Showing posts with label Shop Local. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shop Local. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Kids Kottage Craft Fair Postmortem


Sadly, most of the pictures I took that day came out fuzzy. And yes, that's a fitted sheet on my table -- I swear the label said flat. Sigh.

When I was in college, I studied directing for theatre. After each student directed show, we would get together with our own mentor and teachers and analyze how the show went from start to finish. We would call this our postmortem. . .

Okay, so the craft fair was not a stupendous success, but it wasn't an entire waste either. I mainly got practice doing one: the prep work, all of the set up, selling my wares, etc. Actually, I don't really think of it as selling my wares, but really just chatting with folks and telling them a little bit about what I do. Truth be told, many people have no idea what chain maille really is. My warrior (with her false eyelashes, thank you very much!) modeling the coif drew many people over to my table and inspired many a conversation. I also spent some time weaving a new dice bag and demonstrating how the weave I used (Euro 4-1) could be made into other variations. I brought a whole bunch of beaded and wire wrapped jewelry, some supplies, and even a whole bunch of DIY Necklace Kits (perhaps soon to be added to my Etsy shop) that I wanted to move in addition to my maille. I made a few necklace sales and even a pair of earrings, but no maille sold. Sad.

There was a Pirate guy there making balloon animals for the kids who gave me a lead on a local pirate festival and another vendor offered me a position at a fair outside a coffee shop in another town. I'm not sure if the coffee shop thing is going to work out because it's over an hour away from me, but that pirate festival sounds promising. I'm going to have to make that call and build up my inventory!

I also met fellow Etsy seller Megan of meganclynch and fellow Etsy seller / Florida Etsy Street Team member Stacey of Elle Belle. You can see Stacey's set up here and Megan's here. Check out more pictures of my set up at my flickr.

Friday, March 7, 2008

Craft Fair Tomorrow!


Sneak Peek from my living room.

If you happen to be in the area. . .

Athena's Armoury will be participating in the Grand Opening Celebration and Craft Fair for Kids Kottage in downtown Safety Harbor, FL on Saturday, March 7. Kids Kottage is a resource in the community for families, businesses and artists. No child will be charged a fee for accessing any of their services. The celebration includes games, live music, food, archery, and . . . a trapeze act?!

The address is 255 5th Avenue South, one block south of Main Street. The craft fair will be open from 9:00am to 3:00pm with the rest of the event going from 11:00am-3:00pm.

Hope to see you there!

Thursday, December 20, 2007

I've Been MIA: Here's What I've Been Up To

I've been horrible about updating lately!! The last few weeks have been insane. I'm not sure how it happened, but I was still rushing to wrap and ship Christmas presents even though I started shopping in October.

I finally finished up my custom orders. I had one order for two Dice Bags, one of my standard and the second with copper cinch rings:

I was spotted working on a Dice Bag while at work and got a custom order on the spot for a Crown Royal size bag:

I don't have any in shop at the moment, but if you want a Dice Bag just drop me a Convo through my Etsy shop and I will get back to you with an estimate of how soon one can be ready (usually 3-4 days).

I got to go to the Atomic Holiday Bazaar in Sarasota recently and walked away with all kinds of awesome booty. You can see some it in my flickr Customer Appreciation Set. Also, I finally upgraded to a Pro flickr account! Ooooh, the organization possibilities!

I recently hit 150 Hearts! THANK YOU!


The folks over at Real Simple gave Etsy an awesome shoutout in their December issue:


Need a last minute handmade gift? Check out Etsy's fantastic new feature called Shop Local. It will show you all of the Etsy shops in your neighborhood.

The Fantasy Artists of Etsy (FAE) Street Team's December Newsletter is out! You can sign up to receive our once monthly newsletter here.

You have just 11 more days to check out the FAE Christmas Exhibition. There are many wonderful items here from our members.

We've got another wonderful feature over at our FAE website called the Magic Door. Every single day, it is updated to take you to a different member shop. It's a little happy surprise to go through that door!