Once Kyle received his mission call, I decided that I wanted to have a yard sale to help fund his mission. I was already in the de-junking mode as I was prepping our home for house guests and also for a new employee. So much of the items I was trying to move were toys. 
Since I am known for my cookies, I thought it wouldn't hurt to make 6 different kinds and sell large cookies for $1 each. I made peanut butter, snickerdoodles, ginger, soft chocolate chip, double dark chocolate and M&M. All cookies were individually wrapped.
I also reached out to everyone and asked if anyone had items sitting around their home that they would be willing to donate to our Yard Sale, I would gladly take anyone gently used items.
I was amazed at how generous my friends were and the items they donated. We even got large furniture. A bit nervous those items wouldn't sell and then it was up to me to donated them to Goodwill or Deseret Industries. The date was set for Saturday, July 18th. I had been preparing for a good couple of weeks.
I learned on Wednesday that week that on Friday, July 17th, I was only going to have 2 children that day, so I took advantage of that and on Thursday the 16th, I prepped my DC kitchen with all the toys. Just like the Yard Sale I did back in 2011 (for Ireland) I knew I wanted to keep all the toys inside because it was too much to drag outside. I had a sign that let people know that children's items were inside.
By the end of my work day on Thursday, the whole children's section was set up and families actually came and purchased at time of picking up their kids. By the end of Thursday (2-days before the actual yard sale started) I had already made $90. On Friday, I contacted all my coop friends and some of the ladies from church to let them take a look a day early. Especially the gals from church that had boys about Kyle's size. Thought they might want first picks of his really nice clothes. I couldn't believe how busy I was that morning. For about 3-hours straight I had tons of friends here. I had made $800 by the end of Friday and my sale didn't technically start until the next morning.
Saturday morning, Ryan and I got up at 4:30 and started taking everything that wasn't toys, outside. I went and hung up signs at 6 AM. Sale was from 8-4 that day. By 7:15, people were showing up. By the end of the day, our grand total in sales was slightly over $1700! I started to cry. That was 3-months of Kyle's mission paid for, plus his $300 mobile device and a little extra left for the last minute items we needed to purchase before he left. I truly felt the Lord was blessing me that day. I couldn't have done it without all the donations from my friends.
When all was said and done, the items that I felt could still be sold, I donated to the Shorecrest Rummage Sale for their Ireland trip in 2016. I also donated a ton of items to the Shoreline School District Works program for those students in need of clothing. The items I didn't care about, we donated to the Goodwill. Despite the 90+ degree weather that day, we had the place all put back together and ready for business by Monday morning.
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