I sold a couple of bits from the loft. They were items I'd bought when DH fell off the shed and smashed his shoulder and upper arm. We'd never used them, we'd kept them in case they came in handy. I've got so much "might come in handy" stuff in my loft, and I' decided to get rid of some of it - especially stuff that I could re-buy if needed.
We did a tip run with some electrical items I'd been keeping as spares, an old monitor (plus the table I smashed the other week when I fell on it, and some garden bits).
Anyway, while I was waiting for them to be collected, I decided to sew up the tee shirt (version D) that I cut out the other day. (I was reasonably happy with Version C, but my back was a bit of a mess. The back is a bit of a mess, so it wasn't the pattern's fault, I just needed to work out how to disguise it)
The front wasn't bad at all. The back was still not quite right. I knew this would be the case as I did a bit of a botch job of easing in one of the sides, but I was sure I'd got something wrong in the measurements. Or I needed to amend them to force a change.
I looked at the measurements (Apostrophe Patterns are fab, they list all the measurements you used, right on the pattern piece) and got out my tape measure to try and match things up on the pattern. I had an idea of which measurements were awry, and which was tweakable.
I decided to do some adjustments, so I re-measured myself in a couple of places, did some tweaks, and I've now printed version E.
At this point, it was time for the buyer to arrive. They were prompt, and they were lovely. I had planned to offer them a discount because they bought two of my items, but didn't. They were due to have an op, and I could see what was being operated on. I said I hoped it would go well, and they told me what they were having done. It was drastic, and I was taken by surprise.
I didn't want to offer platitudes, so I said I was sorry and that I didn't know what to say. They were amazing, no self pity or anything. I don't think I'd be that strong if I was in the same circumstances. I didn't offer the discount, because I thought it would look like I was doing it out of pity, and I guessed that they probably didn't want pity. They said if I came across anything else that might be helpful, to let them know.
I wished I'd said about the discount before they collected the items. I followed up later to ask what else they needed - I said my DB was amazing at finding things at Car Boot sales, and he would be able to look out for items. At my request, they sent a pic of one thing they wanted, and I shared the pic with my amazing brother, asking him to keep an eye out if he went Booting this weekend.
I browsed selling sites that evening, found one, which was a bargain but turned out to be way above their budget. I joined and checked out some of the disability ad selling groups, but couldn't find anything.
This morning, my brother phoned me from a boot sale, and sent me a pic. It looked the right sort of thing, but it's not always easy to tell. The price was excellent, so I asked him to go ahead and get it. If it had been a lot of money, I probably wouldn't have taken the risk - but I'd seen enough listings to know we'd be able to sell it for what we paid.
I messaged the intended recipient and sent them a pic and the price. I explained that if it wasn't right, not to hesitate to say so, as I would easily be able to sell it for the same price on one of the disability groups. [I was acutely aware that this was probably all a bit weird from their point of view].
As it turned out, it wasn't the wrong sort of thing at all - far from it. It was also in great condition, which was such an unexpected bonus. I was able to retrospectively give them the discount,soit was even less than I'd originally told them, so I was happy.
My lovely DB delivered it to them on his way home from the Boot Sale, and they were really happy with it.
So a good couple of days.
