Friday Night Sales Event - Fun

The photos at right are of some of the neck wraps that I sold Friday at an art show event for the local Counseling and Education Center. A portion of sales went to CEC, an agency that is valuable to our community. I took 2 photo's of my "booth" which was a 6' table covered with a cloth. I try to arrange items so that the table looks attractive and so people can touch the products.  It may look good to  me but when I look at the photos, it looks pretty sloppy.  I'll have to get some help in that area.

So many people appreciate the beautiful fabrics that I use. If you can see the photos here, one neck wrap is made of a pale green crushed velvet with the other side a rich gold satin with a brown swirl pattern to it. It is beautiful.  Another is an Asian print of branches on a cream colored brocade background.  And a pale blue crushed velvet on one side has a deep brown satin fabric on the other.  With the cold weather around the corner I thought people would like flannel so I made some neck wraps in a flowered flannel.  They all had matching eye pillows but I sell them separately because some people want only one or the other, not both.

I enjoy showing my wares but what was really fun for me was to see many people that I haven't seen in years. Some of us go back 20 years or more when I first came to GJ and worked for the National Council on Alcoholism. At that time I was very involved in the "non-profit" community and so got to know many wonderful people. Many of us are now retired from that line of work and it was nice to have a little time to chat with friends and acquaintances. As I am now in the "wisdom years" as one gal put it, the value of relationships is so evident -- it is really all that matters.    10/24/11

Lavender Coming Out My Ears!

Fall blooms have popped up which means I am STILL harvesting, drying and cleaning lavender.  On Saturday, went to Angie's and harvested a lot from the plants there --- I think this is the end!!!  Of course, I thought the same last month and was surprised at how much more bloomed in Sept.  I may have enough left over after completing my sewing for the year to sell some lavender buds by the pound.   The demand for buds has been greater than the supply for the last few years. But word has spread that lavender is a great plant to grow in this area, so more and more people are doing it. .  At the July Festival I talked with several people who have planted fields and/or are gathering information in order to do so in the spring. 

The weather is still warm here in the city so I haven't prepared my plants for winter yet. It's not a difficult task.  Because of al l the huge old trees in the neighborhood, we have lots of leaves that begin falling in Sept.  So I brush them away from the base of the plants so that they won't hold moisture when the snow comes.  Then I replenish the base of the plants with crushed gravel or small rocks if they need it.  The rock helps hold warmth at the roots.  That's all there is to it.  I don't have weeds at my house, but the plants over at Angie's do have weeks pop up.  I didn't pull many on Saturday when I was there because there were too many crickets around and so I just cut the lavender and left.  But when it gets cold I'll go over and pull the weeds and add some rocks to the base of the plants.

I made some more beautiful lavender-filled neck wraps.  I'll post some photos next time.