Dinner and an auction

Saturday evening we attended a banquet with friends. I guess it was for a wildlife foundation for hunters? Basically management of the species so that they flourish and there is enough for the hunters to hunt, is what I gathered. DH doesn't hunt, so not really a huge interest for us, though we do love the wildlife.

Anyhow, it was great company, great food and a great time. The friend and his wife (these are the millionaire folks) buy a table at this banquet every year.  The other guests at the table were 2 nice young couples that work for this guy. Super nice young people. So down to earth.  It was all jeans and cowboy boots (I found mine in a box the day before LOL). Very casual. There was a ton of stuff they were auctioning raffling and auctioning off (silent auction and live auction). We bought lots of raffle tickets (mostly giving away rifles) but didn't get lucky. We bid on a few silent auction items, but ended up getting out bid. We looked through all the live auction items. Didn't see anything we really had to have other than one item we really liked a lot. But of all the items, we figured we'd get outbid anyway - usually items at these types of "for a good cause" auctions tend to go higher priced than I'm willing to spend. In fact, we have been to many of these types of auctions over the years, but never could even bid on anything as we were always broke and we were barely able to afford the tickets to the banquet and a few raffle tickets!

DH spent his cash in his wallet on the raffle tickets - figured if we went out to a nice dinner, we'd spend that  much anyway and again...it's for a good cause....

Dinner was buffet (it was held at a hotel banquet room). Very good prime rib, chicken and other side dishes. There were probably 400 or more people there and the lines moved very fast. We found out the hotel has a restaurant, so we might go back and eat there sometime.

The live auction started after dinner. Our friend bid on (and won) quite a few things. One of the other guys at our table bid on a guitar he really wanted and he won. (the other couple had won a couple silent auction items, but weren't bidding on any live items). The item we really liked was the second from last item. When we looked at it, DH said how much does something like this cost? I said probably about $1500. He looked up on his phone and said yep, you are right. Ya....not in our budget right now. We have it in savings, but not really wanting to spend that much right now.

It seemed every other item was going for it's value (though not sure of value on some items) or more. People were bidding $450 for a 1 in 6 chance to win a rifle valued at like $1500! DH really liked a handmade American flag coffee table. I liked it, but we already have a coffee table and it would have to be something in a certain decor (like I could see it in our bonus room when we build or something like that). It went for like $500.

They had a real auctioneer, which I love listening too. They are so cool. I couldn't keep up with who's bidding and how he keeps up! He did have a few "runners" or whatever they are called. When items came up that our friend bid on I could at least follow along better. Sometimes he just blinked at the auctioneer (we were up front) to bid!

Then the item we really liked came up. DH looked at me and I said "nah, it'll go to high". The bids started and got up to $625 and stalled. DH and I looked at each other and I said "that is worth $700 to me". DH raised his card and we were in at $650. Then someone bid $675 so DH did $700. SOLD for $700!

You can find out what we won in the next post :)