Magpie Monday - End of the Year?

Yep. It might be the first week in November (just about), but according to my local car boot, it's the end of the year, and they're finishing now til about April.  I can see their point, it was a quagmire yesterday, and I really wished I'd got my wellies on.  Now I've got to take the car through the carwash (sorry, I'm lazy), and clean the buggy wheels.  In fact, can I do that at the car wash too?

Right. Well.  Anyway.  There's getting less stalls now as well, so nowhere near the chance of finding something lovely as earlier in the season.  I've been really jealous of people who've found lovely vintage Ladybird books for pennies, because I only ever see them in Hay-on-Wye with crazy price tags.  So when I spotted a pile of books today with those distinctive matte cardboard covers, I had to have a closer look.  Sadly most of the Ladybirds were newer, and the few vintage ones were dull and/or badly looked after.

The stall didn't disappoint though.  Someone who knows far more about these things than I was haggling out a bargain on a vintage early 70's Sindy doll, still in her box.  I wouldn't have known where to start with that, so I was glad to be out of it.  I did spot a pile of other old children's books, and took a closer look.  TBH I was hoping for The Eagle, Beano or Dandy, but my luck wasn't quite that good.  I couldn't leave the Enid Blyton Bedtime Annual of 1978 behind though, could I?  Sadly the binding's a bit shaky & there's a page missing out of the middle, but these things happen.  I'm particularly amused by the title of the last page "I Love Little Pussy"  (Oh dear, the google hits I'm going to pick up from that don't bear thinking about.)

And in addition to our old friend Enid, I also found a gorgeous pop-up fairy tales book, which I simply couldn't leave behind.  Sorry about the flash flare at the bottom, it's a really really yellow-tinted book, and all the rest of my pics were coming out looking like they had jaundice. It was 75p back in 1982 when it was printed, so the fact I paid 50p for the pair is a bit of a bargain.  This reminds me of the kind of books my cousins & I used to share at my grandparents' house when we were little.  I wonder if the Rupert Bear annuals are still there?

Do you know how difficult it is to take photos of pop-up books, by the way?  I didn't, but I do now.  There's only 3 stories in the book, but each one has a pop-up scene, and this one is my favourite.  (Any secret nail-bloggers reading this, I'm wearing Revlon's Facets of Fuchsia)

So, that's the car boots over for another year. Good job I've got a stash of finds I haven't shown you yet!  What have you found? Pop over to Missie Lizzie's place & tell the world.