Craft Fairs vs. Toddlers & Tiaras

Many of you know that I attended a craft fair last Saturday, and some of you have asked how it went. Here's the break down of how things went.

• For starters, I have been out of the craft fair circuit for quite some time since I did no fairs last year because I was huge preggo with Henry. That being said, I have been looking at a page on facebook that is for craft fair displays and such and I felt ok about my set-up. 
• I had never attended this event so I didn't really know what to expect. 
• The event was outside and I didn't have a tent. Now I thought about buying one, but that's a big expense and I already had to shell out the money for tables and table cloths and a really cool display stand so I thought I'd chance it. This sort of worked out I guess. More on that later. 
• I really wasn't prepared with product for this craft fair. This year has been off on the whole creating thing due to said baby and trying to figure out my new normal. I spent the day before the show running the machine, enlisted the help of my fabulous hubby, and we worked until 11 p.m. that night. 
• I also somehow failed to tag things and/or make pricing signs. 

By now you can tell that things are not working in my favor. This is all my own fault, but still it's a cluster in the making. Henry can't go with me because he has to watch the kids, Joy is far far away, so I have to go alone. I get my directions, load up my car, and head out. The drive isn't bad, but I miss two turns and have to turn around. No biggie. I get there and start to set up. This is where I see the serious need for a tent. Everyone else has one. I feel a little like a gypsy. I look like a rookie. I am, but I don't wanna look like one. It's a small town, and everyone is saying hi to each other. Now I feel really alone. I get half way through setting up and the check-in people come by my spot. They can't find my application. Great. One of them remembers talking to me through email and I keep setting up. Now the weather starts to get a little windy, and it looks a little cloudier. I'm a little concerned due to this whole lack of a tent thing.
The booth/tent next to me is selling rugs, wooden signs, and some wreaths and such. That's nice, I won't be competing with them. Then the booth on the other side of me shows up. They had "requested the corner", which I didn't think was a big deal until they showed up. They apparently had a little boutique store in town and started unpacking their pretty striped tent and all their grids and such from the store. Then they roll out their wholesale purchased (likely made in China) stuff. It's super cute and I'm not really bothered by this. I admit that when you have custom made things next to commercial things it does make you feel like a schmuck sometimes, or at least it does me. I start wondering if my stuff is good enough and does it look like crap, and honestly lots of people gravitate to the big flashy booth and skip yours but anyway, I try to keep my chin up.
This is where the T&T comparison comes in from the title. In the past I have thought of craft fairs as sort of like glorified yard sales. People bring their creations and display them in a pleasing manner in an effort to sell them and make a little cash, nothing wrong with that. Friends, (and others) this is simply not the case anymore. It's no more like that than putting little girls in a pretty Sunday dress to take them to a pageant. Those days are GONE ! You have to have them in frilly dresses with petticoats and their hair all curled and make-up on them that makes them look like a twenty something girl going to a party. The same is true of craft fair booths/displays. Gone are the days of tables covered in sheets and handmade stuff spread out on them. I will add here that I feel a little bad about having machine embroidered items since they are not technically hand made. Anyway, you have to have fitted table cloths and grid walls and tents and shelving and sometimes lighting and rugs on the ground so that you appear to be a retail store that sprang up in the middle of a field! The owner of the store sounds like typical, how do I put this nicely, she sounds really southern and frou frou and a little snotty. She's talking to her partner's husband about how her "little hourly employee" is at the store working so that they can attend the fair, etc. Whatever. 
After we get all set up she comes over and looks at my pitiful booth. She's looking down and she should, I am so in over my head and totally out of place. She checks out my stuff and looks at my embroidered kitchen towels and makes the following statement, "Aww, are these your little crafty things? Those are cute." Now I'm not sure if she meant to sound like a condescending ass when she made that comment, but it bothered me for about .001 seconds. At first I was a little hurt by the fact that she thought I was so basic that I had to make things to sell at a craft fair. I really wanted to say "Those are cute items you have over there, did you get those wholesale to resell? That's some talent you have there, I tell you what!". I also wanted to say that I do what I do because I want to and because I'm creative and have skills and because my husband makes good money that allows me to stay at home with my children instead of sending them to some daycare while I pretend to be somebody at my store. I wanted to tell her that I have ten thousand dollars worth of equipment that is paid for in my home that I use to "be crafty". I wanted to say that I'm not in debt for any of my stuff, and I wanted to ask her if she could say the same. I know that makes me sound condescending and I'm not even sure if any of my assumptions are true, and we all know what they say about assuming. Like I said, these are the things that went through my mind in the moments after her comment, and they allowed me to not feel totally defeated.
Now the wind starts gusting. Lots of products from different booths start blowing around and people are clinging to their tents like squirrels to a bird feeder to keep them from toppling over. Great. Some of my stuff blows around and I go get it. This gusting and retrieving happened about 3 more times before I made the executive decision to pack it in. People had to lower their tents over their products to keep them from blowing away. You can't sell your stuff if it's in someone else's booth, or if you have to lower your tent over it to keep everything put. I tell the booths next to me that I'm just not that hard core and I'm packing it up. I'll spare you the drama of how I had to drive like 2 miles to get back to the booth that I parked 100 yards from due to one-way traffic since the show opened, and how I had to force myself to abide by the directions of some little ROTC boys and make that drive instead of just hauling across grass to avoid said drive. Anyway, I get back to my booth and start packing my stuff up. I drive a mini-van, and I have my shelving unit in one piece to avoid having to assemble and disassemble it at the show. This thing is big and takes up the entire back of my van with all of the back seats either removed or stowed, but it's lightweight and I can totally pick it up by myself. The snotty girl is watching this and says to her husband, "see, we need to think about getting a van so that I can haul my stuff to shows". Who's the schmuck now? mwahaha! He says something like he'd rather be hit by a car than drive a mini-van but he'll consider a big SUV. I'm not sure what they drove there, seems like it was a small suv or van, but I obviously don't remember. The show coordinators come over and apologize for me wanting to leave. I tell them that it's totally not their fault and that I was really not prepared for the show and I thank them for the opportunity. She says she'd love for me to come back next year and I promise to do so. She was so sweet. I tell her that I hope that weather improves and that they get lots of visitors. As I drive off in my van full of hastily packed cargo, I wave to the snotty corner booth people who are sitting huddled and cold from the wind in their chairs outside their tent lowered over their stuff and think "suckeeeer".
On the way home, warm in my car, I thought about what I learned that day. First off I will likely never do a show, any show, alone again. I will also cough up the money for a good tent with sides. I will be contacting my neighbor who used to do the staging for Kirkland's and get her to help me up my display game yet again, since obviously what I originally thought looked pretty good was not. I'm also not sad about the booth fee that I paid since it went to support those ROTC boys that I almost hit with my car. I'm a little sad that the weather sucked since the show had huge potential. Next year I'll probably take the whole family because I think there was something for everyone. They had giant inflatables to play on, a classic car show, a chili cook off, and for Pete's sake, there was a little petting zoo right across from my booth! I so wanted to pet the alpaca to soothe my soul after the defeat, but I was too disgusted and he'd have made my allergies flare up and I'd have had to drive home feeling like I had sand in my eyes. Next year I'm definitely requesting to be near the petting zoo again so that the littles will be mesmerized for hours. I might even request to be on a corner if I can get my act together. I called my mom and my bff from high school on the way home to tell them that I was a quitter but felt like a winner for not subjecting myself to that since I was ill prepared. They said "good call" and I drove home to be with my family. Yup, it was a pretty good day. ~Kellie~

Like the liiiight of the suuuun!!

So if you follow my blog you know that I have been having a rather interesting lighting situation in my office. I was going to install a new light to replace the ceiling fan with the broken light, and then after I took it down I realized that I couldn't turn it off and on independently because the light and switch are tied in with the light and switch in the boys's room. My dad is an electrician as is my uncle, let me start off with that. I know very little about electrical stuff. I mean I can replace a plug or a switch, or a light fixture, and I've even been known to install a little wiring to move a light from one place to another like I did with the stairway light, but this three-way switch stuff is beyond me. The short version of what happened to remedy this situation is that I called my dad, sent him some photos, got some information, and then decided to wait until he came for a visit hopefully around Thanksgiving so that he can just fix it. That being said, I realized that with the changing seasons it is darker than usual in here and especially so if it is gloomy and overcast like it was this morning. Yes, I have task lighting, and yes there are lights on the machines, but that only goes so far. So, I reinstalled the switches that I had taken apart and set about making the executive decision to install the new light anyway since the boys aren't in their room most of the time anyway, and when they are they like it dark like a cave so for the meantime I  will decide when the switch is off or on since my light can only be controlled with the switch. mwahahahaha! So here are some pictures, because everyone loooves pictures.

  Here is my sad, lonely, lightless ceiling with a few wires sticking out of the box.

 I wished to install this rather attractive track lighting.

 

Here are a few "suggested tools" that the box said I'd need.

Marching to the beat of my own drum, I chose to use these. 

The baby took a nap, and my lovely daughter assisted me by picking up screws when I dropped them. No, no, look where I'm pointing, it's down there. LOL! This only took like... 30 minutes?

As you can see, I have LOTS of light now. I mean it's like a shoe store up in here! I might not even need task lighting anymore. Ok, I will still need task lighting because I'm sure to stand in the way of the lights, and because these bad boys are really bright, and because they sadly put off heat which I don't like. I installed the included bulbs from the box, but I will be making a return trip to the store very soon to get some overpriced but much desired cfls. The light isn't really totally installed yet as I still have to anchor the ends of the arms, but I want to make sure that I like the locations before I go drilling and hammering anchors into the ceiling which will require a drill, a hammer (maybe) and an allen wrench. I just want to be clear that there will be additional tools needed later even though the allen wrench I think is the only one listed on the box. Anyway, installation went so well that I was able to do another project simultaneously and by the time it was to a point where I was needed, I was finished with the light. Drum roll please....

Tada! I made this set of coasters while I installed the light. Ok, ok, I didn't, the machine did, but whatever. I finished them when I was through. Now don't be a hater. Don't be all "well aren't you skilled and crafty!?!?!?!". I admit that I am a little bit of both and that today was one of those awesome days where I got really cool things done. Not only that, but something that needed to be done, and something for myself. I am proud of myself and that's all that matters. Today I am a winner! ~Kellie~

Flu shots

I have a friend that made a facebook post about the flu vaccine, and I started replying but thought it got kinda long for a facebook reply, but plenty short for a quick blog post, so here goes. I'm sure that there are people out there who seriously benefit from the flu vaccines. They probably really save lives, but in my opinion that's more for the "young and elderly" and the "at risk for some other reason"people. I have never gotten the vaccine, nor have my kids, and we have never been seriously ill from the flu. OK, I admit that there are about two days out of the year where every person in this house is near deathly ill, (sometimes all at once for the win!) but people get sick sometimes even with a normal immune system and vaccinations. My theory is that there are many many strains of the flu and though you get vaccinated for the "most popular one that year", it does not mean that you won't get another milder strain or some mutant strain that results from the popular strain's determination to live and make people miserable. My dad got the flu shot one year many years ago and was the sickest with the flu he'd ever been, and he's one that never gets sick. My mom got the flu shot last year and she still had a touch of the flu. I'm not a medical technologist like my sister, (really, she's the head of the lab in my home town) so I don't know what makes a cold different from the flu, but in my lame attempts to figure it out I have concluded that both are just one of those things that we as humans must endure. Other animals can get the flu, I just wanna point that out. That's how we wound up with this big rabbit cage when I was a kid and.... just go with me here, it really happened. Anyway, every year our pediatrician asks if we want the vaccines and we always say no and he just says ok. I'm pretty sure he thought my explanation that first year was stupid so he just says ok so that he doesn't have to hear my ridiculous conspiracy theory on it, and that's basically what it is. I don't judge people who get the flu shot, that's their choice and it might be the best choice for them and I support that, I'm just saying that I don't get the flu shot because I have this ridiculous theory. ~Kellie~

Friend or Faux?

Let me start off by saying that I know a few people that I consider friends, and a larger number that I consider fauxs. You know the ones, you are forced or expected to be friends with them due to association and not because you really like them. I mean you might really like them, but the real connection just isn't there. I think that in reality, we only really have one or two real friends  and lots of close or not so close acquaintances. I think that a really real friend is someone that you'd drop what you were doing to help, even if it was really inconvenient, far away, and late at night. If you had to hop a plane at 3 a.m., you'd do that if they needed you. I can only honestly think of one person that I'd do that for and that's Henry. I have a few other friends that I'd probably do that for if it was an emergency. Be honest, and you know who you are, would you hop a plane at 3.a.m. for me  if it weren't an emergency? If I was just bent out of shape upset for something other than a death or serious injury, would you come to console me or just talk it out over the phone and wait until morning before another phone call to make absolutely sure that I needed you there? Anyway, after now seeming like a complete ass to several of my friends... I feel the need clarify something here.

*Real Friend... You'd drop everything at any time to be with them no matter what. They are like family without actually being blood related. Honestly I have some family that I'm not even this close to.
*Really Close Friend... You'd help them out anytime depending on what it was, and even then you'd be super likely to just help them out anyway.
*Friend... You'd help them out if it was mostly convenient unless it was an emergency in which case you'd help them out at any time.
*Close Acquaintance... You'd help them out if it was convenient. 
*Acquaintance... You're pretty sure that they have people who fit into one of the above categories so you're not really worried about them.
I'm going to add another category here, and that is...
*Virtual Friend... You care about them from afar, you're concerned about them because they are human (at least you're pretty sure they are), you miss talking to them online, but you may or may not really know this person. If something happened in their life, you probably send an e-card (which might be more than you'd do for that acquaintance above).

Anyway  all of this comes about because I was making a little get together list via facebook, the creator of seriously faux friends, and I noticed that someone that I had previously been "friends" with was no longer a "friend". Now I have my assumptions about this and I almost messaged said person and asked wth, but then I realized that they weren't really a friend at all so why did I care. If I had messaged them, it would have only been to say "I just wanted you to know that I know" and then I'd have probably gotten into some discussion with them and we may or may not have ended up being "friends" again. I have to admit that I was a tiny bit stunned for a split second and then I was over it. I've had to resist the urge to send the above message a lot lately, mostly because of Henry's job change, but whatever.  I have to admit that I have one really close friend that I routinely leave out of "guest lists" because I talk to her so much I just assume that she knows what I'm thinking and she'll just show up anyway. Bahaha, if you're reading this really close friend, I hope you're laughing too.

I suppose that's all of my rant for this morning. I think I'm going to go prune my "friends" list again as I'm still feeling the need to simplify. Before long I'll just be living in a hut in the jungle with only possessions that I can carry on my back or in a rickshaw pulled by my children. ~Kellie~

  

We have a (mostly) finished wall in the office!

It's been a long time coming, but we finally  have a mostly finished wall in the office. It's not really what we originally intended to put up there, but whatever. It was immediate, cheap, clean, mostly pre-finished, and as my neighbor says "Nothing is ever more permanent than that which is meant to be temporary", so I chose something that was pretty while I was at it. :)

Here's what we started with this morning. Now you can see why I just wanted to put something up there. I mean I was thrilled just to have a real wall, but as progress goes it was time to move along. I started out by removing the plastic from the wall, the ceiling strip that held  the plastic up, and then I got to work removing all those staples (why did I put in so many staples?!). I also had to get out a handy little specialty saw and trim some of the shims at the top of the wall.

After all that, here's what I had, a clean, fresh, wall-o-studs. I'm going to add here that I haaaate popcorn ceilings. You may or may not be able to see the little section that is nearly popcorn free, that happened when we put the wall up, but when I took the plastic down little bits of that crap went everywhere. It was all I could do to restrain myself from stripping it all down. I'm pretty sure that that will happen in another month or so or in the spring at the very latest. Baby steps, baby steps. On a side note, see that stupid ceiling fan? Yeah, it's going tomorrow. The light broke and I've hated it since I installed it due to said crappy light.

So here's the wall all covered in some lovely faux beadboard. Now I wouldn't usually go for such a thing, but in our tiny little office and given the fact that it's only on one wall, I think it's cute. Yes I know that there is a huge gap at the top and bottom, and yes I see the crack where the panels meet (yes this is paneling) and yes I also see the little nail holes. The crack between the panels actually looks way worse than it is due to the fact that only the front of the panel is white so you see the brown edge. Baby steps, I'm just glad there is something there other than plastic.In due time I will get some putty and fill those holes and some trim to finish it off.

All in all, I don't think it's too shabby. Tomorrow I will replace that stupid ceiling fan with my sweet track lighting, and maybe if I feel particularly motivated, I will sneak off and get some trim to cover that gap at the top because it's gonna drive me nuts, I just know it. I might even start to putty, I dunno. I'm pretty sure that no matter what color I eventually paint the rest of the office (maybe a nice light green?) I'll leave the "beadboard" white because I think it looks better in that color. On a random side note, I also got to use the air nailer today and if I install trim tomorrow I will get to use it again. :) Thinking more on it, I'll probably just wait to add the trim because I need to add trim all the way around the room and I'm just not ready to do that yet. Just try not to look at it if you visit. :) ~Kellie~

Too early starts

At 6:45 this morning I finally made it out of bed to deal with the baby who had been crying since 6:30 when his daddy came into our room to get dressed for work. I have to admit that it's always nice to see him first thing in the morning, even if he is about to leave me with the remainder of this post. :-p So I stumble to the baby's room and feed him, that always makes us happy. We get to snuggle for a few minutes and both wake up a little, then comes the diaper change which is now a trick sometimes as he has become fascinated with the light switch near the changing table. He hasn't managed to turn it on yet and I'm thankful for that, I don't think either of us would be prepared for the shock of it. By the time I get his diaper changed, his sister is creeping into the room. She's cute in the mornings though being a creature of habit, if her routine requirements are not met within a timely manner they become demands.
I make it to the kitchen and realize that the boys have left their door open and are presumably playing a video game with some loud obnoxious music that I'm sure their father would approve of, but it drives me nuts. I close the door and move on. I get the baby set up with some food, get the girl set up with her routine things: her shows, a cup of milk, and this morning, her favorite breakfast food, gummies. Don't judge me, it's still super early and the milk at least is healthy. She still won't eat cereal and the number of things that I view as suitable for early morning that she doesn't turn her nose up at is slim. Anyway, my salvation this morning is a hot cup of yesterday's coffee, some smooth Etta James, and this blog. I can hear the boys making noises that sound like fighting Tasmanian devils through the wall. I really must finish my side soon to offer more of a noise barrier. I'm pretty sure that K is in the living room singing into a microphone, it's sort of garbled so I'm not 100%. I have to go to the grocery store today with at least 1/2 the kids, and I'm hoping that it's just too early for the sun and that it's not really gloomy like rain outside.
I'm moving on to another Etta song and pondering what we're going to eat the remainder of this week. I really want to stay home and work all day since I lost part of yesterday being domestic with cleaning and laundry and such. I still haven't folded it, fail. I remember as a kid I was always an early riser, I mean like before daylight. I was almost always in bed before 8 because I was just plum tuckered out. When I say kid, I mean jr. high/high school age. I'm pretty sure it continued into my mid twenties. I really don't think this dislike of abrupt early morning starts began until I hit 30. I used to think that mornings like this were a myth. At least when I was an early rising kid I was up and quietly out of the house so that my parents could enjoy the morning in peace. I came back in at a suitable hour when my mom would make breakfast and then I was out again until lunch. Obviously these were my Saturday and summer hours as I did go to school despite the fact that we lived on a farm. Maybe that's the problem with my kids, we live in a subdivision, we have cable, there's more than one of them... huh, I've never really thought about that until now.
Since it's been about 20 minutes of Etta and hot coffee, I think I am now ready to face part of my day. I'm still not ready to get out of my pajamas and leave the cave, don't rush me, I'll get there, eventually. ~Kellie~

Shedding

There's alot I could say here, but I'm gonna keep it short-ish. I've been thinking for a while about things that make me happy and things that don't. Recently I've given these things more thought than usual. For starters, we decided to relocate our dog. We didn't "get rid of him", because that would imply things that were not true. We felt that we weren't doing the best we could for him. When we got him we had 3 kids and life was easier. As he grew up, much to our surprise he was super playful. We were totally expecting him to just lay on the couch like our previous dog, but that wasn't his nature. There was nothing in the world wrong with him, it really wasn't him, it was us, so we decided that rather than tell him "no play" all the time we'd find him a home preferably with another dog that he'd get along with and humans that had time to throw his drooly ball over and over and over. We found a great couple with a French Bulldog named Murphy. They brought Murphy with them when they came to see Bromley and they instantly hit it off. Murphy wasn't afraid of him and Bromley really got a kick out of another dog. His new human mom sends me text pics and updates to let me know that he's ok, and we are free to visit him if we want to. I miss that dog every day and I feel like I failed him, but in the end I know that he's happy with humans to play with him and a doggy friend to hang out with.
Another major change came with Henry's job. It's a long story and I don't want to get into it, but he decided that it was time for an employment change. He's really happy with his new job even though it's twice the drive that his last one was. I don't think the drive bothers him but I don't care for it. Aside from that I like the new job too. It's a job. People go there to work. That's all.
I've also been giving some thought to little things that bug me. Like all those groups and pages I somehow got into on facebook and all those newsletters that come via email. I've been an unliking, unsubscribing, no thank you kind of fool today. I have more to do tomorrow. I don't need to be tempted by things I don't have time for. Speaking of that, I have suckered, my mom has graciously volunteered to help me finish a ton of projects that I have hanging around the office. I intend to take them to a craft fair that I have yet to apply to and sell the crap out of them. I hope I come home with empty boxes and a wad of cash.
All of these things are kinda like spring cleaning except it's fall. I fire up the pumpkin candle, which has no wic anymore so I'm left putting chunks of it into my warmer thingies, and purge away. Most of this purging is nothing personal, just time to lighten the load. I have my real friends, and enough ideas and projects to keep me busy for a long time. I don't need any more of either. That's not being mean, it's just how I feel. Keep it real! ~Kellie~