It’s been such a busy week!  When there’s a fair to attend, there’s always a lot of stock to prepare: these are door plaques getting their sticky pads on the back. Always a boring job when there are this many to do at once!

door plaques

This week there’s been the Cheshire Show, always a busy well-attended show followed closely by the Arley Garden Festival - so two big events very close together. The preparation is only one aspect of doing a show: fitting it in around customer orders, packing, unloading, getting the stall ready all add to the mix!  The other big part is actually being there for the sometimes long, long days: time consuming and sometimes exhausting, but definitely rewarding and enjoyable.  I was asked at Arley would I be able to take a break during the day. The short answer is no: what we do when we work for ourselves would be illegal if we were employees!  Fortunately, when you’re next to nice helpful people (as is the norm) you do manage to slip away for a few minutes - we watch each other’s stall.

 This was the first time I’d attended the Arley show, and I was impressed.  It was well laid out, with shopping tents, plant stalls and gazebos as well as marquees lining grassy streets!

grassy shopping streets

As you’d expect from a garden festival, there were lots of plants for people to buy

some of the plant stalls

It was incredibly hot and sunny but most people were sensible and hats were in evidence everywhere:

everyone wore hats

There was a rather fetching hat stall, no doubt doing brisk business: this is www.hatsoffoxford.com

hat stall

And there were some lovely things to buy for your garden:

garden ornaments

Lovely handmade soaps and skincare products from www.cherishskincare.co.uk - Laura and her mum make all these products themselves. They’re all completely natural and I can assure you the scents are just gorgeous - I spent a weekend next to this stall and it was a real treat!

gorgeous handmade soap

A real life owl

owl

and impossibly cute baby hedgehogs courtesy of www.lowermosswood.org.uk who are an educational nature reserve and wildlife hospital:

baby hedgehogs

And there was even a large painted rhino sculpture (not that I know much about the sizing of rhinos, but this one looked life-size to me) on display

rhino sculpture

There’s more info about the rhino here: www.rhinomania.co.uk and www.visitcheshire.com/gardens

I was fortunate to have a position just by the entrance to the marquee - which meant I caught a gentle breeze every so often, which was most welcome on such a hot day.  If you’ve ever spent more than a few minutes on a hot day in a marquee you’ll understand just how welcome that breeze was! This photo is taken from behind my stall:

welcome breeze from the entrance

It is always a delight to be able to personalise things for people there and then: this plaque was personalised for someone who has a collection of bears and bear-related items, which will be having their own room. 

clares bears

This shoe clock reads: give a girl the right shoes and she can conquer the world - it’s also personalised for Charlotte Mary, who I believe is someone who likes her shoes!

shoe clock

Probably not surprisingly, the Saturday at Arley was busier than the Sunday - I would imagine the only reason for this was the England v Germany match at 3pm.  I’m told England didn’t play well - but I guess the score is testament to that: I’m no soccer expert but 4-1 is not a good result in anyone’s books… unless you’re supporting the opposing team, then I suppose you may be celebrating!! 

My next event could not be more local to me unless it was in my back garden!  I’ll be at Croft Carnival on 3rd July, which will be held on the playing fields in Croft (Warrington): about 2 minutes from my house - walking at a slow pace!!  I’m looking forward to it - hope the weather stays good!

In the meantime, if you’re not close enough to visit me at any of these shows, you can buy all the products online at www.1stuniquegifts.co.uk or email me for special requests: wendy@1stuniquegifts.co.uk

Everything is hand-painted and hand-lettered, which means there are always slight differences between each item.  It also means that if you have any special requests regarding colour, design, images or wording, they can usually be accommodated.

The Cheshire Show is a big event in the Cheshire calendar and I must admit I was surprised at just how big, given that it’s on a Tuesday and Wednesday, bucking the trend for weekend events.

cheshire show

Last year, there were queues to get onto the showground to unload, diversions set up for exiting the ground, massive visitor numbers (80,000 over the two days) - but lots and lots going on.  I know people take time off work to spend the day (or even both days) at the show, and local schools come along with groups of children.  I lost count of the number of children I spoke to who were taking part in events with their horses - and the rosettes were definitely out in abundance!

rosette

This year I’ll be there again, in the craft marquee, hoping the weather is just as good as it was last year.  On second thoughts, maybe not.  Last year was a little too hot: the marquee was airless and overbearingly hot.  Us Brits are never satisfied with the weather!  (To be fair, it’s no real wonder, given what the weather throws at us on its ever-changing, thoroughly unpredictable roulette. Throwing often being the operative word!)

If you’re at the Cheshire Show this year, come and say hello!!  If you’d like more information, it’s all here: http://www.cheshirecountyshow.org.uk/

If you’re waiting for an order, I’m hoping to get them all sent out soon!  I am working on them as hard and as fast as I can.   If you ordered at the Cheshire Show, I’ll be posting your order out on Monday or Tuesday the 13th or 14th.  If you ordered at Capesthorne Hall Hot Air Balloon Show, I’ll be posting your order out on Thursday or Friday the 16th or 17th.

orders waiting

Your order will be sitting amongst this little lot, but I have made a start on all of them, believe it or not.  It can be a time-consuming business because everything I paint needs at least a few layers of paint and maybe varnish.  I tend to work in batches, doing all backgrounds, or all detail, at one time.

I may see you at the Stockton Heath Festival tomorrow (11th July 2009) - it should prove to be an excellent event.  Let’s hope for sunny weather!

What a fabulous day it was yesterday at the Cheshire Show.  If you were there too, in whatever capacity, I hope you had a great day too.

My customers were all fabulous!  Everyone was lovely.   Other stallholders were lovely too.  It was great to put names to faces of people I’ve met online on the craftsforum. 

The sun shone all day, but it wasn’t clammy like the day before.  It was a shame to be inside a marquee all day (although I could think of many worse places to be!) but it was lovely on the rare occasions I ventured outside for loo breaks.  Speaking of which, I was amazed and impressed that the toilet facilities were kept clean, were fairly plentiful, and replenished with loo roll and hand towels.  Doesn’t take much to please me does it?!

If you were one of my customers, or potential customers, thank you.  You all collectively put a smile on my face yesterday.

I’m sitting here at the Cheshire Show, typing this in between chatting to the earlybird customers.  It’s just gone 9am, and looks like it’ll be another hot day.  Yesterday was hot, clammy and airless in the marquee, which made people want to exit asap - not brilliant!!  However, it was a good (if slightly sticky…) day and enough people braved the clammy conditions to keep us happy!

Today is the second and last day of the Cheshire Show, but the Capesthorne Hall Hot Air Balloon Extravaganza in Macclesfield is hot on its heels.  It starts on Friday afternoon, and runs into the evening, is on all day and evening till 10pm on Saturday, and runs all day into the evening till 8ish on the Sunday.  Phew!!  Long days, but should be great fun.

As well as making up customer orders, next week will be spent replenishing stock so I can add names, dates, messages, etc., to items and gifts at the fair.  It’s all hand-painted at the moment so pretty labour intensive!

I forgot to bring my camera today, but I’ll try to remember it for the hot air balloons!  It’s the first one I’ve been to and I believe they are amazing.

Will you be at the Cheshire Show next week on 23rd and 24th June?  I’ll be there with some of the 1st Unique Gifts goodies - please come and say hello!  It’s a massive event - there’s more info here:

www.cheshirecountyshow.co.uk

It should be a great day out! Let’s hope for good weather - always improves a day, doesn’t it?