Bohemian Mermaid Palace

See how cute the girls' faces are? Just ignore that weird one on the left... Here's the Lampgirl hanging out with Redballs in my bedroom. As you can see, his balls are no longer red. But, when I found him sitting next to a dumpster behind the thrift store... he had bright red balls and a magic marker bikini top. Leaving him outside for a while took care of that. And below you see Betty in all her glory, wearing my dress from The Buz's castle wedding in Prague. The ladies next to her are old fashioned blouse forms, with wooden ball-joint arms. Pretty sweet.

I have a small collection of mannequins... have I mentioned that? I love every one of them. Betty here is the original family mannequin. My dad passed her down to me as I will pass her down to Josh's daughter some day. She wears outfits, she has a box of wigs. She is glamor. I also got the frilly lamp girl from dad. Her body lights up green. She usually hangs out with Redballs... hm, I need a photo of him. The girls here are pretty neat. They have beautiful old-fashioned faces and one-piece bodies. They prefer no hair or clothing... unless they model for my website. I have a few more... but no photos. I'll work on that.

Woo! I'm scheduling a ton of festivals this year, and I'm pretty set up through July at this point. Here's how it's looking (if you really care about exact dates and locations look here )... I have one at the end of April here locally called the Spring Fever Festival. It's very new and not yet very well attended. But, it's put together by a local art chica and it has great potential to really take off. There's also a fall version in october. Good quality crafts, non-profit booths, activities, music. So, this is my second time doing it... who knows if money will be made there. But it's my first chance to visit with some of my craft buddies and see what other festivals people are doing etc. AND it's literally right down the street. May will be interesting, no local festival really during May. So, I'll be going to Shasta for an Old Time Fiddle Jamboree. Then for memorial day weekend, heading down to Lakeport right on Clear Lake. I'm looking forw...

So there I was... saturday afternoon sometime, I turned on the tv. First thing I saw, the very first thing, was my ex-boyfriend's big face. Stunned, I watched as they zooooomed in on his face even more. He was talking on the phone on tv, his wedding ring glistened on the handset next to his big face. 'Weird' I thought to myself. Then, I figure out why he's on the phone on tv. It's the local Easter Seals Telethon. Weirdness #2 - I worked for ES for 2 years and volunteered behind the scenes of that very telethon twice. Whoa. As I'm staring, still stunned, STILL seeing whatshisname's big face ... the mc lady says, "now let's speak with someone pledging all the way from Bismarck North Dakota!" I almost spit out my beer. Why, I used to live in that very part of North Dakota ... in fact my mother still does. It felt like I turned on the tv and the tv people pointed right at me and said, "HEY MERMAID!!" Weirdness, no?

Man, my head is spinning. Lookit all those applications! But see how organized I am? Yeah... I know. I made a map and everything. Yep, tis the season for planning out the craft festival season. It's fun! I'm trying to do as many shows as physically possible this year. It may kill me. If so, please give my mannequins to my boyfriend. I'm looking at doing all the usual local fairs... oyster fest, north country fair, 4th of july, trinidad sunday market. Also some things in oregon and mendocino. Sweet. Check out my web site if you care about exact dates and places. (Don't bug me about the crappy width of the screen ok? The html edit thing stinks.) Really, I can't think of anything else right now. Must... do ... more ... fairs...

I always have. Now, I'm trying to make a living making stuff... sheesh. It's fun, but there are plenty of challenges. Mainly I like selling at craft fairs and such. I have a great time. Traveling, camping out, meeting interesting folks. I love all that. The up side (along with all that stuff) is I'm getting full retail price for all my goods, personal interaction with my customers and therefore direct feedback. The down side, I suppose, is the added cost of travel, booth fees... and personal energy. Physical and emotional. Well, that's not really a down side I guess, but a cost none the less. The travel, setup, and breakdown takes lots of physical energy. And being 'on' all weekend, schmoozing customers and such, is exhausting as well. Still, it is my preferred mode of selling... versus say, wholesaling to shops. That's a separate post I think. The problem I'm trying to solve right now is, well... there are only so many craft shows. The ones that are goo...

O k, well you can all relax now. I got my confirmation in the mail yesterday... whew. Not only that, but it looks like I have a killer spot! All alone on a little island, in the middle of the show. Sweet. I did this show once before... when I was doing Wax Hand job. That is, the job where I worked in a kid's wax hand booth in college. As I recall, the quality of crafts was mixed... not too high end handcrafts, mixed with buy/sell goods. Well populated, large festival with a difficult setup. I also remember hitting some bars at night and having fun. I think it's a sort of historic section of town. Anyway... I think I'm set up to do as well as possible, which is all I can ever do. At the very least, I'll cover my expenses. Not worried about that. And I'll get some quality time with my little sis, a rare treat. Get a little visiting time with Dad, also fairly rare. AND get out of town to someplace warm where I'll be doing my thing. Good times. But first, I have app...

This could be a blues song... But I hope not. Any day now the Dandelion Days - Lions Club guy is going to call me back and confirm my booth space. Yep. Pretty soon. Festival is this weekend. Ha. Anyway I'm proceeding as if it's a go. My first ever double booth. Yessss. I've got bead kits, hat kits, dye kits, lots of new jewelry... oh, and some new goodies for my booth set up. Extra baskets, better dressing room and awnings! Oh, I'm ready. And clothes . I always have lots of those. Jackson is waaay down near Stockton, so there's a bit of travel involved. I'm getting excited to leave town, now that spring is starting to spring forth. It's gonna be in the 70s! Plus, my little sister will be my sidekick for the weekend. That will rock. So... yeah... once I can get this all uh firmed up... that will be cool.

Well, it's been decided. The Same Old People will run the North Country Fair this year... and Washington Whatshisname has resigned as coordinator. Yippee! I can't wait for September and my same old festival.

Well, I think my foggy winter head is waking up finally. I have my lists of potential craft fairs and application deadlines nicely plotted out on my yahoo calendar. Printed and color coded and pinned to the bulletin board. I'm even sending off applications! I have my lists and charts of new bead and jewelry stuff all laid out. Sweet. Gawd how I do love going through the bead catalogs and web site. Rather than doing it for 2 weeks, though... in a cave-dwelling haze of notebooks and pajamas... I'm getting it all done in a couple days. Not bad huh? Sometime today I'll be conferring with The Buz about some new clothing designs. Heehee. I'm gonna have my OWN original designs. So, we need to get going on all that and work out some details. I'm also working on my booth setup. I want to order a few items to beef up the display a bit... it's getting freakin crowded in there. I've been needing a rolling clothing rack for the travel of wrinkle-prone clothing... and a f...