New Year - New Stock

I was hoping my "Vintage to Victorian" website would be ready for the New Year, but apparently it isn't, quite.



So! It's time to get busy! The holiday is over and I have 2 weeks to sort my stock for the next 3-day Shepton Mallet Antiques Fair. It's always a dilemma deciding what to take - whether to 'major' on enamelware and kitchenalia, household linen and fabrics, eiderdowns and quilts or baby gowns, or whether it's better to take a general mix.

This eiderdown is the latest eiderdown to cross our threshold. Each new one I find usually has pride of price at home for a week or two before it goes to either one of the antiques centres or I take it to a Fair. Some have been known to stay with me for nearly a year until I'm really firm with myself.

I usually have a table of kitchenalia with a shelf of jelly moulds for "my regulars", and then fill the rest of my pitch with the textiles. Sometimes the regulars just come for a chat and I go home with not one jelly mould sold, but on these occasions it seems to be the eiderdowns that sell. At other times I might go home with all the eiderdowns but may have a run on damask tablecloths. One thing is for sure, if I decide not to take something I get asked for it 3 or 4 times - linen bedding being a prime example. Two fairs ago I sold 8 single linen sheets so made sure I had plenty the next time and not one sold. I had no linen pillowcases left to take to the Fair and it seemed that every visitor to my pitch wanted a pair!

The blankets in the armoire are staying - they're being collected for the wedding. Odd? Not exactly! The seating in the bar area of the marquee will be straw bales (she is marrying a farmer after all), and the blankets will lie on top of, or over, the bales. At least that's the plan. Anything can change between now and May! The eiderdowns on the top, and the lovely pink one on the lower shelf, will be going to Shepton. The one on the right is one of a pair ... not sure about those yet. I have another pair on the single beds in our spare bedroom and I can't decide which ones to keep! Blogger won't let me show you the other ones at the moment.

I'm off to my storage unit shortly to sort through some of the linen and kitchenalia that hasn't yet seen the light of day. Hopefully I'll find something I'd forgotten about which can become the centrepiece to work from.

Well, I can't stay chatting all day - there's work to be done. I've unearthed my sewing machine and I have ideas for some of the damaged linens I'm expecting to find in the store. I may not have time to produce anything between now and Shepton, but at least the ideas are beginning to flow ...

I seem to be having a problem with the spacing between paragraphs on my posts at the moment. Not sure what I'm doing wrong!

Have a jolly day!