The One That Got Away

Tonight I somehow made my way onto eBay. If there's anything that can suck me in for hours at a time, it's eBay. A long, long time ago, I registered with eBay through my office email address, because I didn't have a home computer at that time. And when my office cracked down on employee use of the office email, I drastically curtailed my eBay excursions--even though I could, by then, access it from my home computer. But every so often, to this day, I get dragged down into the quicksand that is eBay.

Like tonight. I started out looking for a particular line of semi-older fabric which, for me, is the gateway drug of auction shopping. From there, I moved onto pottery and glass, reminiscing about the auctions in the past that I let slip by or lost to another buyer. Like the covered pedestal cake dish that looked like a lovely red and white wrapped gift. Or the seductively curved chocolate pot. I have, though, managed to score several cherished pieces. Like the coin dot pitcher that resides in our hutch and which human hands are not allowed to touch; especially not clumsy male human hands. You can see it in the photo below--that white pitcher on the middle shelf behind glass.

It's a bit more "frou-frou" than my normal tastes, but there's something about it I love. I think it might be because it reminds me of agates a little bit, and I also love agates. One of my bosses gave me a Christmas gift in the form of lovely green cash, and I used part of it to buy myself that pitcher one year.

Every now and then, I'll get on eBay and search for the things I didn't win the first time I saw them, but rarely have I gotten lucky that way. I think the key is to make up your mind and try to buy them when you see them, don't you think? There are also a few things I look for to add to what I already have. For instance, awhile ago, I found a plate just like this one at Goodwill:

It's a line called Wild Poppy by Poppytrail which was manufactured by California Pottery. The colors are brilliant and the plate looks like a handpainted work of art. The one I found at Goodwill cost 49 cents. The ones I find on eBay cost more--particularly when you add on shipping and handling, which can often be a killer when it comes to heavy dishes and pottery.

Each piece in the line is a little different. For instance, here's what the dinner plate looks like:

I don't know why, but most of the sellers don't realize there's an "up" and "down" to this pattern--the poppy stems should point down. Duh! Anyway, all of the Wild Poppy pieces on eBay tonight were a little more than I wanted to spend, so I finally pulled myself away. But the day was not without its good deals. A lunch time trip to Goodwill netted me these treasures:

An oldish Pyrex pie dish (we're getting rid of all of our metal bakeware because we hate the rust that inevitably develops at some point, and I've got apple pies to bake!) and two Ball canning jars with the old screw on lids. I don't think I've EVER seen those types of canning jars at Goodwill; usually I come across them at antique stores or fairs, and the sellers want WAAAAY more than Goodwill's price of 99 cents and 49 cents--I'm still amazed that they had them priced so low!

And now that I think about it, I think that's what got me to log onto eBay tonight--after the excellent thrift store results, I probably felt it was my lucky day. But at eBay tonight, that wasn't the case, so I'll just keep dreaming about the ones that got away.

Do you shop eBay? If you do, what do you regret not "winning" and still think about?