My First Show! Part I.

This past Saturday, the 13th, was the very first time I participated in a show. Now that it's over AND I survived it, I thought I'd share what led up to it and how it went!

What it was: A vendor show, not a craft show. This was hosted by our local middle school PTO in an effort to raise money for educational opportunities for middle school students. Table space (10 feet) was a mere $35.00! A friend of mine who sells Southern Living at Home shared this opportunity with me and I registered the day I found out about it! (about 6 weeks ago).
There was a large variety of hobby, craft, and home based businesses from Sewing Lessons to Mary Kay Cosmetics to Silpada and Pampered Chef!

What was I thinking?! I was thinking, WOW, local exposure for only $35.00. Wow! I can try and sell some items I have been storing and haven't gotten around to listing, yet. and wow, what did I just do? I've got to get busy!

A month before; Since I had a lot of stock made, I spent time going back over everything to do a quality assurance check! Then, I started on my tags ( I make individually typed tags on labels and attach them to decorative paper ). These are then attached to the piece of jewelry with an inventory number and finally a price. All of this (the name, inventory number, and price is recorded in a notebook). Each piece is also all photographed.

Two weeks before; I needed to work on my booth display. I had already bought an easel, a large (2x3 white board), a table cloth but knew I needed to put it all together in a mock display. At this point, it was too early to do that but I did start pulling things out that I could use.....a couple of metal baskets, two wooden displays for bracelets and necklaces, a white leatherette bracelet display, and some other items.

You see I wasn't a complete novice. I had a little experience as I had been a featured artist at a shop that I had jewelry on consignment last May at an open house. However, it was about this time that I found out what kind of competition I would have! There were to be about 20 vendors and 4-5 of them featured jewelry! Okay, I'm getting nervous now!

One week before; I finished all the inventorying, photographing, and recording. About this time, I had my husband set up my table (the exact one that I would use) in our family room. For the next several days, I arranged and played with my display! Finally, the day before the show, I was set. And so , I took it all down, packed it up, and gathered everything I needed (or thought I needed in a couple of totes)!

By this time, I was kind of in a bad mood. Wow! What a lot of work! And making my bad mood worse was my nerves! I knew this was only a small local show but I was nervous!

How would I fair?
How stiff would the competition be?
Would I be organized enough?
Would the event be a success?
Would I be satisfied with how I did?

All these questions and more were swirling around in my head!! I have to admit, I lost more than a little sleep!
This is where I will leave you for now....Stay tuned for part II, coming in a couple days!

The Northeast and Snow!

Part of me longs for those good ol' blizzards like the Northeast has had this winter, or more recently, this week! I grew up in Western New York and remember fondly, days spent off from school in the winter, in the snow! And I feel for those in Philly and Baltimore, both places in which I have lived and worked, knowing that the snow has all but crippled those cities! Our winters here in Wisconsin are cold, definitely very cold, with a good share of sub-zero days! However, the snow that falls here generally stays on the ground but there is nowhere the amount of snow or the effects of such a snow fall here, like the northeast has been experiencing. Thus, the longing for a good blizzard of my past, albeit, younger years! My thoughts are that they should enjoy the snow, take care of themselves while traveling and/or shoveling and take comfort in that spring should be less than a month away.

Well, after my first mid-week post pleading for people to be nice to each other; another very nice random act of kindness fell upon me! Another etsian, reading my post about being nice, featured my shop and the sale I was having, on their blog! I was touched and thrilled! The act restored my usually optimistic faith in the positive aspect of human nature! You can link to this blog using the button at the right for the searched and found or go here;

http://thesearched.blogspot.com

It is a great blog to keep up on some very unique handcrafted items and talented individuals!

Please leave Chaucee a comment if you visit to let her know how nice her gesture was!

Well, tomorrow is March first. The month is getting busier and busier as each day passes! I will be doing my very first "vendor" show at our local middle school. The booth space fee benefits the middle school students, so I figured that it was for a good cause and will be a small venue for me to "get the kinks" out of having a booth at such a gathering. So, I am busy getting ready for that as well as the upcoming gardening season. I need to decide whether to start plants inside or not, this year! Last year, I had the most success ever with starting seeds and am getting that "gardeners" itch to be dirty! Have a great week!