freshvintage

BlogHer Recap - Swap Meet

Here's me behind my half-table at the BlogHer Swap Meet . Thanks to my new friend and fellow vendor, Lotta, for taking this picture. More on her later.

This was my oh-so-nice neighbor, Amy Turn Sharp, who didn't even scream as she witnessed what looked like a flea market barfing all over the other half of her table. Amy and her husband own Little Alouette and make baby teethers & rattles out of locally harvested wood in Ohio.

Amy is a blogging superstar, and was selected to read one of her posts at the Community Keynote. Yes, the same keynote for which my posts weren't selected. And after listening to the bloggers who were selected, I realize that I need about 157 more years to hone my writing skills before I would try again. One of my favorite humor pieces was one by Danielle from Knotty Yarn. Here's the video of her reading (it is not safe for work, which is my favorite kind of video).

I took your advice and packed a vintage suitcase stuffed with linens, tiny jars of buttons, vintage coloring books, goodie bags of vintage price tags and so much more. I attached a clothesline across the front of the table (which was already covered with a tablecloth and draped). It was pinned with those freaky flashcards and the horse show prize ribbons. 

I sold the flashcards individually ($2 each or 3 for $5). They were definitely a best seller, along with the sex books and medical journals.

I sold six out of the seven books that I brought. Thank god for all of the twisted and perverted bloggers who purchased books from me (especially that one who bought three books - you know who you are). Those books were too damn heavy to lug back to the airport.

My Moo business cards were a big hit, too. Throughout the conference, I had some bloggers ask to see all of the cards, and then pick the one that they liked best. It was a fun and easy way to let people know what I blog about, since there didn't seem to be any other antiques bloggers at BlogHer (at least none that I knew about).

I met some other vendors that were really sweet, including Velma who blogs anonymously at A Smeddling Kiss. I was fascinated by the fact that she doesn't use her real name on her blog and that her extended family doesn't know about it. The funniest was when she walked out of a session called "Blogging Identities and You", which was a panel discussion about blogging anonymously, and she randomly ran into someone that she went to high school with (and hadn't seen since). Of course, her first question was, "Why does your name tag say Velma? That's not your name."

I found a vintage soul mate in Lotta from Mom-o-matic, who makes jewelry out of vintage buttons. I traded some of my junk for two pairs of totally hip earrings and two hair pins. I love how she uses old photos as the backing for her earrings. And tiny flashcards for her hair pins. To top it off, Lotta packages her items in vintage-style peanut & popcorn bags. So freakin' cute. Lucky for you, she has an Etsy shop that she frequently updates with new stuff. I double love her because she bought my blue vintage suitcase to display her wares at craft shows and whatnot. One less thing that I had to bring home.

Make sure you click on the picture to see the adorable pink & white hair pin with the pair of jitter-bugging dancers. I wore it to the fifties-themed BowlHer party at the Lucky Strike Bowling Lanes on Saturday night.

Here I am with my new friends Gwen and Lotta on our way to the BowlHer party. That was the first time that I'd bowled in over 15 years. Bowling balls are a lot heavier than the Wii remote. Thankfully, all of that heavy lifting didn't keep me from doing the running man on the dance floor later that night.

We had so much fun at that party that I can't even share the photos without getting explicit written permission from them first. And I doubt that will happen.

But here is one of Lotta at a different party with a blow-up doll. Just my luck...the one party that I missed had blow-up dolls!

I'll have much more about BlogHer in my next post. Perhaps I will eventually get to the part where I learned stuff. Or maybe not.

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For your reading pleasure:

Lotta has her own crafting column at Try Handmade.

Read Gwen's About Me page - she grew up in the jungles of Indonesia. She only had electricity for three hours a night. And I thought I had it rough because my mom wouldn't let me watch The Newlywed Game or chew Bubbalicious.

BlogHer Recap - Day 1

Day one is done! Here's the view from my window at the Sheraton. Not bad, huh?

Today was a free day - the actual BlogHer Conference doesn't start until Friday morning. This is my first time in Chicago, so I walked around for a few hours before the pre-parties started. Here's the ferris wheel at the Navy Pier:

There's a beach in the middle of the city!

I walked along the Magnificent Mile. (Did you hear Oprah's voice while you were reading that? I know you did.)

While all of the fancy people were at Ferragamo and Armani, I visited the Lego store:

After my long walk and a personal-size deep dish pizza, I went back to the hotel to get ready for the first party. There was a knock at the door. "Delivery for you!". For moi? It was a vase of flowers courtesy of Colombia, Land of Flowers and a totebag from ivillage:

All of the BlogHer attendees staying in the hotel got them. Swag-mania has officially begun!

The SocialLuxe Lounge party was at the Hyatt down the street. I caught up with two great Philly mommy bloggers, Whitney from MommiesWithStyle.com and Colleen from ClassyMommy.com. There was one other famous person in the Hyatt, but we didn't get to a chance to chat:

Yes, he was in the building.

But back to the party. You could get your nails done there!

Upon arrival, I received one drink ticket and one raffle ticket. You know that my drink ticket was gone in the blink of an eye. And then the party hostesses started pulling tickets out of a hat and calling the numbers for the raffle tickets. While I was busy trying to figure out a way to steal another drink ticket, they announced my raffle ticket number! Yay! I won a prize from shopbop.com:  

I couldn't believe all the stuff in that bag. A shirt, a dress, three pieces of beautiful jewelry and a $100 gift certificate!

These are the three lovely ladies from shopbop.com - they were so friendly. Kelly (in the middle) was nice to me even after I told her that I had never heard of shopbop. They drove all the way from Madison, Wisconsin to come to ONE party and then had to drive all the way back. Too bad they couldn't stay and hang out. But, it worked out for me, since they didn't need their drink tickets. ; )  Thanks so much, ladies!

Before leaving the SocialLuxe party, I received a stuffed-to-the-gills oilcloth swag bag to take home:

Here's one thing that was in it:

Okay. I think I could get used to this. It is the Kodak Zi6 HD video camera in Red Rouge.

For some reason, I was equally excited to get this pack of girly office supplies from Office Max:

What a loser I am.

It's time for me to get ready for a full day of learning and schmoozing. The swap meet is at lunchtime today - I will let you know how it goes!  I might be tweeting occasionally, so be sure to follow me on twitter. Twitter is free to join, and you don't have to interact with people if you don't want to - you can just "follow" people and read what they have to say.

And if you want even more inside scoop, do a search for blogher on twitter. There are 1000+ women tweeting about it all day and all night!

On My Way to Chicago!

Wow! Thank you for all of the great display ideas for the BlogHer Swap Meet. I knew I could count on you. There's one update, though: I now only have half of a table on which to sell my vintage finds. This is definitely a stress-reducer (and a baggage reducer) for me.  But I am still going to use some of your fabulous ideas, including the vintage suitcase.

I packed nearly everything that I am going to sell into this navy blue and white suitcase:

It is a small suitcase, but it weighs a TON. I plan to carry it on and put it on the overhead compartment. It is so heavy that I had to practice lifting it in the air, to make sure that I won't drop it on anyone's heads.

I will surely take some pictures once I have everything set up at the Swap Meet.

Hey - who's peeking out from under that tablecloth? It is my little fancy beer-opener man.

His gal-pal is shoved in there somewhere between the the ob/gyn medical journals and the illustrated sex manual. I would expect nothing less for someone who is always screwing. What a slut.

I will try my very best to write a couple of posts while I am in Chicago. On Thursday afternoon, I am planning to attend the SocialLuxe Awards ceremony for which I was nominated for the Funniest Blog. I didn't even remotely make it to the finals, so I have no chance of winning. I am totally getting trashed and storming the stage when they announce the winner. I'll be sure to take pictures of security carrying me out!

Moo Business Cards & The BlogHer Swap Meet

I am a sucker for business cards. I already have 200 cards that I designed and printed at overnightprints.com last year. But I'd heard so many great things about the totally cool Moo cards. With the BlogHer Conference quickly approaching, I decided to check them out.

The Moo cards are unique because you can have a different photo on the back of each card. I used the photos in my Flickr account to create my 200 double-sided business cards, but you can upload photos directly from your computer, or from Etsy or Facebook. The Moo cards are also available in the original skinny version (MiniCards), but I prefer the full-size card to show off the photos of my vintage finds.

It was just like Christmas when I received the package! (Christmas for paper-obsessed nerds.)

There's a photo on one side, and my contact info on the other side. There are several configurations for laying out your info.

I included some photos of my home:

As well as some of my creepier displays. I might not want to give these away at BlogHer. Definitely won't make many friends handing out a card with a pink dollhouse zombie standing next to a toilet.

Here are a few of the other cards:

Another reason why I wanted to get new cards is that I will be selling at the BlogHer Swap Meet. During one of the breaks between workshops, attendees can sell their books, t-shirts, handmade goods or whatever else they please. I signed up for one of the ten 6' x 3' tables available. I'm not sure what the hell I was thinking, because I am nervous enough about going. Now I have to figure out which wonderful vintage finds I should stuff into my extra suitcase. Damn USAirways charges $25 for the second checked bag EACH WAY (and $15 for the first). So I am essentially paying $50 to sell at BlogHer for about an hour. Sounds a little crazy, but I think it will be a great way to get the freshvintage name out there, and to meet some other vintage-loving bloggers.

Any ideas on what products to bring? I am thinking about selling some of ephemera and linens, since they are light and easy to pack. Maybe a few of the child-themed vintage items, like blocks and books. And what better place to sell my 1920s Obstetrics & Gynecology Journals than at a blogging conference for women?

Can you lend a hand with some display ideas? You know how obsessive I can be about displaying my stuff. I don't want to lay it all out on the table - I'd like to add some height to the display. And I don't have my cute wooden boxes and enamel bowls to display things in (too heavy), so I have to think about other lighter containers. And, I will probably only have a very short time to set up & take down. I might have to enlist retail display guru Debi Ward Kennedy for this one!

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Today I received a code for free shipping for new Moo customers (that means you can't have ever ordered their free sample pack). You have to spend at least $15 and order by August 31st. You can buy any of their products, including the MiniCards, which are great to use as price tags or gift tags. Here is the code: Q63N9W.

Fill It Up for Five Bucks

A few weeks ago, I visited a antiques sale inside a huge warehouse. On the first day of the sale, I bought the enormous 1906 Webster's Dictionary and a breadbox with a glass knob. I spotted a few other things I liked, but they were priced a little higher than I was willing to pay. 

I returned the next day and discovered that I could fill a big shopping bag with anything that would fit in it for five bucks. They were really trying to get rid of everything.

Guess what? Both of these fans fit into one bag! Or at least the nice woman running the sale said that we could pretend they did. We didn't actually try it. They were priced at $10 each the previous day (which is still a good deal). Everything else in this post fit into another bag. All told, I spent $15 for the breadbox and dictionary on the first day of the sale, and another $10 for two bags of stuff on the second day.

The back of the dictionary has a reference to all of the illustrations found throughout the book.

This long metal container once stored old maps or artwork. I threw this into my $5 bag.

The old photo and Amish bonnet went into my $5 bag as well.

These 8x10 band leader photos from Washington, D.C. went in there, too:

As did the postcard packs from San Francisco:

And the stack of Wee Wisdom and Jack & Jill magazines from the 1940's:

Some of my purchases have already been put to good use. The breadbox can now be found on my kitchen counter. It looks like someone sanded all of the paint off of it, so it is nice and shiny now. I love the way it blends in with our stainless steel appliances.

No, I'm not using it to hide wine. Just bread.

And the Amish bonnet is the newest addition to the dress-up box in the kid's play room.

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To my American readers, I hope you have an enjoyable Fourth of July weekend!  My mom has an extra-special Famous Friday post to celebrate the holiday.