More
My dad has been in town for a few weeks now and it has been great to have him back down here in California. He hasn’t visited since February. Way too long! The modus operandi is this: you get off of the plane and I whisk you away to do some work at HQ (headquarters)! My poor parents. My mom arrived a few days ago and the same thing happened to her.
My parents were here to help celebrate Indy’s birthday. She turned 12 this month. Check out this fun sign I had her school run on her birthday. I picked her up after school and wanted to take a picture of her in front of it and she was too embarrassed. We had to go back at night (in the dark) to take the photo. Pre-teens 
!
Then she had a sleepover birthday party for four girls plus herself in our new EMPTY Rec Room (that was formerly the eBay room). That was interesting. They actually got along very well and the party was a huge success. My kids love having their huge house back, clean and void of eBay items. I, however, am having a hard time not working on eBay listing at home. I am sure I will get used to it but it has been a difficult transition.
Here is Indy and her friends at the party with a creepy Santa Claus doll that I got from….of course….my Grandma!
Luckily for my parents, Houston had a baseball tournament while they were both here. His team took first place in the American Division and Houston had some huge hits. He also pitched incredibly well against a Major team out of Los Angeles. Amazingly enough, we watched four games last weekend in the rain here in Palm Desert. Southern Cal has just been getting deluged with rainfall.
Here are the boys after their win.
We have all been working incredibly hard at HQ. Carmen, Mo and I are all trying to list 100 new items each per week at auction. We are up to 251 at auction today. We struggled some with the inside photo studio but Lee came out from LA this past weekend also and he got it fixed up for me in about two minutes! Yay. I felt like I was a student at my own Live Boot Camp!Â
All the boxes from my grandmother and all the inventory I have been buying over the past eight years are all now ensconced at HQ. I call this mountain of boxes the Alps and it is my New Years Resolution to get it all listed in 2011. Wish me luck. I will definitely need it.
The Alps
One of the first things we have been doing is to get the larger items listed and out of the way. I couldn’t believe it when this Santa Claus that I bought for $20 for my kids several years ago sold for SOOOOO much. Merry Christmas to me!
Singin' Swingin' Santa
Check out the Santa Claus Listing to learn how much it sold on eBay!
I did eBay Radio with Griff and Lee last week and we talked a lot about headquarters and how I am trying to grow my eBay sales to $1 million in 2011. If you missed that interview you can access it in the archives from the eBay Radio broadcast page.
I have three things that I am doing to increase my eBay sales. Tripling my eBay auction listings each week, tripling my total store inventory numbers and tripling my average sales price. My average sales price right now is about $16.58. We are shooting for an average sales price of about $50.00.
Here is an item that sold recently that is one of those higher end antique/collectible items that I am sourcing and (YAY) selling!
Devon Rose Wedgwood England Georgian Teapot
Check it out the listing for this Devon Rose Wedgwood Teapot.
As a thank you to my family for all of their hard work, I took them out for a really nice pre-Christmas dinner at the Homestead restaurant in La Quinta. It is a really cute place that used to be a ranch home. They have an outdoor fire pit where you can make complimentary s’mores after dinner. The kids loved it but it was the night after the baseball tournament and the day after Indy’s sleepover birthday, so both kids could barely stay awake!
The Family at Dinner
