Curb Appeal - via Yard Sale Signs

So - do you want tons of people to come to your next estate/tag/yard/garage sale????  My friends David and Jennifer have a running joke about yard sale signs - and so they 'critique' everybody's signs.  And it's true! - is it legible - can you read it?, did the lettering run and drip because of rain or heavy dew?, is it too small?, is it flopping over because you didn't back it with something or use stiff enough cardboard?, is the contrast between the sign and the lettering strong enough for people to read it???? 
David always says that his sign is going to be HUGE, Neon and Purple :))  Not a bad choice if you want to attract attention!


This year at Purcellville's Town Wide Tag Sale - we had more people come to look at our treasures because of our great signs.  Did we think they were great? - sure - but even better - our customers thought they were great,  We kept them at our sale - buying, because we had a variety of great stuff at good prices - or because we were willing to negotiate.

This is 'Miss Directed'.  She is wearing a Mark Shale 1980s dress with a Peter Pan collar blouse, as an under layer for modesty.  She was in charge of getting everyone's attention and sending them down the street to our sale - which you could NOT see from the corner.  She is definitely attention grabbing, the words are legible, good contrast, concise, and tells you exactly where the sale is.  We only had one of her - but she was at the corner of Main and Maple and 'looking' towards where most of the sales were happening further in town.

This is my lady, 'Miss Bittersweet'.  She is wearing a sleeveless 1930s house dress with a 3/4 sleeve, round collared, 1980s eyelet blouse  - again modesty!  I added a ruffle at the bottom of the dress to make this a bit longer and actually wore this while pregnant at two different craft shows that I was juried into years ago - East Berlin Colonial Day in East Berlin, PA, and the Waterford Fair in Waterford, VA.  These two shows required 'period' costuming to exhibit and demonstrate there.  Hence wearing this 'get up'.

There is also Jennifer's lady, 'Miss Lucketts', who for some reason or another didn't want to come out of the barn this year :(  But here's her photo: She is on the left - wearing a very pretty, handmade, floral, floor length gown. 
Miss Directed got everyone to the sale, Miss Bittersweet caught their attention as they drove down the road, and the large sign 'Best Tag Sale in Town' just told it like it was!


We had used our 'ladies' and the large 'Best' sign three years ago when I did my first sale with Jennifer - and pulled them of 'mothballs' for this sale.  And yes - I made them - of course!  The large sign is an old piece of metal that I repainted.  The color and 'typography' on it matched the ladies signs that they held. For the ladies, Jennifer said she had some great 'blow ups' of old photographs, and wouldn't it be fun to use them somehow for the sale?  I cut them out, glued them to Luan (a thin plywood), and then used my jigsaw to cut out the shape once more.  Then I screwed their head and shoulders to a piece of wood I had around (really - you had wood hanging around?) and then screwed the signs to their chests.  Then of course I let them rummage around in my costume box so they could pick out their outfits.  They may like a change for next year - maybe Halloween costumes, if you don't think it's too early for that???

 And I end this post with two more photos - a Haphap happy customer in his NIB - [new in box] Stetson  :)  

 and a shot of our AWESOME customer service -  Jennifer and David delivering a lovely buffet down the street for the O'Connor family.


Many thanks to Jennifer and David Huffman for drinks, snacks, wake up coffee (a.m. and p.m.), their great location and fantastic front yard, and all of their help, unpacking, display, packing; my husband, Bob Pickett - who loads and unloads with nary a complaint; my daughter, Virginia Theerman, who helped through the weekend, and my 'sister' Jennifer Bowders, who came and pitched in all day Sunday.  It only took us an hour to pack up - Yes we almost sold it to 'the walls'.  
Was there a piece of jewelry, clothing, beanie baby, hankie, or antique that caught your eye - but you didn't pick up?  Google Bittersweet Design Studio for our location - our town Paeonian Springs - west of Leesburg, VA; east of Purcellville, VA, is having our own small town version this coming Saturday October 15th.  I will be set up in my yard next to my shop, and several other neighbors throughout town are combining forces and will have yard sales as well.   


Look for Miss Directed, as well as Miss Bittersweet.  Stop and say HI!

Town Wide Tag Sale Day One

Good evening!  WOW!  Long day.  What incredible Autumn weather we are having for this tag sale.  The only thing we might find to complain about was the heavy morning dew, but who could complain about that?

  

Jennifer - smiling as usual!  

How fabulous is it, to have a friend lend you their front yard for a huge sale like this, and help me out to boot?  Pinch me!

 Jewelry off to the left, a great buffet and castle painting on the right.

 The fun table - full of vintage style toys - these are available everyday ay Everyday Elegance, 600 Main Street, Purcellville,VA. 

 A great work table of Jennifer's - filled with lots of my vintage kitchen smalls.

 A beautiful farm table of Jennifer's - with hours and hours worth of my Mom's knitting.  All of the proceeds of the knitted goods will go to Saint Mary's Church in York, PA.

 Two adorable blue and white pieces - a chest of drawers and a dresser with a mirror.

 The Man Cave area.  A cool whirligig and Red Eye sign, club chair, deer head with hoof hooks, English riding saddle, and light up fireplace logs (my fav)!

 The 'Primitive' section - a popcorn popper, wood fruit crate, a great 1930s side table, 2 sweet hand painted chairs, milk cooler (you remember - when the milkman delivered milk to your front porch?!), a cute, primitive kid's table, and lots of spindles, and bobbins from a textile mill.

The cozy Christmas area - a few chairs, a Victorian love seat, oriental runner - and of course - some Christmas decorations!
It was a busy, but fun day.  We had lots of happy customers, kids and adults alike.  

 All closed up for the evening!  We covered everything tonight - so less morning dew to deal with tomorrow.  If you get a chance - stop by and say HI tomorrow.  

We would love to see you at "The Best Tag Sale in Town".  

Our sign claims it, and our customers confirmed it!

More Vintage Earrings (surprise!)

Here are the rest!

  In my previous post: http://bittersweetdesignstudio.blogspot.com/2011/09/vintage-jewelry-anyone-earrings-to-be.html  
I mentioned that I had carded all of ROY G BIV earrings, but that I still had to card up all of the 'neutral' colored earrings.  My made up acronym for those is now WBBR PSGC.  That stands for White, Brown, Black, Rhinestone, Pearl, Silver, Gold, Crystal.  This side consists of 52 pairs of earrings.

Here are the White, Brown, Black and Rhinestone.

Here are the Pearl, Silver, and some Gold.

Here are the rest of the Gold, and the Crystal.


WOW!  That was a lot of work!  But they do look much better when they are organized and on uniform cards.  
These will be available at the Town Wide Tag Sale in Purcellville, VA. this weekend.  Also eventually on Etsy and up at It's Bazaar on 21st Street in Old Town, Purcellville, VA.


Now to finish pricing those Brooches, and start to price the bigger stuff. 

Vintage Jewelry anyone? Earrings to be Specific

I always seem to sell jewelry at the shows that I do - which these days, you can probably count on one hand.  I am continually drawn to vintage jewelry.  I always wonder - who wore it? to where? who gave it to them? was it for an anniversary? lots of wondering.  


I have just started selling some of my vintage jewelry up at It's Bazaar on 21st Street in Purcellville, VA.  I have sold it on line for a few years now - but I never really listed very much; and I was not allowed to sell it at Everyday Elegance, where I consign some of my items, because they already had a jewelry person.

This caused me to have quite the 'back up' of vintage lovelies.  I have shown you these jewelry boxes before.  This was the beginning of my 'jewelry sorting chore' in the living room.  Believe it or not - the boxes were over flowing by the time I was finished.





So far, all of the necklaces have been priced, the brooches are in process - wow - were there a lot of them!, and the earrings are about halfway finished.  I am through the ROY G BIV part.  Now I have to move on to the white, cream, brown, black, gold, silver part.  Can I call that WCB BGS?  :)
Here is the ROY G BIV part:

The screen the earrings are hanging on measures 3' tall x 18" wide.

 Before, when I put the earrings on cards, I used leftover postcards from my open houses.  Because I didn't have a ton of earrings - having the cards mismatched didn't seem to really matter.

 But I knew, when I went to display all of these earrings together - it was time to make it look cohesive.  This would make sure that when you look at the display - the earrings would catch your attention - and not the various bits of miscellaneous card stock.  Well OK - hopefully now the entire display is attention getting as well!  My daughter says it makes her happy :)

For my templates, I took two pieces of 8.5" x 11" paper and folded them.  The first was folded to create 12 sections; 4 across the 11" length, and 3 down the 8.5" dimension.  This size card would be for the larger earrings.  Then I folded the second piece to create 16 sections.  This would be for the smaller size earrings.  Then I used the dimensions for both cards, and I transferred them to another sheet of paper.  One half would have markings for 6 of the larger cards, the other - 8 of the smaller cards.  
Then, I took one of my tiny alphabet stamps and spelled out VINTAGE up the left hand side of each earring card template, and stamped 'screwbacks' or 'clip ons' across the bottom.  This way some one can immediately identify what type of earring it is.  Because you know - we all have our preferences  :)


This jewelry display is kind of neat because the earrings shown here span nearly a century.  We are pretty sure that the fabulous red and brass dangles in the upper left corner are late Victorian; and those round purple earrings - third row up from the bottom - 4th from the left - are all 1980s!  The price range is very wide as well. 


The other side of the screen will have the WCB BGS color range - when I get them on on cards and priced (that'll be tonight - right?).  Then they will be ready to sell at the Purcellville Town Wide Tag Sale, next weekend.  I will be at 311 South Maple Street - You might recognize this sign from a few years ago: 

We'll have the sign out once more - so look for it on the right side of the road as you go south on Maple Avenue.  Hope to see you there!

Jewelry organization

These peg racks originally occupied another wall in the room.  Since I was giving up some drawer space (remember - 2 dressers into 1) I needed to reorganize - as well as down size - my costume and vintage jewelry collection.  Of course everything is in ROY G BIV order.  You know Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet?

So where are the down sized goodies going?  To Missing Heirloom for the vintage, Bittersweet Design, for the handmade, - some of these perhaps as early as today! (check the side bars on the right for the two shops), and the Purcellville Town Wide Tag Sale for the newer items.  

2 peg racks - already owned, hold my beaded necklaces.  2 wrought iron bird and vine wall decor pieces (purchased at It's Bazaar, Purcellville, VA) have enough tendrils, etc... to hang bracelets and other necklaces.  

I had a handmade primitive wall box that held my bangles - but they were overflowing.  Time for another solution.  I did have a mish mosh collection of Transferware on my dresser - but the pieces didn't work the way I needed them too, and the many colors were too busy.  I edited the grouping down to 3 vintage Milk Glass pieces to hold the bangles - again organized - ROY G BIV.  I kept 3 smaller Transferware pieces - (all in various red patterns) - a lidless sugar bowl for a votive candle holder, a heart dish - given to me by a dear friend Patty, and a pin dish.  The 2 smaller pieces will be a good temporary place for 'catch alls'.    

 More later!

Nuts and Bolts - and a new computer - finally

Stacks of chenille, a 'tramp art' or 'make do' cupboard built from fruit crates, stacks of plastic drawers filled with trims, yarns, and vintage fabric.

My plans for the All Media Arts Challenge "Nuts and Bolts" had to be shelved due to my attentions wandering on to more pressing matters - such as my work room.  I started setting it up three summers ago.  At the time, I had strayed from much of my handmade work and was uncertain as to the direction I was going to go.  Over the years I have sewn, dried flowers, made wreaths and arrangements, painted, made signs, refinished and finished furniture, knitted, crocheted, poured candles, made jewelry, and I'm sure there must be something I missed!  

Needless to say - all of these activities require a lot of items to keep them 'going'.  I had no idea what to keep and what to pass on.  Three years later I have a better idea of my direction - and the workroom is almost complete!  Much of my supplies are in order and put away, thanks to my daughter, Virginia Theerman "Queen of Organization" and two of her friends Lauren Hunt "Queen of Christmas Balls" and Kristen English "Queen of Ribbon".  I love to be organized - but sometimes in my scattered life, this doesn't always happen - but we're getting close folks!
This means workroom stuff *out of the house* and shop stuff *out of the house* - awesome!  This will come 'hell or high water' by September.
My other task is to get the shop completely organized - I know - I may be going a bit too far - but it's good to have goals!

Cali gives the workroom her seal of approval - finally more than one place to lay down!

Look for me at Purcellville's Town Wide Tag Sale Saturday and Sunday October 8 and 9.  Possibly Friday the 7th too.  I will have tons of amazing stuff for sale!

Courtesy of Ginna my workroom has it's own name - "The Fledgling - where ideas take flight"!
The exterior even got a spruce up!  Fresh white trim and my signature 'aqua' for the siding.

 

Makeover at Bittersweet Design Studio

This is currently where my 'to be worked on' furniture is being 'held'.  :( 

The messy beginnings of my tools/supplies area - but hey - at least there is an area!

Shelf installed and filled with autumnal colored items to be added to my Etsy shop.

It has to get worse before it gets better. 
Right - really it does, doesn't it? 
This is the view just a foot or two into the shop, looking towards the back. 
It actually looked worse just a week ago!

A lovely glass and wood display case for displaying beautiful items - however, now it stores shipping supplies.

OOPS!  My shipping counter - which got cluttered up while working on the smaller room of the shop...
I'll fix it, I'll fix it - I promise!!!

The smaller room - where all of the vintage jewelry, purses, shoes, hats and clothes will be, as well as vintage suitcases and other accessories. 

Number 2 clothing rack and shelf in place.  This rack currently holds clothes from my daughter Virginia's 'mid-retail' experience.  Cute stuff that is available for sale and will also be at the Town Wide Tag Sale held in Purcellville, VA the second weekend in October. 

Number 1 clothing rack and shelf in place.  This photo pleases me to no end!  All of the vintage clothing (wait - I have to preface that - the clothing that was already out in the shop) is hung and organized. Some of this is listed on Etsy and some is waiting to be listed.  From left to right:  negligees, outerwear, evening wear, day wear, casual.  

Back to the main room -- A cabinet that I found at My Mother's Closet in Keymar, MD.  Look for a post in the future about how I 'restored' this pretty thing.  It is filled with items that are already listed in my Etsy shop.
http://www.etsy.com/shop/bittersweetdesign.  

Big Event Purcellville VA Town Wide Tag Sale

Look for this sign to find me!

This Weekend - Saturday and Sunday (however - We are starting Friday!)- over 200 yard sales and loads of other vendors selling their wares. Great stuff, including all the normal yard sale items - but also amazing items from artists, designers, etc... This is a shot of my stuff from last year's sale.

I will have vintage furniture, vintage table top items, accesories, fun kids stuff, and more. My daughter will have many of her amazing and unique clothing items from her shop.

We will be set up at The ReallyGreat Finds store in Purcellville at 600 Main Street, under 2 10x10 canopies. Stop by and see us. Mention this blog post and we'll give you an additional 10% off the already bagain prices!

Bittersweet Design Studio Happenings

A view of the Garden Room, with our items for sale, at Really Great Finds, Purcellville, VA

Hello everyone - NO - I did NOT fall in a well or get swept out to sea... I am so sorry for 'blanking out' on you this summer - See my "Sorry Excuses" below.
OPEN HOUSE "It must be Fall" to be held this weekend at our shop in Paeonian Springs, VA We will be open Friday September 18 and Saturday September 19 from 12 n00n to 5 pm. As usual, if you need to come by earlier or later we are happy to accommodate your schedule.
ALSO on the schedule for FALL:
September 1st - I have been graciously invited by Suzanne at Really Great Finds, to take over part of the garden room (AKA sun room) at the store in Purcellvillle. I moved in some pieces of furniture and a boat load of smalls two weeks ago. If you need a Bittersweet fix and are in Purcellville - Really Great Finds is open every weekend - Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
Also September 1st - The 25 finalists for the Handmade Moment were chosen - I was not one of the 25 - However I still think "If Etsy were a person" video is an awesome thing. Thank you to everyone who took time to view my video. I greatly appreciate the support.

September 4th - Pushing the Envelope - Crafty Packaging for Cards of all Kinds by Marthe Le Van, published by Lark Books, a division of Sterling Publishing Co. arrives in the mail! My submission "TOP SECRET" is on pages 34 and 35! I will have copies available for sale in the shop. I'll even sign it for you :P

September 18 and 19 - Open House in Paeonian Springs, VA

September 26 - Historic Homes Walking Tour, Paeonian Springs, VA at 1 PM, during the Paeonian Springs Fall Festival. I will be conducting the walking tour and discussing the beginnings of Paeonian Springs, and some of it's architecture. This is will be approximately a 45 minute tour. This is only the beginnings of a comprehensive walking tour brochure/guide thatI will be working on for our town.

October 9, 10 , 11 - Fri and Sun 10 - 6, Sat 8 -5 - Open Air Market at Really Great Finds to coincide with the Purcellville Town Wide Tag sale (October 10 and 11 Sat 8 -3, Sun 10 -3).

October 17 - Paint the Town Green - Purcellville VA 10 am - 2 pm - to coincide with the Fall Farm Tour. I will be bringing my "Top Secret" Recycled Envelopes cards, as well as two new lines of 'green' items designed and made by Bittersweet Design Studio.

SORRY EXCUSES:

4 days after my last post, our dearly beloved dog of 15 years Abby, a Black Lab, passed away in our arms, amid kisses, tears and belly rubs. I can hardly even write this, because I can't see through my tears... frankly I think that's a pretty damn good excuse!

Now some other ones...

We had the good fortune of having 2 young enegetic sisters - Anna and Amy Reynal, helping us over the summer, as well as our nephew, Kenny Kopp. I'd like to see you keep the three of them busy, and try and squeeze a blog post in!

We were busy making the video "If Etsy were a person", and being a peer reviewer for the videos.

We listed and sold a boatload of stuff on eBay (that's a lot of packing and shipping!), and listed stuff on Etsy, where we had brisk sales there also.

So - enough for my sorry excuses - I gotta shake a leg and finish getting the shop ready for this weekend, and get some more small tables up to Really Great Finds to replace ones that I have sold!