It's About LOVE, People

I know I already gave y’all the craft show update from the St. John’s show on October 11th. But I left out a very big part of the story, as that post was getting long. And this part needed to be separate anyway. You will see why.

It’s no big secret that I’ve been going through a lot lately with pain, intractable chronic daily migraines and now hemiplegic migraines, which brings occasional sudden paralysis to my right side and with it an inability to make art. To say the least, my emotional state has not been great all the time. This has been difficult to accept and get through sometimes. I get mad. I cry a lot. Much lamenting is done about wanting to just quit all this. Yeah. It’s bad.

Last Monday was a big smack in the face about why I keep going despite all this suffering. It’s about LOVE.

I already told you about how I got sick Sunday night and my mom, Heather and Mr. M packed up for me and did the set up Monday morning. That was about LOVE. Specifically their LOVE for me and their belief in my work. Then my LOVE for them deepens because they totally didn’t have to do all that but they did and I LOVE them even more for it.

Fast forward to around noon on Monday. I finally make it to the show. I’m there with my mom and Mr. M at my booth. Lots of people at the show are commenting on how beautiful my work is. People are buying. More LOVE.

Then something strange started to happen. People started to show up just to see me. My twin sister came with her 2 small children; my father arrived; my friend Christi came (who works 70 hours a week and I never get to see her so I was so happy to see her); my good pals Heather and Maggie (who really helped a lot to get me ready for this show); my new friends Jack and Lorraine (who were old acquaintances and now are good friends thanks to Twitter and Facebook); a friend from high school who I have not seen since 1993 (who we caught up with through Facebook and through which he was spammed by me about the show); a totally random coincidental meeting of a youth group leader from when I was maybe 14 or 15 who lives in Charleston and was visiting Rochester and happened to be at the show; and (finally) my mom’s very helpful neighbor who came to help us pack up as Mr. M had left to go to work.

Including my mom and Mr. M that is 14 people total. My booth was a rocking party all day long. People, food, laughter, hugs. LOVE. One person would show up and go and then another would show up so it was spread out all through the day.

Then add all the people who stopped to just look and/or buy my work. And add other vendors who knew me and my work through other people or being online who wanted to meet me. That was weird. LOVE LOVE LOVE. Throw in a couple 55-gallon drums of validation while you are at it.

I was starting to wonder when the “This Is Your Life” cameras were going to pop out from behind a corner. Seriously. None of the other vendors were having loud reunions with friends all day. I wonder if we got to be annoying after a while!

I am getting all misty just writing about this. I think The Universe may be trying to tell me something like, “Good grief, woman! Don’t you feel all this LOVE? You can’t off yourself! Imagine all of these people at your funeral. How could you do that to them? They really really LOVE you!”

So I feel the LOVE. I feel it in my chest so much that literally my heart aches with all this LOVE. And, yes, now I am crying full blown tears as I write. Wah. This isn’t going to appreciate itself, people!

How did I get so lucky? What set all this good in motion? Me? How on earth could that be?

There are not words in this language to accurately express the depth of my gratitude to have this kind of LOVE happen in a time of such suffering and desperation from a loss of hope that this pain will ever go away and I will get my life back. But then again this LOVE has been around me all along. It just happened to kick me in the pants all at once in one day last week. Quite powerful stuff!

Yes, Universe, I am listening. I am spinning string made with this LOVE and how it makes me feel safe, valued and needed and I am weaving it in and out through my ribs and around my heart so I won’t forget it; so it will be my light through the yucky dark places.

Go share some LOVE!

- Vickie

Upcoming 2010 Shows

Saturday, October 23, 2010

St. Rita’s Craft Sale

9:30 AM – 4:00 PM

St. Rita School

1008 Maple Drive

Webster, NY

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Mayday Underground

10:00 AM – 4:00 PM

Village Gate Square

274 N. Goodman St

Rochester, NY

The first 50 shoppers will receive a free swag bag!

Mayday Underground Flyer

maydayunderground.wordpress.com

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Irondequoit High School’s Arts & Crafts Sale

10:00 AM – 4:00 PM

Irondequoit High School

260 Cooper Rd


Rochester, NY

Craft Show Happenings

Yesterday kicked off the 2010 craft show season for me and I think Rochester, NY in general. “What?” you say. “A show on a Monday?” Yep. It was Columbus Day and many folks had the day off. The turnout was actually quite good! We did really well, I am happy to report!

And I must say that is a good thing because I worked my butt off this week, as did my mom and Mr. M to get ready for this show. My pals Heather and Maggie also worked like little elves for me, too. With all the health issues going on and the memory problems associated with them I forgot to really look at inventory early enough. The inventory box contained a little less than I thought it did. So a slight mad scramble ensued. I cranked out tiny art. Mom sealed the dominoes. Heather and Maggie put on the cord findings for pendants. Mr. M ran ribbons for domino ornaments. It’s nice to have minions really good helpers!

However, the stress of putting in 15-hour days all week got to me and I crashed hard Sunday night incapacitated in bed in pain. Mom, Mr. M and Heather were left with the final packing of all the show items. Thankfully I made good lists so it was slightly easier on them. I wanted to cancel the show if I could not finish it all myself. I’m sick of everyone picking up the pieces when I become ill. But they throw the “Well, if it was one of us, wouldn’t you pack up our show for us?!” Uh, yes. Absolutely. Yes, I would. Hands down. No question. But for some reason, the same just does not apply to me. Hmmmm… Baggage claim! Aisle 3!!

What I really needed was sleep. Mr. M and Mom set up the booth at 8:00 AM by themselves. They are pros at it by now. I slept in and Mr. M picked me up a bit later. This worked out well because this show was a long day, not ending until 7:00 PM. See what a lovely job they did setting up?

We have Halloween on one end of the table, Scrabble tile pendants and domino pendants in the middle, then checker and domino key chains, and Christmas domino ornaments at the other end of the table. Sales were a pretty even mix between all of them except the key chains. Not one sold.

I always look forward to the first holiday season show so I can catch up with my craft show buddies. It’s an awful lot of fun to be on the vendor side of the table!

Upcoming 2010 Shows

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Victor PTSA Arts & Crafts Show

9:00 AM – 4:00 PM

Victor Intermediate School

953 High Street

Victor, NY

More information about the show

Saturday, October 23, 2010

St. Rita’s Craft Sale

9:30 AM – 4:00 PM

St. Rita School

1008 Maple Drive

Webster, NY

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Mayday Underground

10:00 AM – 4:00 PM

Village Gate Square

274 N. Goodman St

Rochester, NY

The first 50 shoppers will receive a free swag bag!

Mayday Underground Flyer

maydayunderground.wordpress.com

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Irondequoit High School’s Arts & Crafts Sale

10:00 AM – 4:00 PM

Irondequoit High School

260 Cooper Rd


Rochester, NY

Collage Paper Prepping

Lately I have been creating my own papers for collaging. I’ve needed a couple specific colors for some new ideas that I could not find in my scrapbook paper stash. Gasp! How could that even be possible? I know! But it is indeed true!

My process starts with a generous coat of gesso on regular white cardstock. Nothing fancy… just a pack of white cardstock from the craft store. I kind of lay the gesso on thick creating a great deal of texture. This step is best done in batches so I do between four to six pieces of paper at a time. I bought some of those giant plastic carpet protectors so my chairs could scoot on the carpet in the studio. They have turned into great carpet protectors from painty projects (not that we are really attempting to save the carpet in the studio anymore at this point)!

I don’t know if it’s a throwback from childhood or what but I prefer to sit on the floor when I work. My body is displeased with this however and only lets me do it every so often. But painty gesso on paper calls for the floor! Huzzah! Also, there is not enough room on my worktable to accommodate the drying of four to six pages of paper.

The gesso dries quite quickly and I get to paint them soon. I think today I need more yellow and orange. Maybe some red and green for domino Christmas ornaments. Pink for cupcakes. I will also play around with some glazing and layering for visual interest.

This is a page I painted for a project a few weeks ago.

So what becomes of all this painted paper? It gets cut up into ridiculously small pieces for decorating dominoes. I’m talking about pieces smaller than half an inch, mostly much much smaller. Often I wade into dealing with one millimeter by one millimeter pieces. Yep. I do. Why? I’m still looking for the answer to that question.

- Vickie