A Morning Out...

I had a lovely morning today.  It's "Half-Price Monday" at my local thrift store, the MAAC (Medina Area Association of Churches) Clothing Depot, so I went to shop for sweaters to transform into monsters. 

 

The local church association-run thrift store already has really low prices...most of the items are $1 or less...but on the 4th Monday of the month, all the clothes are half off!  So adult clothes are 50 cents and kid clothes are 25 cents!  It's the perfect time and place to swoop in and get sweaters for monster-making!

And I got quite the haul today!  Sometimes they don't have a lot of the colorful, stripey sweaters I like to use, but I found lots today!  I got 12 sweaters to use for monstermaking, and 3 items of clothing for myself to wear...all for $6!  You can barely buy one sweater at Goodwill for $6 nowadays!

Have I mentioned how much I love the MAAC Thrift Store? 

Knowing that I was going to be in Medina today, I had made an appointment to get my hair cut.  I had about and hour to kill before my appointment after I finished at the thrift store, so I stopped at my favorite local coffee house, the Shirt Factory Cafe.

I loved the little paper shirts on the garland/bunting in the window display!

And I discovered that they had redone a bit of the decor in the dining room!

The huge photo of the building when it used to be an actual shirt factory and the vintage theater seats on the back wall were the most obvious (and my favorite) change.

 

The photo of the barn owl made me think of my owl-loving friend Casey from PeachesProducts/PeachesPictures.

 A "before" picture of my hair...me enjoying my vanilla chai latte with espresso (my gateway drug into the world of liking coffee!).

And the "after" photo of my hair! This was a bit of a milestone for me today.  This is my first haircut by someone I didn't know previously (only family or friends have ever cut my hair before!) It was a new thing to entrust a stranger with my hair.  I feel slightly guilty for "cheating on" my friend & regular hairdresser, Rochelle, who works in a salon in Victor and does amazing work.  She did my hair for my wedding.  My mother also goes to her and I've gone with Mom to her appointments before and gotten my hair cut if Rochelle had time to fit me in.  But Victor is an hour and a half from where I live now.  (I'm sure Rochelle will understand!) I've been wanting to find a local place to go, plus, it was nice to get to know someone new. And Kim at "Fringe" was very nice and did a very good job! I'll definitely be going there again!

Window Display at Shirt Factory Cafe

We finished the window display this weekend at Shirt Factory Cafe for Presence on the Patio.

Big thanks to my hubby for helping me out! (only real men will help their wives fluff out tissue paper pom-poms in the middle of a coffee shop!)

I love using these pom poms to decorate. (I first saw them when I was helping decorate for a baby shower) They're so easy to make. I have instructions on how to make them in my baby shower post, but you can also check Martha Stewart's website for a more official tutorial (she's where my friends got the idea from in the first place).

I even saved the scraps of tissue paper I cut off the ends and used them as a kind of confetti...I think they look like fallen flower petals.

I need to get more tissue paper and make more of these for decorating on the day of the craft fair. The flowers/pom-poms are taking the place of the paper lanterns we had up for the winter show...since they have a springy feel and the spring show is during the day instead of in the evening.

Presence on the Patio Spring 2010!

Presence on the Patio is BACK! And this time, my friend Rachel and I are in charge!

After the Presence on the Patio we had back in December, the owner of the Shirt Factory Cafe agreed that doing it seasonally was a great idea. He suggested we have it on one of the weekends that the life-sized Thomas the Tank Engine comes to the Medina Railroad Museum (an event known as "Day Out With Thomas", which I'm told draws THOUSANDS of people to Medina each year!). And Shirt Factory Cafe is right around the corner from the Railroad Museum! So we've scheduled the Spring 2010 edition of Presence on the Patio for Saturday, May 8th.

Rachel and I are still in the planning stages, and are trying to line up the vendors (obviously, KiraArts and the girls of Primele (Rachel & Tricia) are going to be there!), but planning is coming along! Hopefully we'll have a list of definite vendors by mid-April. For now, you can check out the Facebook event and fan page. I'm thinking about possibly starting a blog soon as well.

I'll be sure to keep you posted!

Presence on the Patio...a Rousing Success!

Presence on the Patio on Saturday was a rousing success! I know for me, it was my most successful craft show I've ever done! I sold so many monsters! We weren't quite sure how it would do or how good of a turn-out we would have, since this was our first time doing an event like this. Plus it was an evening event (most craft shows are in the morning/afternoon). Plus is was outside...in December...in Western New York! But those Western New Yorkers didn't disappoint us! We always had a steady stream of people coming in and here was never a lull in the crowd.


I love how the lanterns looked! They made it look just like the poster I designed! Everything looked really good all lit up. We had been concerned about having enough lighting, but it turned out great!

We did have a couple of snags during set-up earlier in the day (we started setting up at 10am). The first issue being that I ended up not having all the pieces to the canopy I borrowed from my parents, so the canopy ended up being a quarter of the size it was supposed to be! But, my brilliant husband found a way to make it work.

Another snag was that my clothesline set-up at my table kept falling over with every strong gust of wind. It fell over about 3 times before (#1) my brilliant husband again, found a way to rig things and tie things down so they would be more secure...(#2) no joke, we prayed to God for the wind to stop...and about 5 minutes later...no wind! And no more stong wind for the rest of the night! (don't tell ME there's no God!) It was pretty awesome!

This is my brilliant friend Kim who was the mastermind behind organizing the event (with the help of her sister Rachel). She and her 2 sisters, Rachel and Tricia, are the ones behind Primele. I wish I'd thought to take more pictures and get close-ups of their stuff. They have a cute style. Their style is kind of country-ish, but with a modern twist. It's not your grandma's Americana sort of country style. They're very inspired by the Adirondacks and primitive elements (hence their name Prim(itive) ele(ments).

The also did a wreath-making table with natural elements (like pinecones, dried oranges, apples, and hedge apples) and evergreens. Most elements were taken directly from their farm!...even the grapevines that the wreath forms were made out of.

This table was for the Beadery... a handmade jewelry company. I loved talking to Beth. Her table was across from mine. I look forward to being friends and getting to know her better.

Jackie from "Jars of Joy" is another woman I enjoyed talking to and look forward to becoming friends with. She and her daughter were great to hang around and were very helpful when it was time for tear-down. Even when their table was packed up, the stuck around to help the rest of us with our tables and the canopy and lights.

Apple Blossom Florist were further down the patio from me, so I didn't get to talk to them as much, but they were very nice and had some lovely holiday centerpieces!

I was glad I had the idea to bring my fire-bowl from my backyard (and that the Shirt Factory owner approved the idea). It was a nice way for the vendors in particular to warm up a little in between sales. I think it attracted customers too!

I really don't think we would have done quite as well if the event had been inside. Because we were outside, we had more exposure and presence (ha! Presence on the Patio!...get it?)

It was a long day, and it was very cold (here's Rachel and Tricia warming up in the Cafe after teardown), but all in all it was very fun and I can't wait to do another one! We learned a lot from our mistakes this time around and there seems to be lots of interest in doing it next year and making it an annual event. And I even suggested to the owner that we do it seasonally...one in spring, summer and fall as well!

We'll see what happens!

Presence on the Patio Advertising

I've finished the flyer for Presence on the Patio!

And Rachel and I started making the sandwich board sign to put on the sidewalk outside the cafe`.

I can't wait to see it out on the sidewalk!

Decorating the Shirt Factory Cafe for Christmas

So, remember back when I helped decorate the Shirt Factory Cafe for a baby shower?...well, we're at it again! I've been helping my friends Kim (on the ground) and Rachel (on the ladder) decorate our favorite cafe for Christmas!

But that's not even the best news! We're doing an event on the Shirt Factory Cafe's patio on December 19th from 6:00pm to 9:00pm. The event is called "Presence on the Patio" and we are calling it "a winter fair". There will be wreath-making, donuts and (best of all) handmade gifts made by local artisans like me! We're currently working on securing either a sound system or live music, and I am working on a flyer/logo.

We're friends with a guy who is good friends with the owner of the cafe (yay for connections!)... and Kim and Rachel got asked to help organize an event. And they've been so kind as to invite me to help too! I'm so excited to be involved in the planning process of this event!

More details (and a flyer) to come!