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!

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!