When Life Gives you Lemons

In lieu of me not having a job, I decided to try to do a Christmas craft fair this year to earn some extra money around the holidays. I recruited my friend Carla, and with the guidance and help of the craftiest lady I know ( aka my Mother in Law, Donna) we set out on a journey. The fair we rented a booth from had 2500 people attend last year, so we made a lot of stuff. Well, long story short due to some freak California weather it actually rained and our fair was canceled. Yes, it rains probably 20 days a year in CA and it rained on our fair day. Bummer. Big time.

So then we were stuck with about 300 pieces of inventory and a deficit of money in which we spent to buy supplies to make the aforementioned pieces. Hmm... not what I was hoping for. So we had to act fast.

We tried to have a garage sale style boutique in Carla's front yard the week after our canceled craft fair. We managed to make our money back via that, so at least we weren't in the whole anymore. But unless I wanted to give Jimmy a set of blocks that spelled "Noel" on them, we still had a problem. We hadn't made any profit!

I tried to stay positive. But it was hard when it looked like months and months and months of work would be all for nothing. I'm a firm believer of the saying " When God closes a door he opens a window". We just didn't have a window yet. And then we got one. A lady emailed Carla because she had seen our add on Craig's List. She invited us to rent a booth at a different craft fair they were having in Simi Valley. We gladly accepted, and had an extremely successful day. We actually made a profit, a pretty decent sized one. Yay! I needed it. We were also invited to participate in a different fair this weekend. This will be our last attempt to sell all of our stuff.

So things worked out. It wasn't as easy as we originally thought. We were hoping for one weekend of exhibiting, and now this last one will be our third. But I can't complain. Maybe we would not have sold anything at the fair that was rained out, and we have been more successful this way. Who knows. We can speculate all we want. But we have already made more money that we originally hoped for, so anything after this will be icing on the cake.

I'm going to switch gears a bit here. Last night was the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show. Why? Why do networks broadcast that every year? I guess it gets a lot of viewers, but for the life of me I can't understand who. Unless maybe it's men wanting to rationalize watching soft porn? I get the Victoria's Secret catalog in the mail. I didn't sign up for it. But yet my mailbox is stuffed with 99% naked anomalies every season. I don't read it. It takes a one way trip to my trash can. I honestly think things like that are NOT healthy for women. If you are someone who can look at those catalogs and watch those fashion shows and not have suicidal thoughts more power to you. I am not. They make me feel terrible about myself, and I don't like that. So I did not tune in last night. Nor do I ever intend to tune in to that. Perhaps that networks could air a piece about someone doing something more worth while than strutting in a high heels and a thong for the holidays. Something that actually makes people feel good about themselves. Makes them want to help others. I'm sure that would not get as many viewers, but it sure would get mine!