So many photos

I take a lot of pictures for work, so many that most of the time I really don't look at them. There's a very short window of time I can send them off to the PR person to post on all our social media pages. Sometimes I add a tag line or the story behind it if there's time. Things sell so fast that most of the time I can't get a picture of it.  I have to go in to the store two hours early if I'm going to do a big display change just so I can get the picture taken before everything sells. 

This photo was interesting because I didn't notice the ceiling lighting going into the flowers. There's no photo editing done at all, even if I knew how to do it I don't have the time to fuss with editing.  I was wondering why my PR person picked this photo to add to the website, so I took a closer look.  About an hour later this plant sold. 

New display - I think I need a vacation!

Decided to change up the front table display with something a little cheerful and tropical.  It's been cold here at night by California standards. Most of the flowers have sold so my little island paradise isn't as lush as it was this morning.  :)

Lunch with the ladies

One of my volunteers loves to cook and has a beautiful house on the water so she hosts lunch on the patio all the time. Since I really have no day off, on the days I babysit Henk, I bring him along. Today Henk was a little fussy which is not normal for him. Willette's husband (now called Grandpa Dave) took Henk for a walk around their garden which has several fruit trees. It was a bit windy that day so we were all bundled up and under the space heater. Lunch was bbq shrimp with three different salads. Homemade  French apple cake with fresh strawberries and ice cream for dessert. Everything was so good and it was a real treat to have bbq shrimp, which is a favorite!

Another coffee card

I borrowed some stamp sets from another crafty friend so I could stock up on coffee theme cards for my card swap. 

I had all the parts of this card done and just had to have the time and mental energy to pull it all together.  Nothing too fancy with this one but it still took a little bit of time to get things balanced and looking right. I still may bling out the heart before mailing it out. I had plans to make a beaded heart, which still may happen but then again it's have the creative mojo to do that after a day of babysitting and work. 

Full Day of Picking

Today was a full day of picking. I packed my car 2.5 times. This load is just the stuff coming from the last auction and heading down to Cottage Crafts in Campbell. I left my place at 8:00 am and didn't get back home until 8:00 pm.  Yes it was a very long day but things just had to get done while I was down there.  Since I was back in Cupertino I also stopped by the Japanese store to pick up the things I can't get here and a quick car wash. Living on an island there's only one car wash place and they charge $$$ just for a basic wash because they're  the only game in town, plus they don't do a very good job.

I did two big picks through out the day and filled my car twice with stuff that had to be sorted and cleaned. I wasn't able to get it all done while down there so one car load had to come back home with me.  It was such a busy day, I didn't have time to take photos but I did pick up some very cool ikebana vases so I may unpack them to take some pics. If you asked me what I got (other than the vases) I really couldn't tell you because I was cleaning, tagging and packing so much I was just focused on getting things done. Life a picker!

Just having fun

This card design was made over several months.  Following the advice of the crafting YouTubers I like, they preach "it's the process not the end result when crafting.  The backgrounds were made months ago with no thought on how they would be used. I stamped the owl, thinking maybe making it a Halloween card (bird looks like a vampire) but that didn't happen so every thing  sat in a project box. I made little heart (I can't remember why) and just stuck one on the owl since a bow tie just didn't work. 

I had to clean up my crafting table, since the piles were starting to get too high and stuff was staring to spill out on to the floor. 

I was putting the stamps back in it's packaging and I saw the sentiment that matched the owl and heart card. Interesting how those things just happen. :) 

Use what you have

Being a card maker I have a lot of parts stacked everywhere. You know, us paper crafters just can't throw anything away. Since I'll be moving in the next few months (really hate the thought of having to pack up everything once again) I'm trying to use up all the bits and pieces of things I just can't throw out. The kimono image came out of the iris folding cards I make and it way too good to toss.  I used my gelli plate to paint them so I could also use up all the bottles and tubes of paint I have.  Amazing how much I have for  someone who doesn't paint anything!  I'm also trying to restock my card rack at CCB with new stuff or at least keep it full.  I don't sell a lot of cards but it's still nice to have an outlet for all the things I do make. 

I do miss teaching card making classes and just hanging out with other card markers. Back in the day when there was a scrapbook store in every corner, it was fun to just hang out.  I always thought of it as a bar for those of us who don't drink. :) Those all night crop that went to into the early morning always amazed me!

Truffle Zest Seasoning

Working on developing Mees's favor palette so he won't grow up to be a picky eater. I saw good review on this truffle zest seasonings so decided to get a few bottles. This morning we made scrambled eggs and I have to say Mees ate it all and even licked the bowl, s0 it passes the taste test.

How things happen on the same date.

I didn't realize until Annie past away the memory feature on Facebook.  It goes back to all the posts I made on the day. I started checking it out really to see what Annie and I were up to.

Today on February 8, 2010 I brought Annie home and eleven years later I scattered her ashes at her favorite place in Carmel. 

Interesting that both things happened on the same day. 

I miss my fur baby everyday.

Mees and cooking

Mees is learning to cook and bake. It's very hard to be in the kitchen and not have him running in and trying to help with everything.

So far he has learned to make hamburgers (maybe over salting a little) fried rice and chocolate chip cookies. The cookies have to get in the oven ASAP as Mees is very fond of cookie dough. 

He's also learning to clean up the kitchen which I think is a life skill many over look!

Colorful Displays

I didn't think we would sell all the dead of the dead stuff that came into the store this week, but it sold almost as soon as it was put out on the floor. Skulls are very popular around here too. 

I know my volunteers think we should do everything like the big retail stores and only put out what's in season but for a thrift store it's different. People come in looking to add to their collections or flip so I try and keep the good stuff. I don't keep cheap trashy stuff, only things I think worth collecting.

What I like about the day of the dead stuff it that it's very colorful and makes a nice display even if it only last a few days. I send pictures to my PR person (who's vacationing in Hawaii for several months) but by the time she gets things posted it has sold.  

Second round of coffee theme cards

I've been working on my cards for the coffee theme group I joined this year. Since I don't have a lot of stamps in that theme, I had to borrow some from my crafty friends or modify some of the stamps I current have.  I'm also trying to do the "use what you have" trend and so far I haven't had to buy anything but postage stamps. I'm also trying to restock my card rack at cottage crafts, since it's been awhile since I've added anything new. My cards are small enough I can mail a box down instead of driving everything down. With gas prices going through the roof mailing what I can just made more sense. 

I went with the mid century modern look with some of them to change things up. I do have to say I look like that fox at the end of the day. Much more alert in the morning but more creative late at night. I remember when I was living in Cupertino, I would have the front door open because Annie liked to sit by the front door and look out (it's a German Shepherd thing) while I worked away until dawn. I sure miss those quiet days with my big fur baby and never having to worry about keeping my front door open.

Books

When we first opened the store I would only take clean hard bound books. The reason for that was many of the books we would get would be dirty and very worn which also equals smelly. 

I didn't think books would be a big money spinner for us (and that proved to be true) so didn't want to deal with sorting out piles of unusable books. Since our books are scanned to the most popular ones selling on Amazon, we have a  very nice and current collection that we know people want. We can't compete with the library book sale  (which are starting back up) on price so decided to go for quality instead.  This past week we've had 100's of books donated that we can't use. Took a few hours to sort them out into what we would take (many had to be cleaned) and the rest put into brown paper bags so my volunteers could take them to the little libraries around town.

I was told the local library is going to open a book store, which I think is super good idea. Great way to make a little money and help recycle books people no longer want. Not sure how it will effect the store's donations but I think with the library being closed during COVID people realized how much they missed the services they do offer.