This is going to be picture heavy because I liked my booth set up this year and want to be able to repeat it. And while I liked my set up last year and thought I'd repeat it again this year...I couldn't remember how we did it. So, let's take a (map-able) tour. I'll try to point out some fun and/or historical highlights to keep it sort of interesting ;-).
I use this quarter round shelf as a work space and it probably goes without saying that I "straightened it up" before I took the picture ;-).
If you look to the right, you'll see a picture of Punkin from years ago. My friend Julie took it and it's one of my prize possessions. I hadn't brought for a few years, but felt sentimental this year and packed it along.
I really just can't believe I went from one pet sheep that I didn't have any interest in taking pictures of (but loved seeing pictures other people took of him) and gave his wool away each year to a whole flock of sheep, a small hand spinning business and a big girl camera of my own. Isn't life funny. Punkin would be amazed.
On the left.
Back wall.
If the amount of merchandise looks a little light, that's because I wasn't smart enough to actually use my big girl camera on Friday, so had to re-take all my pictures on Saturday. Sales were good all three days :-D.
I had four wreaths made and could have sold many more. Get. Organized. Earlier. Next. Year. There was something about the dark brown one that I decided I just couldn't part with, so I put a pretty high price on it in hopes it wouldn't sell...and two different people tried to buy it. Luckily we were having terrible luck getting the credit card readers to work. Whew!
Moving on to the right side.
I hang up some of my finished items made from out wool in hopes they inspire spinners new and
old less new. There are tags on each one giving the sheep's name and explaining that they are not for sale... Saturday was so cold that I wore
B. Willard's barn sweater. I left his tag on to identify him and couldn't figure out why folks kept calling me Bea :-).
I usually use this table for weighing wool and keeping my drop spindling supplies handy. I thought it worked well for calendars and Lamb Camp cards, but the scale in the back of the booth wasn't super handy (Note to myself for next set up).
Saint Tim had both calendars ready for Saturday thank goodness and I am so sorry for the folks that came by Friday to pick them up. I got them put together and "sent to the printer" late and he really had to jump through some hoops to get them done for me.
You will only get that kind of service from your local printers (and so many other small businesses that are quickly getting pushed aside by volume corporations :-/). While getting "250 business cards for $10" sounds like a good deal, if you need any special services (design assistance, rushes, corrections...) that they won't provide...well, I'll get off my soap box.
The
Lamb Camp cards and calendars are really cute I think :-). I especially like the cover of the calendar and can't believe I didn't pick that as one of the original 10 card designs. I am going to look into doing some prints this fall. I think my photography is getting good enough that that's not an unreasonable idea.
Speaking of photography, here's a funny story from the weekend. So I always run this neat digital picture frame on a continuous loop of pictures of our farm, sheep, dogs, cats, horses...so visitors who don't read the blog can get an idea of our farm and see how the sheep are raised and know how much we love them...
I always use the same thumb drive/storage device to store the pictures. It lives in the box with the frame. I took it out, plugged it in my computer to add some newer pictures (which I did manually so I'd know exactly what was being added), plugged it back in the frame and Friday morning turned it on.
The pictures started like normal...and then a couple scrolled on that I was pretty sure weren't supposed to be on there. I watched for awhile and realized that it must have pulled all the pictures off my blog (or something). I didn't think that much about it though until
Small Farm Girl came in and saw herself on the screen! She'd been at one of
our Hug a Sheep Day open houses :-D.
My first thought was to take it home that night and try to fix it, but as the day went on with all sorts of crazy, random pictures from all over the place flashing up there, it turned into a fun game waiting to see what might show up next. The realization that
Graham Lamb's contact information kept popping up might answer a few questions ;-). Luckily no little kids were in the booth when the pictures of
20 drinking a beer came around :-o.
Oh look, a flood washing out my lavender garden. Yep, that makes it look idyllic here!
Tim doing his Shawshank Redemption shot when he got to the Flambeau River a few years ago.
Excellent, let's give Brooks Brothers some free advertising. Seriously though, those were some
amazingly cute lambies!
It was and endless source of fun and people started hanging around to watch just to see what might come up next. And you really never knew WHAT that might be :-D.
"I think I earned a beer yesterday when those ladies were pinching me on the butt through the back of the chair!"
All in all it was a great weekend! Sales were great, the weather was perfect Saturday and Sunday (and not horrible on Friday) and some of the nicest and neatest people came by and visited all three days. Definitely one of my favorite festivals so far. Thank you!!!
