Down the Rabbit Hole

This past weekend we finally had my oldest daughter's birthday party.  I say "finally" because her birthday is in July.  We were supposed to have this party in early August, but that was in the middle of the whole water leak/demolished house debacle, so we had to push the party down the calendar.  She wanted an Alice in Wonderland theme, so I did my best to give her an Alice/Mad Hatter themed party.

We had loads of treats labeled "Eat Me" or "Drink Me":

 

Everyone got a crazy top hat when they arrived, and then went in the back yard to play croquet:

We had our tea party table set up under the magnolia tree:

The girls had tea sandwiches, fruit, and lots of sweets with their tea or apple juice (not too many takers on the tea!).  Then they played an Alice in Wonderland trivia game (with Alice in Wonderland books as the prizes).  Then we played a fun (but messy!) paint the roses red relay race game.  I had drawn a mural of roses on white paper that we taped up across the garage doors (it was a BIG mural). The girls divided into teams and did a relay race where each person had to run up to the mural and paint a rose red.  The girls loved it, but it was crazy and messy (so much so that I forgot to take pictures).

After that excitement, we opened presents, watched a few minutes of the Disney Alice in Wonderland movie, and then it was time to go!  The girls got an assortment of party favors, including keys and teapots that we made out of candy melts:

I think that it was a successful party.  There were so many things that I wanted to do, but didn't have time to do.  But in the end, my sweet (10 year old) baby was happy, and that's all that matters:

The Motherlode!

I promised you some pics of my new lace score -- and here they are!  It's hard from these pictures to get a sense of just how huge this lot of lace is: but trust me, it's massive.   Certainly the largest amount of lace I've ever bought at once.  I'm going to be busy photographing and listing..... but it's going to take me a long while to get through all of this wonderful lace!  For now, enjoy the eye candy:

I hope you had a wonderful weekend!  We were busy with our Mad Hatter Tea Party.  Pics of that to follow soon.

New Flowers Coming Soon and Exciting News!

I'm so excited about these new flowers!  They are little velvet forget-me-nots, on a bendable wire.  The flowers are actually two layers: velvet underneath with a thin net layer on top!  So cute!  I have them in this gray/light blue, and the light pink.  I hope to have them in the shop later today (and I hope to have more colors soon).

In other exciting news, remember these kits I made for the show?

Well, I didn't sell a single one at the show.  Not.A.Single.One.   BUT.... one of the other vendors who has a brick and mortar store saw them, loved them, and placed A WHOLESALE ORDER for them!!  OMG!!  Perhaps I'm making too much out of it, but I've never before had anyone ask for a wholesale order of anything I've put together, so I'm pretty over the moon about it.   Guess that goes to show that it's worth trying something new because you never know!

And finally, for my fellow lace junkies, you are not going to believe the lace that I just scored!  (I do sound like a junkie, don't I?)  I'll have pics galore in my next post.  :)

Show Pics

We're in the middle of the show, so things are crazy, but I thought I'd share a few pics with you.  These were taken on my Iphone, so they are, ahem, well, not great pics.  But hopefully you get the gist.  Here's our booth, all dressed up and ready to go!  Little tip for those of you who do shows: a few years ago, we started taping down oilcloth fabric as a "floor" for our booth; in the fall we use this white with red polka dots, when we used to do spring shows we used a pink oilcloth with strawberries.  Anyway, it instantly brightens up the space -- and most vendors don't think to do it.  It can make your booth really stand out!  Just be sure to completely tape down all the edges so that no one trips!

The vintagey looking pink/gold/silver trees on the top shelf above are new for us this year.  I love them so much that I've been hoping that no one will buy them so that I can keep them!   Bad business decision, I know, but LOOK at them -- so pink and sparkly!!

Kari had the inspired idea to hang some of our vintage hankies on this feather tree -- I think it is super-cute and a great way to display the hankies! Building on her idea, I set up a lace display tree on the other side:

Well,  I hope you enjoyed this little tour of our booth.  Tomorrow is another long show day, followed by packing up what's left, hauling it home, and then finally some exhausted couch time with a bottle of vino and  hours and hours of L&O on my DVR!  (But that's just the calm -- or the bottle of vino -- before the storm: have I mentioned that I'm hosting an elaborate Alice in Wonderland/Mad Hatter themed tea party for my daughter's belated birthday -- this weekend?!?!  In t-minus 3.5 days???  Holy cow.  I can't think about that now. More to come on that later!)

Hope you're having a great week!

More Show Prep: Vintage Crafting Kits

Saturdays at our house in the fall are busy with football watching.  Lots and lots of football watching.  We follow 3 teams (TCU, LSU and the University of Texas) -- so that can be a big time commitment!  I love football -- love it! -- but I have to do something while I watch so that I don't feel too guilty about all of those hours.  Last night, while we watched Wisconsin beat Ohio State (helping out TCU a lot -- thanks, Badgers!!) I put together some crafting kits to take to the show this week.

These have sheet music, vintage papers, flash cards, a vintage glittery greeting card, a tag with laces and trims, and a spray of velvet flowers.  I think they came together nicely, but will they sell?  Who knows!  We've been doing shows for years, and it still surprises me from year to year what sells and what doesn't.  (If these are not a hit at the show, they'll soon be appearing in my Etsy shop.)

I used my new Moo cards as the tags on these -- so fun!

Well, I'm off now  -- more linens to iron before the show!  Hope you had a delightful weekend!  :)

I Moo!

I'm so excited -- I received my first order of Moo minicards!  I had been considering getting these cute little business cards for awhile, but then I saw Elyse's cards on her darling Cottage blog, and decided that I had to have some of my own. Now, I don't think mine are quite as adorable as hers, but I'm still pretty thrilled with them.  I uploaded 10 different photos for this set of 100 minicards.  I think these will be fun for packaging, giving out to friends, all sorts of things.  You can go make your own fun Moo cards here.

It's that Time of Year Again

It's show time!  My friend Kari and I don't do nearly as many shows as we used to -- it's just too hard to juggle childcare and our other jobs, etc. to do a bunch of big shows.  But we still do St. Martin's Joy of Giving Market here in Houston, which starts next week.  After that, we'll do a small show at my daughter's school, and that will be it for us this show season.

So, now we're in the thick of the getting-ready frenzy.  There are piles of laundry to soak and then iron.  We've been collecting these fantastic vintage towels all year -- aren't they awesome?  I wish we had twice as many!

 

Meanwhile, in the dining room, little sugary boxes and houses are boxed up and ready to go to the show:

Even the living room is full of show stuff: boxes of vintage inspired glass garland (in silver and pink!), huge bags of lace, and bins full of vintage linens. 

I think I might have mentioned before that I have a very patient husband.  See what I mean?  :)

If you live in the Houston area, come see us at St. Martin's Episcopal Church's Joy of Giving Market, next Tuesday, October 19 (preview party night) through Thursday, October 21.  I'll share some pics from the show next week!


 

What I'm Working on Today

I pulled out the stitching supplies last night and started on some new little dresses.  Not sure yet what I'm going to do with them, but they sure are fun to make!

This one above is a work in progress.... Of course, tiny as these little dresses are, it seems that I need to create quite a mess on the coffee table in order to be creative:

I have a very patient husband.  :)

More Black & White Box Swap Fun!

Here are the fabulous boxes that I received from my swap partners!  Aren't they awesome!!  I'm in love with these! 

Here's what I received from Mary:

 

Don't you just love that glittery witch riding in front of a doily moon???  So clever!!  And here's what was inside:

So many fun things -- and that tiny purple doily??  Love it!  There are much better pictures on Mary's delightful blog.  You must go check it out!

And here's what I received from Stephanie:

How fantastic is this?  I'm loving that big flocked damask "A"!  And here's what was inside:

So many fun things for creating!  She put lots of little treasures into mini cupcake liners -- what a great idea!!
Stephanie has a wonderful blog -- be sure to visit her to see more examples of her fantastic artwork.

This was a wonderful swap.  I can't wait to use all my new fun crafting supplies! Thanks to my swap partners!