More Goodwill Bargains

The kids and I went into Salem today for a fun trip to the Goodwill Outlet Center. If you've never been to one you should visit just to see how amusing they can be. I haven't been to the Salem one in ages though I used to visit fairly regularly before I had kids. In fact I'm still wearing several clothing items I picked up then! The Goodwill Outlet Center is different from a regular Goodwill in that everything is dumped into humongous plastic bins on wheels and the bins are placed in a huge warehouse room and periodically removed from the floor and new bins take their place. That's when the scavengers come elbowing in and it can get a little messy as people swarm in to grab all the "good" stuff before someone else can take it.

I put both kids in the cart and started hunting as soon as I got there. I forgot how much fun it is and also how exhausting it is. The bins are loosely sorted so that all the clothing/linens/bedding/soft goods are dumped together, books are together, shoes are together, and everything else is together. If you've spent 90 minutes heaving large piles of clothing and bedding around you'll know why it's tiring. Especially when you're also carrying a heavy diaper bag because your kids won't stay out of it when it's in your cart. Since the soft goods are all jumbled together it can be a pain to sort through since Mens, Womens, Kids, Baby, blankets, bath rugs, shower curtains, sleeping bags, towels, and anything else soft is all together. What's really annoying is when you find the pajama top but can't find the matching bottoms or vice versa.

Ethan did his best to give away his shoes. He drove me nuts because he kept taking off one shoe (he was wearing Crocs) and throwing it into a nearby bin. Then I'd have to hunt for the shoe and hope nobody had grabbed it in the meantime. Luckily the other shoppers were helpful and would give it back to me. He said "uh oh" every time he took his shoe off and I think I heard that phrase uttered 6,000 times in the 90 minutes we were there. Grace just laid on the pillow in the cart and wouldn't keep her shoes on either. At least she didn't dump her shoes in the plastic bins though!

Back to the bargains. The pricing at the Goodwill Outlet is by the pound for most things. I wound up buying 7.8lbs of soft goods which was $12.40 and $6 for two larger items which were sold for $3 apiece. Here's my soft goods loot:

I found two pairs of capri pajama bottoms for me, an REI coat for me, a fleece zippered vest for me, a skirt for me, two funky shirts for me, a pair of velour lounge pants for me, a striped polo for David, a scarf for me, two pairs of Hanna Andersson tights for re-sale (or I'll keep if I don't sell but they won't fit Grace for YEARS!), two pieces of textured fabric I bought for doing photos with, and a memory foam pillow I also bought for doing photos. That's right, I made out like a bandit this trip and the kids got diddly squat! Mostly because there wasn't anything good to be found in their sizes. I saw lots of small sizes so anyone needing baby clothes ought to make a trip. At $1.59 a pound you can't go wrong.

I also found this cool wooden crate that I want to use for something. Not sure what I'll use it for quite yet, but something.

And this funky piece of luggage. It was open when I found it but when I closed it I discovered it wouldn't re-open again because it locks. No big deal since I want it for display. The other side has the locks. I thought it was kind of cool looking!