Office Snapshots

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Office Snapshots is a website filled with just that, photos of offices of companies, mostly tech companies. Some you've heard of: Google, eBay, Craigslist, Flickr (above). This fits in nicely with my fascination with biographies and autobiographies - how people live.

I work in an oddly shaped building. It's fairly old but was very cutting edge for back in the day. The window offices now hold 1 or 2 people. I work in a very large office with 2 of us - used to be 5 in there at one point. Being a computer company, we were at our peek employee-wise in 1998 and 1999, before Y2K.

The interior offices, of which there are just a few now, are your typical cube farm. So I was interested to see that these modern companies shown on Office Snapshots, still use cubicles. I don't know what I expected - something new and innovative, I guess. Though typically, it seems the walls are all low, whereas ours are highish walls. I wish we'd get rid of some of the empty cubes and open up the space, but that's just me.

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I worked my October shift at Enchanted Rose Garden on Saturday. I met a new vendor, Lisa, a jewelry artist. She worked half the day, then I worked with Eileen the owner, the rest of the day. We were fairly busy so the day went faster than previous days there, I thought. I still managed to get some stitching in, during the slow times. The thing that amazes me about that store is that in the 3 days I've worked there, there is rarely a time there isn't a customer in the store. It's a nice steady flow.

And each check is higher than the previous, so I'm definitely trending in the right direction, as they say. Checks are cut twice/month and my last check covered my rent. I've covered my rent in sales both months I've been there, but it's nice to do it in one check, not two. MJ was right, this is a good store - I think things will only get better.

I took my Halloween pins in and Eileen and Lisa both loved them and each bought one. So we all wore them Saturday. I was going to put them in my booth, but Eileen put them in the Halloween/Fall section, which was terrific. I sold one Saturday to a customer too. So I've been making more to have at the show at MJ's house this week.

Oct 18, 9:00-6:00

Oct 19, 20, 9:00-4:00

MJ Inspirations 4th Annual Home Craft Sale

342 Pannell Road, Fairport, NY 14450

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Enchanted Rose Garden

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I worked my monthly shift at the store in Penfield on Saturday. I worked with another Stephanie, a talented whimsical painter, whom I worked with at the Powers Farm Market show. I own a set of her salt & pepper shakers. It was fun. It was relatively slow so I got some stitching done too.

I bought these bi-fold doors last week and painted them black. When I get more framed pieces done, I'll pull this out a bit more and hang them on both panels and even the back of one of the panels if I set it just right. Love the black. (I noticed a new display downstairs at the shop, the same black shelves as I use - which I bought from MJ, who uses another one. She's started a trend!)

I also took in 4 of the new acrylic risers I bought a few weeks ago, filled with Sticky Notes. The display now looks like I want it to. That's the good news. The bad news is that's about 125 notepads that I don't have available for the next craft show in 2 weeks. I should be okay by then but I have to work like crazy. I set up my big acrylic Sticky Notes shelves in my studio so I can fill it as I finish more - using that as motivation (and encouragement that I'm making progress).

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Everywhere a Sign

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My name is Stefani and I am powerless over exclamation points!!! These are signs I made this morning for my display at The Enchanted Rose Garden. Sorry the lighting is a little weird - and I have no time to fix it. These signs have little paper easels attached to the back but I'm taking push pins and double sided tape with me because I won't know for sure how I'll use them until I get there today on my lunch hour.

Eileen, the owner suggested these signs, which I know, falls under the Duh! category. I was 100% focused on the product, not thinking like a customer. I do have a sign there now that I made that says Hand Stitched Paper Art but it's smaller. Now that my booth is switched around, the sign needs to be read from the door to entice people to come in to look closer.

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Enchanted Rose Garden Set Up Day

.Almost all of my inventory is now is 3 stores. And I have the biggest show season of my career this fall. Panic much? Nah. Gulp. The good news is I have lots of centers stitched, ready to be made into cards, notepad covers and framed art. And lots of centers ready to be stitched.

I set up my space at the Enchanted Rose Garden in Penfield yesterday. I want to fill this wall with framed art. I actually have a few more pieces at home that I want to rework a little bit or reframe. Then they can go in too. That card rack contains a bunch of non-stitched cards I'd like to sell to get rid off so eventually everything I make will have stitching on it of some sort. I also have slightly bigger card racks I could put in addition to or in place of this puny one, as I increase my inventory here.

That's my friend MJ's painted glass next to me. She downsized her space slightly and offered this set of black shelves to me at a good price so I took her up on it. Those two shelves actually form a wall down the center of that room, dividing off our little area. (You can see her glass next to my wall space too. We both have space on both sides of an aisle, if you will.) MJ bought the shelves at Target and painted them black, which the owner & I just love. Really pops those colors as they say.

Overall I'm happier with my initial set up than I thought I'd be. I was able to fill more than I expected. This is an acrylic display I had, someone had given it to me actually. I've found one similar online at a good price, measured yesterday and so today I'll order 4 to fill the rest of the shelves. I like displaying all like-colored items together so I think I'll keep that theme going. It worked out well assembling these purple Sticky Notes all at one time too. I punched multiples of various parts at a time and so they went together pretty quickly. I hustled at the last minute to get the gold flip flop Sticky Notes ready - it won't be summer forever. The fall shows will be too late to sell these.

I priced that piece on the left pretty low - would love to sell that thing. It was way more work than the result warranted and has garnered very little interest. I'm going to pick up some black or clear easels I saw at Michael's recently. I just used these big clunkers for now because I had them on hand. This turquoise quilt set-up sort of came to me at the last minute.

This shows the top two shelves. The shelves are adjustable so I can always play around with them as I change things around. That's a wood tray I painted black that holds my pins. Next to it are my business cards (must stitch more!), my little bio sheet and my list of future shows.

Above are the 4 remaining notepad & pen sets. (I had another but I stored it carelessly so the cardstock cover got bent so I'll have to redo that one.)

I had to retag every single thing because I now have a vendor number again. Since I haven't had one in a while, but still participate in one-cashier-for-all shows, I've been using my initials. Most shows are good about using existing numbers, knowing that vendors also participate in co-ops. Hopefully there's not another #15 participating in the same shows that I do. I took this opportunity to raise my prices just a skosh because for one, I feel more confident in selling. I initially priced my stuff on the low side to test the market. Without exception, every fellow vendor who saw my prices thought they were too low. The second reason is the owner of the store keeps a percentage of each sale to cover advertising and credit card fees.

I need to tidy up my studio a bit today, then get back to creating.
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Pink Flowers

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See? Not everything I make is in the blue/green/purple family! This is one of 5 of the original 13 Notepad Sets left that I'm calling my "Father/Daughter Limited Edition". Dad lathe-turned the wood pen inside and I made the cover to hold the pen and 4" x 6" notepad inside. I'm only charging $14 and you know the pen is worth way more than that but Dad is being a stubborn ol' coot about the price.

I had two pieces of very good news this week, within 24 hours actually. The owner of Artizanns wants to purchase some of my Sticky Notes for her beautiful store in Naples. I haven't received the actual order yet so I'm only semi-celebrating until it's official.

Yesterday I met with the owner of The Enchanted Rose Garden in Penfield (no website yet) and she asked me to join their store. This is a co-op where I'll rent space and have to work 1 day/month, which is a situation I've been in before and decided not to do again due to time constraints. But my mentor and friend, MJ Cramer, the glass painter, is in the store and highly recommends it. It's very near my house and is on a very busy road. (Attention locals: it's on 441 near the 4 corners of Penfield.) The rent is a little higher than I would have liked but I trust MJ completely. It's just a 4-month lease to begin, which takes us almost through the big holiday season, so that will be a good trial period for them and me.

I was thinking yesterday as I drove to the store on my lunch hour, what a difference a couple of years makes. When I visited my first store a couple of years ago, I was soooo nervous, wondering if my work was good enough, fearing being rejected. Yesterday, I found myself just eager to meet Eileen and learn the particulars of the store. I've had such an overwhelming good reaction to my work at shows that I know my work is acceptable - just needed to see if I would be a good fit for that store and if it would fit me.

The store is in an old house so it has lots of rooms. I started channeling Mom the moment I walked in, "Wow, there is a LOT of stuff in here." The first floor is 90% the owner's space, all buy-and-resell stuff. Honestly, I didn't look at it very closely. The second floor is where the majority of vendors rent space. I immediately found MJ's area and saw a corner next to it that appeared to be vacant, though a few things had been moved into to make it look less vacant. I was so hoping that was the available space - it was!

Walking past MJ's painted glassware area is whimsical painted stuff (glassware, clocks, furniture) by Stephanie Teitsworth. I knew her work from a couple of shows we did together - in fact I bought a set of salt & pepper shakers from her at the Powers Farm Market show. We both worked the same shift at Powers so I got to know her a tiny bit. So I think my stuff will be prefect in that corner - the whole section will be colorful and happy.

I emailed Eileen last night my intention - yes, I'm interested. So presumably that will be effective August 1. I'll post more about that here and on Pine Tree Designs as the time gets closer. I'll do an email and postcard mailing too, once the 2 stores are finalized. (If you know you're not already on either list and want to be, email me to be added to the list.)

Driving back to the office after meeting with Eileen, I found myself quoting MJ, "Now I'm over-extended, just how I like it." She cracks me up. I might not like being over-extended as much as she does - I just need to figure out how to make Pine Tree Designs profitable enough that I can retire from the day job.

And do not get me started on that. Last week, you may recall, was spent entirely with an outside auditor. This week has been spent entirely with 2 New York State sales tax auditors. I honestly don't mind working with these guys, it's not as scary as it sounds. They are just people doing their jobs and I'm doing my job. But this means I haven't touched my "regular" work in 2 weeks. If this kind of pressure kept up, I'd be going back to a weekly massage, let me tell you.

I'm hoping for a "normal" week, next week. And of course I'll be stitching my little fingers to the bone every other minute, in order to keep up with this new found demand. Good news, like I said.

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