write the next part of this ezine. My dad, aka Papa, as most of you know him, was recently diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. It has spread to his liver and his kidneys. He is a fighter and he has many people praying for him . I am hopeful that a few more of you will join us in our prayers.

My dad is the kindest and most giving person I know. He is that one special person who is always more concerned with how you are doing than how he is doing. He loves my kids more than anything and with God’s help and our prayers, he will be visiting us here in Rancho Mirage, next Monday 4/24, for a week.

Now, let’s share a score to lighten the mood. I bought this frame in Bellingham when Mo, Kel and Candy visited Bellingham for a girl’s weekend this past September. If you missed that crazy fun visit you can read about it here in this past ezine .

Click here to see this auction.

Since we got back from our European Vacation, it has been one whirlwind of activity. I have been sorting, sorting and doing more sorting to get out of my office space by May 31st. I recently decided that with everything that is going on, I am going to extend my office lease to June 30th and then reevaluate month by month.

Coco, Queen’s Court Member extraordinaire, has been helping me every Thursday to sort and either put it in a “to list” box or a “donate” box. It has been a tremendous help….so thank you Coco!

As we sort, she always seems to find something that reminds her of her childhood or something that her nephews or niece may like. I always tell her to please take it if she likes it. Most of the time she says “NO” but there was one time that she said “YES” and grabbed this super cool vintage airplane tray. Both of her nephews, Eric (the former MLB player) and CJ are pilots and she knew that they would love it!

I haven’t bought ANYTHING new to list on eBay since I have been sorting back there. I have so much amazing stuff to list that there is absolutely NO reason to buy anything else. Check out these really cool wall candle holder reflectors that recently sold at auction from my warehouse “stash.”

Click here to see this auction.

In some super happy news, Indiana was accepted into 15 out of the 16 colleges she applied to attend. Her plan is to pursue a degree in Musical Theatre. OMG! Seriously? Way to go Indy girl!

There were only five colleges that required auditions or audition interviews….USC, Azusa Pacific, Pepperdine, UCLA and Fordham. This leads me to believe that they have the best Theatre programs.

Here are the colleges that accepted her into their Theatre program (assuming they have one, but most do), Biola, Boston College, LMU, USC, Notre Dame, Pepperdine, Azusa Pacific, Vanguard, Saint Mary’s, UC Irvine, Berkeley, College of the Holy Cross, and University of San Diego.

Here are the colleges that she was not accepted into their Theatre programs, but was admitted, UCLA and Fordham. The only college she did not get accepted into was…..drum roll please……the same one rejection letter that I received……But I was three for four (UofW, USC & Whitman) and Indiana is 15 for 16…..Stanford. Their loss!

Here she is with her first college acceptance.

She has narrowed it down to two schools, Pepperdine and Notre Dame. Please pray for her to make the right decision. She has until May 1st, when the deposits are due.

OK, time for a score. Another item that I found in the back and it sold at auction. Amazing! I need to get all of that shizzle listed. LOL

Click here to see this auction.

Indy was recently the bird seller in the play Sweeney Todd. You wanna talk depressing? Well, that play was macabre. Indy did an amazing job and she was so wonderful as both the bird seller and a member of the ensemble cast. I invited all my friends with an email that had this subject line..."Any of you want to go see this SUPER depressing thriller with me? Indy has a small part.”

I just bought a $15 ticket for Friday night….looks like they have only sold about 25 seats….let me know and I will get you tickets.

Well, at that point you know who your real friends are….LOL. Mo, Kel and Kelly Flanagan all wanted to attend. Thank you girls! You ROCK! Here is an amazing picture that Kflan (that is what I call Kelly Flanagan) took.

Here we all are after the play with Indy and her flowers. She did an AWESOME job!

Time for a score that relates to music. This is an item that I sold for my brother. Took a best offer of $125.00. Nice!

Click here to see this auction.

Indy left for New York on Tuesday, April 18th for a six day theatre trip with her Musical Theatre University. The students who are on the trip will take four master classes from current Broadway stars, see three Broadway plays and get to perform at a very famous venue. What an interesting and an amazing experience!

Here is a score of a very interesting item that recently sold for a best offer of $200. Yay!

Click here to see this auction.

The same day Indy left, Houston arrived home from Heidelberg. He wanted to head straight to Pepperdine to spend time with his friends, so instead of me getting to see him and bring him home, my brother went to LAX to pick him up for me. He will get a ride from his dad back to the desert on April 20th, which is today! I can’t wait to see him.

Here he is with Uncle Lee at LAX.

Although, Houston had the time of his life, he has been texting me recently that he is ready to come home. I was curious as to why and he explained that “It’s just time haha. I’ve been here awhile."

Check out this epic photo of Houston standing in front of all of the faculty and the staff.

Houston is wearing a wool blazer that we bought him at Revivals Thrift store over Christmas and the brown cords I bought for him when we were all in Heidelberg. He looks so collegiate .

The reason he was facing everyone is that I am guessing that he is taking a one second video. He took a ton of one second videos during his first semester and Indiana made it into a cool youtube video.

Here is a link if you want to watch semester one .

Here is an item that recently sold for a best offer of over $100 and reminds me of Pepperdine. Surfboards…

Click here to see this auction.

So our Queen’s Court challenge for April has been an interesting one. As you know, I have been working very hard to weed through all of my unlisted inventory. In fact, today I donated 50 boxes full of books, glass, lamp shades, etc. and 8 huge garbage bags of Brenthaven computer sleeves. It really made me feel so happy and enlightened. It lightened my load… both literally and figuratively .

Here is one of the back aisles where nothing is listed with all the donate boxes on the floor.

Here is the Coachella Valley Rescue Mission truck with most of my stuff in it. Tyler and Antonio were awesome and did a great job loading it all up.

So here is how the April challenge came to be….

While I was going through all of those old boxes of stuff that have not been listed yet with Coco’s (fellow QCers) help, I asked her what do you think would be a great challenge for April?

She thought about it and came up with a few suggestions…none of them struck a chord with me and after three hours of cleaning off 8 shelves (thank you Coco), she called me from her car and said, “I think I have it!”

She suggested a month long challenge of exploring your inner creative (aka artistic April) self and trying something new that is outside of your COMFORT zone. I LOVED IT!

I think she was suggesting it so that I would try to cook something special for my kids for dinner. NEVER gonna happen. But I liked the challenge.

One of our newer QC members, Lizzie, is from England and here is what she posted….

I wrote back….

Here is the photo of Indy’s art studio that I had created for her when she was away at a bible camp. It was my creative goal for April to finally recreate that same space here in our new garage….when we had to move into our new home two Decembers ago…Yikes! I still haven’t gotten it set up. I will do it before month’s end to meet April’s challenge goal!

I wrote back to Lizzie…

Nice! And so inspiring!

I have been very inspired lately and can’t wait to open up my Grandmother’s new/old antiques store in Bellingham. I flew up there as soon as I found out my dad was sick and got to spend a lot of time with him.

I was also able to watch Gonzaga advance to the finals for basketball at his house with a lot of family around. It was great. Too bad that final game was such a terrible game for the Zags. I actually blame the coach for that loss. What do you all think?

Here I am with my dad while watching the final game.

And, I also got to spend a lot of time with my darling nephews since it was Spring Break.

While in Bellingham from April 1st to the 4th, I think I found some retail space. Super excited about it. Hopefully, it will work out and I will be opening up sometime in early Fall.

Here is a recent score that sold on eBay for full asking price. I bought it in a Bellingham antique store for $5.00. Yowza!

Click here to see this auction.

So while up in Bellingham checking out retail space, Audrey Angel, my first Cheryl Leaf employee met me and my mom at several of the spaces. This is the one that we all liked the best, but it was priced over market price. Trying to work out a deal with them that will work for both of us.

This past winter in Bellingham was super harsh, so while I was in Bellingham Audrey asked if she could come down and visit. I said “Absolutely! Houston’s bedroom will be empty until April 20th, so please take us up on our offer. Mi casa es su casa. Our house is your house.”

She made plans to come down for a few days. We ended up having a blast. Audrey was my original employee at Cheryl Leaf Antiques and she and I toured a lot of Consignment stores here in the Coachella Valley and came up with some awesome ideas!

We also had some really fun nights out with my friends. Here are Audrey and I at Guillermo’s before Mo, Kflan and Lori showed up. It turned out to be a super fun night and we ubered home. Never drink and drive.

While cleaning up the back of the warehouse and sorting with Audrey and Coco, I found a pile of old family newspaper articles, ancient black and white photos (I do mean ancient like 1930’s) and two color photos. It was the strangest thing. Maybe it was meant to be….Kismet. The two color photos were of my two kids with Audrey’s two kids.

Our kids were born within months of each other. Houston was first in July of 1996, then Audrey and John’s, Madeline, came along a month later in August. Here they are at Elizabeth Park in the gazebo for Madeline’s 3th birthday party. How cute is this?

And what is even stranger, is that we were at Elizabeth Park in Bellingham twice this past summer. I do think that someone, or a few people, are sending me a sign.

In addition to that color photo, I found this color photo and while holding it and wondering who the kids were…Audrey from about 10 feet away saw it upside down and said “That’s Indy and Ana at the same birthday party.” What? Yikes!

Indy was born in December of 1998 so she would have been 8 months old and Anabelle was born in March of 1999 so she would have been 5 months old in that photo. WOW!

So here is one final awesome score to share with you! This sold for full price today, but I had to ship it to Australia. Ughhh! But Thank GOD for our international sales!

Click here to see this auction.

Also, while cleaning up I found these amazing vintage photos of my dad. When I said that the only new color photos I found were of Audrey’s kids with mine, I was serious.

This first photo is one of my absolute favorites of my dad. It is him on the left, my mom’s cousin Donald in the center and my grandfather, Elmer Leaf, on the right. I have to smile at the 22 on the cabin they are staying in as that is my favorite number and it was always Houston’s baseball number.

I was talking to my mom about it and she said “that is not a hunting cabin, that is where your dad and I lived when we were married students at WSU (Washington State University) in Pullman and they were converted army barracks. The address is 22 Fairway Lane.” Yikes is all I could say.

We all agreed that my dad and my grandfather’s big smiles just show how happy they were that day. My grandfather had one of his favorite dogs, Brit, with him and Brit was just a puppy. Oh those great old days . Please bring them back.

Here is one last crazy old photo to share. It is of my grandpa Elmer Leaf barbequing behind the antique shop, my grandmother setting up a table and my dad sitting and watching before this area became a driveway.

I love this because it looks so staged…like a photo shoot for Better Homes & Gardens and my mom laughed when I told her that because she said “that backyard was not worthy of Better Homes & Gardens.” LOL. I loved that little space .

OK, one more score from something I inherited from my grandmother and was used in her home…since her home is shown in that last photo . These andirons were in my grandmother’s private residence and inside her fireplace.

She used that fireplace daily to burn all of her private papers. She was way smart. She knew that no one should see her personal information…again way ahead of her time. I miss you Cheryl Leaf and please pray for my dad, Wayne Dralle, I don’t want to miss him yet…it is too soon.

Click here to see this auction.

Thanks for reading my ezines! I appreciate it!
Happy eBaying!
Lynn

Lynn Dralle, 'The Queen of Auctions,'
Creator of the best-selling eBay Boot Camp in a Box.