My New Year's Resolution

This may sound like a pretty pathetic resolution, but I have made a commitment to not buy any more purses. Lame - yes, but necessary. Last year I only bought four purses (maybe five) but I have so many fabulous ones that I neglect by simply throwing them aside to replace them with a bright, shiny new one. I have at least three HOBOs, a pretty leather one I bought in Italy on my honeymoon, a gold deer purse from Patch NYC that only comes out on special occasions, two from Charm Design including this fabulous one:


and one from A03 Designs that I love and get so many complements on:
The sad thing is, I'm already tempted. Just look at this one from Becky OH!:


She's using some of my favorite fabrics, and I just love the gathered structure of the bag. Speaking of gathering, this one by Aubrey Hyde is really nice, too, and is very tempting. I love the way it is a little bit sloppy and casual but still very chic.


The best thing I can do is just not click on any image of a purse I like online, and to avoid shopping altogether in the coming year, which is basically impossible. I guess I could always just try to focus on the age old resolution of losing weight instead, which I'll begin with eating Special K every day instead of granola...

Christmas!

My sister and Zero get closer at Christmas

Yay! Christmas!!! So, first things first - my sweet sweet husband gave me a ring that I wanted so badly but did not expect to actually receive. It's handmade of rose gold and morganite and it's so pretty! I was totally surprised when I opened it, so it made his Christmas just as much as it did mine. I also got a sweet new camera from my parents for taking better jewelry photos, so look out for some fancy new pics on my website soon (plus a lot of new styles, too!).

I gave my husband a new road bike (it's bike #3 for him) but it hasn't come in yet, so he got a lot of bike-related items to open up, like this very cool bike parts t-shirt from a shop called Quiet Doing on etsy, plus some Walz caps, a Chrome bag, and Guitar Hero III which isn't bike related but fun nonetheless.

I gave quite a bit of handmade this year, including a handmade notepad (a "bookie" and a zipper pouch from Beth Howard:

I gave my BFF a beautiful pale aqua blue textured platter by Olaria - hopefully she will post up new photos of her beautiful serve ware on her website soon! I gave my mom a glass vase hand painted with modern flowers that I got at Art & Invention Gallery here in Nashville, a bizarre "Tranny" Barbie that is so hilarious, I can't believe I don't have a picture of him/her from Dolled Up Dolls. I also got some adorable little t-shirts by So Silly for my little niece and nephew in Virginia, but hopefully they don't read my blog because we're not visiting for a couple of weeks:
Plus, speaking of gifting indie, I want to thank everyone who gifted Freshie & Zero this holiday season, including the husbands of the ladies behind Harrilu, Supermaggie, and the lady behind Indie Fixx! I had a very busy and merry Christmas - definitely one of my best ever - and I can't wait for next year!

Merry Christmas

Christmas is tomorrow, and for the first year in a long time, I don't know what I'm getting! I'm so excited! The best part is watching other people open the presents you got the, though. I also like watching my 12 year old sister open her presents, because Christmas is still super exciting to her. Here's a silly picture of me taken with a free program called Santa Snaps on my mac for your Christmas viewing pleasure:

She's Crafty Secret Santa Gift Exchange Part Deux

Yay!!! I received my Secret Santa gift in the mail yesterday, and I was so excited to receive this awesome pair of earrings from Honeydoux! Due to a prior conversation via etsy where I was telling her how great her jewelry looked in a shop in Atlanta that I had just visited, she knew exactly what I wanted. What a fabulous surprise! To all you other ladies who participated in the exchange, email me your gifts and I'll post them up here, too!


I drew Angie Montgomery of My Olivette and made her a shadowbox diorama, which she had on her wish list. It was so fun to craft outside of my box! Even though I was technically crafting within a box...


Cindy Tomczyk, a fabulous illustrator from Chicago who participated, blogged about her gift here.

The office is organized

Oh yeah - Freshie & Zero World headquarters is officially organized AND the insane Christmas shipping season is officially over. Thank goodness - I feel like I haven't slept in days! Don't get me wrong - I'm not complaining. I shipped a record amount of jewelry in just a couple of weeks and am so excited that so many people chose to give my jewelry as gifts this year (there were a lot of gentlemen buyers!) I just think that next year I may need a little elf to help me in the workshop, which is exciting and scary, (especially if it's a mean elf).

Anyway, I've always had a hard time finding a clear space in my little office to wrap packages and prepare a box for shipping without everything toppling over, but no more! I got some great commercial shelving from U-Line, some cool bins from Crate & Barrel, some organization things from The Container Store (acrylic magazine files, anyone?) & Organize.com (who has incredibly slow shipping, by the way). It was something I had always wanted to do - buy a bunch of matching magazine files, bins, and crates and arrange them in a very cool Domino meets ReadyMade kind of way but had just never taken the initiative to make the investment. I literally measured and planned my space like a professional organizer and put it all in place on Sunday.

I am in H E A V E N. It looks so awesome! Now as soon as Greg and I are done wrapping up all of our Christmas presents, I can put away the gift wrapping supplies and we can really see the entire office floor. Check out the sweet mail sorter next to my Marie Antoinette poster...

Ahh... Gotta love an organized office. In other news, the She's Crafty Secret Santa Gift Exchange has ended, so hopefully everyone mailed out their crafty projects yesterday! I'll post up what I made after I'm sure my receiver received it so I don't spoil her surprise! I think I'm getting jewelry, which rocks my world since I feel guilty buying jewelry. When you're a jewelry maker, you can never really justify buying jewelry unless it's something so far removed from anything you would or ever could make, so for me that means big sparkly things that I can't afford...

Article in the NY Times

All about the "D.I.Y." movement, buyhandmade.org, etsy, and even mentions the Renegade Craft Fair, Austin Craft Mafia, and the Girlie Show, of which I am currently a featured participant on their fun blog! Take that, lame craft shows of whom I keep getting rejection letters!

Click here to read the article.

Office Gift Ideas

Since I know my office mates don't read my blog (okay, I don't really work in an office - I work part time in an art gallery/frame shop so I work with a bunch of crazy creative types), I'm going to post what I am giving them for Christmas. It became a mad search this week, mostly because I really like giving gifts and supporting indie businesses, so it was an excuse to do both. First - the men - five of them in all and they have COMPLETELY different personalities. I thought - how about a nifty handmade notebook? Finding a nifty & manly & inexpensive handmade notebook proved to be tough, but I found this one on Little Otsu:
I have always been under the impression that men liked graph paper, but when I shared this profound knowledge with my husband, he kind of looked at me funny, kind of like he disagreed. Oh well. I guess I don't know everything, but I think they'll like their new journals.

Next - the ladies. I work with the same two on the usual days that I work so I wanted to get them something special. I knew I wanted a cute little handmade pouch/makeup bag since there are SO many cute ones out there (especially on etsy) and since I only can have so many, I thought I would vicariously buy and give some. What I found for them was an adorable makeup pouch AND wristlet keychain gift set for only $18!

It's from a shop called Jimmy Pickles, and I like them so much, I'll have to get a set for myself now, but I'll wait until they restock after Christmas, since it seems pretty picked over at this point, but good for them! They've sold over 1,000 items on etsy! Holy crap - that's a lot!

For the other ladies, I wanted to give them handmade pouches, too, but I didn't want to spend that much so I found another great shop called LouLou Bell. Here are two of the seven that I purchased:
She had so many great fabrics to choose from, and great prices, too. I found a fabric for each of the seven ladies that I work with, which was no easy task since they range in age from 25 - 55! Unfortunately, I suck at geography and didn't realize she lives in Canada. Sooo... the shop owner was super sweet and agreed to express ship them for me in the hopes that they would arrive before Christmas. I'm crossing my fingers!

The Girlie Show Blog

The Girlie Show blog did a little write up about me in their blog. Go check it out! It was such a fun show, and I was tickled that they wanted to feature me along with some of their other fabulous artists!

I'm in an etsy treasury!

Yay! It's so exciting to see that little star next to a treasury listing... and then the next thing I know it's on the front page! Woo hoo!!! I sold 3 things while it was up - that's a lot for etsy! My etsy shop does okay but my website does much better. There are just too many distractions on etsy to draw attention away from shops. Speaking of, have you ever seen the etsy tools website? It's really interesting and shows charts of sales, listings, etc. It's down for the moment, but you should bookmark it and come back to it soon to see how much etsy sells in a day - it is amazing! Etsytools.com

She's Crafty Secret Santa Gift Exchange

Hey Ladies!

You're invited to participate in the She's Crafty Secret Santa Gift Exchange!

Here's the sign up link!

The sign up deadline is Friday, December 07, 2007.

I hope you'll join in. This is going to be lots of fun! The rules are simple - get ready to give and receive something handmade this holiday season!

Are you a jewelry maker who loves to draw? Are you a knitter who's always wanted to try amigurumi? Now is your opportunity to create something you've never tried just for fun! Or, stick with what you know and try and tweak it to your secret santa's liking...

Once you sign up, you'll receive an email on December 7th telling you who you have drawn. You will then be able to anonymously ask that person questions to help you along, i.e. "what's your favorite color", "what's your t-shirt size", "what's your favorite city", etc. You can then get crafting to create something nifty for them. It doesn't have to be big or elaborate - just hand crafted by you!

Then you must mail your gift on or by December 19th (that's 12 days to make something). Just don't be a Lame Santa and space out on the most important part!

Have a crafty holiday!
Freshie

Renegade Handmade!

That's right - the Renegade Handmade shop in Chicago is now carrying Freshie & Zero! Woo hoo! It's a really cute little shop on W Division Street that carries cool handmade items from vendors from all over the country (and world!). Vendors such as... Super Maggie, Biggs & Featherbelle, My Paper Crane, and fellow Middle Tennessean - Fondue Art & Design among many talented others!

The store was created as an extension of the Renegade Craft Fair, an event founded in 2003 that I was lucky enough to participate in this past September right in Chicago. It is still my #1 show that I have ever done! For more info about the fairs, click here!

Stuff

So, one of my nearest and dearest friends who I've been been playing phone tag with for months finally caught me on the phone! It was just like high school all over again - we talked like we had just seen each other yesterday and talked, and talked... for an hour and twenty minutes! That's probably the longest conversation I've had all year! It was so fun to catch up, but weird that our conversations have shifted from boys and homework to savings accounts and marital housekeeping duties.

Second, there was a LOT of lightning tonight in Nashville and it was scary because it was very frequent and very close to my front door. I happened to watch the news tonight and saw that a fire (not confirmed that it was lightning that started it) heavily damaged the Werthan Mills Lofts - the same ones where my wedding photographer has a studio! Yikes! My first thought was "oh no, all of Chuck's pictures" then I thought "he better have mine backed up!" Fortunately, the fire only affected one of the buildings that no one happened to be living in yet since it was still being finished. Fires are scary. It reminded me of the fire we had in my condo complex last year (one of the buildings next to mine had a massive fire and I watched in disbelief as the flames ate up people's homes). Maybe it's time to buy a backup hard drive for my Freshie & Zero files and store it elsewhere...

the view from our booth

Also, I went to a great craft show this weekend in Alabama - it was the Moss Rock Festival and it was so well organized, planned, and full of things to look at and buy! I was so impressed, and it was also successful sales wise, which is always nice. I met a talented ceramicist named Amy (her line is Olaria) that I traded necklaces with and bought one of her platters for a Christmas gift.

a necklace by Olaria from Birmingham, Al

I also saw an artist making wooden jewelry and wooden "art" which I thought was really pretty until I recognized a piece of scrapbook paper from Michael's being sold as an art piece! All I could think of was "Lame!!!" Granted, she had embellished it a little, and I heard her say something about sanding and varnishing, but it really was just a sheet of scrapbook paper glued onto a piece of wood and sold as art. Wow.

Featured on the Austinist

Check out my interview in the Austinist! Since I'm not a local, what I can gather is that the Austinist is a frequently updated blog/news source about happenings in Austin, TX. They're doing profiles of various Stitch artists and luckily for me, Jennifer Perkins of Naughty Secretary Club sent them my way. Some nice person even commented already on how much they love my jewelry - awesome!

To see more Stitch previews and reviews from the Austinist, visit their Stitch section. You can also visit the Austin Craft Mafia to learn all about the ladies behind Stitch.

Photographing jewelry with Gemmafactrix of etsy.com

This is a great video posted by etsy about photographing jewelry. In it, Brooke Medlin of Gemmafactrix shares her secrets of taking great jewelry shots with the world - I definitely followed some of her advice for my own jewelry pictures! Quoting from their video post: "Brooke Medlin visited us at the Etsy Labs in March 2007. She taught classes on jewelry making and photography. Based in Ohio, Brooke also ran her Etsy shop Gemmafactrix.etsy.com out of our Brooklyn homebase for two weeks."

So, if you've ever wondered how to take quality photos of small items (such as jewelry), you should really take a moment to watch this video - it's well worth your time!

Click To Play

The girl is good - she's sold over 2600 items on etsy!! AND she has 100% positive feedback. That's pretty darn impressive. Here's a great example of one of her beautiful photos below. She really makes me want to get a better camera, or at least one I understand how to use properly...

I personally take photos with natural light like she does - I set up my jewelry shots right next to a window in my apartment but unfortunately this means you can only shoot them in the daytime when it is sunny out. I recently bought a light box but it just did not give me enough light to really pick up all of the little details of my jewelry. When it gets warmer out, I may try and take the light box outside and see if diffusing the natural light works better than trying to use the little lights that it came with...

New Discoveries

I just discovered how to take screen snapshots on my Mac by downloading their handy tip of the day podcasts, and then I discovered that I can post a wish list in my blogger profile!! Wow!

So... if you ever wondered what to buy me for my birthday, Christmas, Columbus Day, Labor Day, etc... here's a link to my etsy wish list complete with a screen shot:

Back from the Girlie Show!

The adventures of freshie & zero take us to The Girlie Show 2007 in Oklahoma City! Ten hours there and ten hours back... another long journey for Freshie & Zero, or should I say, Beth & Greggars? We listened to some David Sedaris, tried to listen to Stephen Colbert's new book on CD (put us both to sleep unfortunately), and learned that although Arkansas has bad roads, Oklahoma has worse ones. Fortunately, the gals at the Girlie Show know how to throw a rockin' craft show. It was held here at a neat old building formerly known as the Farmer's Market where they also apparently host boxing matches:

There was a line out the door starting at 5:30, and the show didn't open until 8:00! The decorations were really cute and girlie, of course, which I loved. The layout of the show was great, and it was pretty packed all night. I was a little afraid that the merry customers (a.k.a. wasted) were going to knock my tables over or spill a cocktail since they were setting their drinks down on top of my necklaces (that's a first!), but we got through the night without any mishaps.

we're safe behind the tables!

On Saturday, we listened to great music - if the Oh Johnny! Girls ever come to your town, I highly recommend going to see them! I even bought a special present for a special friend, but I must not reveal it until Christmas... mwa ha ha... We also ate at a yummy restaurant called Cafe Nova because when on the road, it's important to investigate the local cuisine... All in all it was a great show and I'm glad we were included!

Ah, the glamour of craft shows...

So we're back from the Germantown Festival and it was hot hot hot and then wet hot wet. The best part about doing this show was that I got to try out my new tablecloths, made by Beth Howard and they look awesome! The saddest part was watching mud get splattered on them when the rain was dripping heavily off of our tent. :( (but they're all clean now)

The first day, it rained early in the morning, so when the sun came out it was muggy and sticky, quite like a sauna. Of course there was the usual crafter grumbling that they were having bad days, but my day was fine. This is one of the very few shows I have done for two years in a row, and it was nice when customers would run up to the booth, super excited that they found me, and telling me they were so happy I came back! That certainly is good for morale when my body feels a bit wilted.

Then.... it rained. But really, it only poured through the night and mostly in the morning of day 2 when we were setting up. I was feeling pretty low since my tent has a little leakage problem and it kept dripping on us as we were trying to dry the cases and put out the jewelry. But, it was mostly disappointing because soooo many crafters had packed up and left! They gave up on six hours of selling because of a little rain! And poo poo on them because the rain let up right as the show started and we had another successful day.

The view from our tent day 1:

Notice there are several booths, including my neighbor who was selling "spirit hair". Yes, you read that right - colored human hair that you can put in your own to match your school or favorite sports team. And that's all I have to say about that.

The same view day 2:

The rain scared off a lot of vendors around me: spirit hair girls were gone, a potter from Oklahoma, a guy selling pet i.d. tags and pet hats (which was really odd since Sunday is this big dachshund race, "the running of the weenies", that brings out tons of little dogs whose owners would buy little hats for them. I was really surprised that so many people left, and that the festival officials didn't try and stop them or threaten them (like saying they wouldn't be allowed back next year - a threat that is rarely followed up on anyway).

Here comes the big scary cloud, but we're still in the sunshine. This big nasty cumulonimbus (ooh! big vocab word!) passed us over for the most part at the end of the first day.

A little puddle was all that remained of the nasty overnight storm. Since Tennessee is in a drought, the ground just sucked up all the water.

If you want to see all of the photos from the Germantown Festival, you may view my set at Flicker here.

Shows gone wild!

And so it begins - my intense month of shows. I'm doing three craft shows in one month - probably a record I may not repeat. We'll see how it goes... This weekend is the Germantown Festival near Memphis, Tennessee, which was great last year so hopefully it will be great again this year! Then the next weekend is...
in Chicago! I can't WAIT for that show! The list of vendors is AMAZING and I'm seriously contemplating just bringing a stack of cash for the sole purpose of spending it on the other indie businesses that will be there. Here are some of my favorites (but there are many, many more):






And THEN the next weekend, we will be doing another indie show called Strange Folk near St. Louis, Missouri.


I'm especially excited about this collage artist, Denise Lombardozzi, who will be there:


Also, I just got into The Girlie Show, in Oklahoma, which I am also super stoked about. It's all female vendors - I love it. So there will be lots of driving (99% done by my husband) over the next couple of months, exploring this great country of ours. I feel so blessed right now - I'm doing what I love and getting paid for it, and it really just doesn't get any better than that! Except maybe the fact that I also get to share it with my husband, who willingly participates and help me sells jewelry! Okay, okay, enough gushing. Time to go to bed.

Ode to Anthropologie, my favorite store

Can... barely...contain... excitement...

SO excited am I. The Anthropologie less than one mile down the road from my apartment is opening in a few days. Holy crap. I'm stoked yet sad at the same time. Sad because now everyone in town can shop where I buy so many of my clothes, where before I always shopped at Anthropologies in other cities therefore keeping my clothes kind of unique to Nashville. :( Bummer. I'm more happy than sad, though, because every day I drive by it I get so excited! I seriously thought about applying to work there, but I only wanted to be on the visual team, and my schedule is pretty limiting due to my craft shows.

But... what an amazing time I would have being in Anthropologie for hours at a time without any nagging friend or husband wondering when I would be ready to leave... There would be no reason for Anthropologie to write me a paycheck (in my fantasy where I am a starry eyed employee) because I would simply be happy to work for merchandise.

I just might have to be there when the doors open on August 31st. Unless there's a line. It's too hot to wait in line.

Sweet! I'm a winner in the etsy poster contest!

You can see all of the winners here or you could just look at my fun poster below... What a sweet contest - I'm so excited to be picked as a winner! I wonder if I win anything but street cred... At the very least, I'd love to get a poster! In other etsy news, I've updated most of my listings with new photos that are a little more artsy and colorful - just for fun and in the hopes of maybe getting picked for treasuries more often since my main photos are more interesting now. Click on the poster to check it out!

Stitch News

If you're in the know about the coolest craft show west of the Mississippi, then you need to know these fabulous updates to Stitch 2007! I was lucky enough to win the Stitch Grant last year, and the gals have kindly asked me to come back again this year, so my husband and I will pack up the Explorer and head to Austin, Texas in November one more time (a mere 15 hour drive from Nashville). I can't wait!

*We've extended the application deadline!!*
It's true!! Due to travel plans we won't all be in the same city to
review applications until August 28, so why not push the application
time back? So August 28 it is! But don't rest on your laurels - that
date is firm so all of you fantastically talented crafters and clothing
designers get your applications in for your very own booth and runway
segment!! Go here to apply:
http://www.stitchaustin.com/participate.html

*New amazing raffle prizes (that you want)!!!*
Seriously - this year's raffle is the best ever with prizes from Dremel
(yes... the drills!) and Babylock (yes... the sewing machines!!). All
raffle money goes straight, no stopping, to the grant winner. By trying
to win the drill and sewing machine of your dreams you also help a very
deserving small business owner build their business and their dreams.
Can't make it to the show? You can still win one of these amazing
prizes!! Raffle tickets will be on sale online before the show. We'll
keep you posted! Want to be a winner of this sure to be fantastic grant
prize?? Please go here http://www.stitchaustin.com/grant.html to find
out how to apply.

*Built By Wendy!!!!*
Say what?? Well, this year Simplicity is sponsoring Stitch and they're
bringing their new Built By Wendy pattern line to the show. You can see
it on the runway AND receive a custom fitting in their booth. How
awesome is that?

* Don't forget...*
Our blog is updated several times a week:
http://stitchaustin.blogspot.com/. Be sure to visit it for news about
this year's show, tips on the hottest indie designers and recaps from
last year. As mentioned before Duncan paints will be back at Stitch
this year with their super fun make and take booth last year!

This is just the beginning so keep checking the blog and make sure your
calendar is marked for November 10. As always advance tickets will be
available on the website a few weeks before the show.

See you at Stitch!!
xox Jesse, Jennifer, Karly and Tina

the best photo ever

This is so hilarous. I think Vogue or W might wanna take a look for an idea for their next fashion shoot. Boys doing jack knives in the pool. Very sexy.

Gah!

I got my first bad check! Crappers! It's my first bad check I've received since starting Freshie & Zero, so that's not too shabby really. What sucks, though, is that I now I have to track this lady down to get my $60. That's no fun. I feel like a mean old bill collector, but she did write me a bad check...

Another Gah! moment is that have to file my business tax. I managed to do it last year, and I think I took notes to help myself out this year, but I'm sure that will take at least a day to figure it out. Yuck! All I want to do is get ready for my trunk show on Thursday night, and my show in Blacksburg next weekend. Plus, my birthday is a week from today. Business tax and bill collecting are not what I want to be doing around my birthday.

I also had a goal to finish my wedding thank you notes this month - how embarassing is it that I haven't finished those? I think I only have 10-15 left but you should see the pile of crap I have to do on my desk... scary stuff.

yes, that's two computers on my desk.

I'm in the Rage!

Sweet!

I'm in the Designer Spotlight in the Rage this week (a weekly free Nashville magazine/paper about what's happening around town). It just came out today, so if you're in the area, pick up a copy! It took me five different stops before I finally found a place with the current issue, but I was on a mission. The article turned out great - you never know how you're going to come off in an interview, but the author, Jennifer Killerich, did a great job! Just click on the photo below to see the whole article.

Timeless Toys

You don't see too much stuff on etsy that is just classic, such as this wooden toy/jelly bean dispenser by Stump Pond Woodworks. I seriously want to buy one of these and bring it to work so I can watch our customers get all excited when they watch the jelly beans fall down its wooden slides. It's much more fun that our current candy offering of peppermints (we actually get reprimanded for the mints since we used to always have something Hershey's). Jelly Beans certainly aren't the greatest candy, but what presentation! I guess you could stick tic tacs in there but tic tacs are kind of gross.


This one is called Wilbur Woodpecker, and I had one of these as a kid, except it was a more girly bunny rabbit. Here you drag the little bird to the top of the pole and let go and then he shimmies down, giving the illusion that he's pecking the pole. Cute and simple, it's a timeless toy that every child should have, and should bring a nostalgic smile to every parent's face.


I don't know about this one - a Flipshooter. Looks like a fun thing to watch your friends play after they've had a few drinks. Their description: "Shoot the ball into one cup and flip it back to the original cup. How many times can you do it ??? Similar to a toy found in a Chinese child’s tomb and estimated to be 2500 years old. Suitable for 4 year olds and up." Maybe I need one of these, too...

Maybe it's my childhood spent in the country with my grandparents, where there was nothing to do but watch Lawrence Welk or play with hot wheels in the dirt but it doesn't get much better than classic wooden toys like these!

whew - I needed that!

Finally - I got some good news! I not only got into Strange Folk in Illinois, but I also got into the Renegade Craft Fair in Chicago! Sweet!!! The craft show rejections were really starting to get to me, so it was so nice to get two acceptances in two days!

In case you are interested in the craft show application process, and what my morale is going through, here is a list of shows I received a rejection from so far this year: 17th Street Arts Festival in Atlanta, River Arts Fest in Memphis (actually I was wait listed), Virginia Highlands Summerfest in Atlanta, Decatur Arts Fest in Decatur, GA, American Artisan Festival in Nashville, , Grant Park Summer Shade Festival (they actually lost my app) in Atlanta, GA, three different sections of the St. James Court in Louisville KY, Woodland Art Fair in Lexington KY, Village Art & Craft Fair in Asheville, NC, Artclectic in Nashville, TN, etc etc. I was even rejected from one (Craftsmen's Classics) simply because I'm a jeweler - "We have so many exhibitors that show jewelry at this time that we don't feel like our shows can handle any more jewelers at this time." Sounds like they need a new copy writer, but I get it - there are too many jewelers!

I've only been accepted to about five shows this year up until yesterday. That's not a good ratio. And that's about $330 out the window, just to apply.

I'm now preparing my slides for TACA Fall show, but I'm not expecting anything there. Especially since I'm now committed to 3 craft shows in September and if I actually got into TACA, that would make four. My poor husband probably wouldn't be such a willing helper by number four... that sweet, sweet man. I wouldn't even apply if I hadn't already bought slides specifically for this application.

Ah, anyway. I'm going to go and celebrate with some guitar hero. Rock on!