Families can find bargain children’s merchandise and have a car safety seat check this weekend at the Lil’ Angels Attic Sale.

The spring sale, hosted by Broadway United Methodist Church on Melrose Street, opens to the public at 9 a.m. Friday with hours until 7 p.m. and from 9 a.m. to noon Saturday.

The Kentucky Office of Highway Safety will have a free car safety seat check from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. in the church’s parking lot. Parents should allow 20 minutes for each check.

Organization of the sale continues to be streamlined with sellers inputting their merchandise into the organization’s Web site and downloading their sale tags, so that a computerized checkout system can be used.

The number of sellers and amount of merchandise sold continues to grow with each sale. The fall sale brought in $114,000. Sellers get to keep 70 percent of the sale price and 30 percent goes to charities named by the church, according to Leslie Smothers, one of the organizers.

“There are nearly 25,000 items that will be for sale,” Smothers said. “We have everything from infant clothes to junior clothes and all kinds of toys.”

There also are strollers of every kind, bouncy seats, outdoor toys, bikes and numerous other items.

Smothers said 260 sellers have items for sale, up from the 220 at the fall sale because spring clothing items are less bulky, leaving more room.

“It’s amazing, in three hours this room has gone from empty to nearly full,” Smothers said of the Ministry and Activities Center where the sale is staged. “We have three large rooms.”

Smothers said there is really no trick to finding the best deals.

“Many people come on both days,” she said. “A lot of items are half off on Saturday.”

Since its inception in 2002, the sale has provided $165,000 in cash to various charities and ministries and more than $31,000 in donated merchandise to local organizations.

The charities that benefited from the fall sale included the Pregnancy Support Center, Community Appointed Special Advocates, Warren County Community Education, the Family Enrichment Center, Barren River Child Advocacy Center, New Beginnings Therapeutic Riding Program, the Early Learning Center, BUMC Kids Zone, Adoption Fund at BUMC, Angel Tree Ministry, BUMC Youth Group, T.C. Cherry Elementary School and Blessings Unleashed, which was the Heaven Cent beneficiary.

Smothers said at check-out customers are asked if they want to donate $1 to the Heaven Cent charity, which this year is going to a relatively new chapter of Newborns in Need.

Naomi Smith-Rowland is one of the organizers of the local newborns chapter, which got started in February.

“We are really, very new,” Smith-Rowland said. “We take donations of new and gently used baby items to make newborn care kits. … And we will use the money we get to purchase things like diapers and formula, baby soaps and lotions – things people don’t think to donate.”

Smith-Rowland said the newborn kits are taken to the hospital for them to distribute to low-income families, and they also have other items on hand to distribute to families with babies in need.

“We give out the items, no questions asked,” she said. “We don’t do income verification or require any information about the families. All we might know is that someone has a 6-month-old who needs help. I think we have helped six or seven families so far, and I don’t know how many of the kits the hospital has given out.”

Smith-Rowland said she is grateful that her organization was chosen for the donation.

“We’re extremely blessed and honored that we would be chosen for that,” she said.

Anyone coming to the sale should bring cash or check.

— For more information on the sale, visit www.lilangelsattic.org. For more information on Newborns in Need, visit www.newbornsinneed.org/warrencountyky.