Good JuJu – Page 3 – Karla's Cottage

Finalizing my new spot and finding joy in doing it

By Karla Nathan / February 3, 2025

My new space is done, inventory set up, and ready for this week’s sale at Good Juju.

The front portion of the booth is my jewelry boutique.

The very front entrance holds a jewelry shelf dedicated to Valentine’s Day.

Once you step into the main part of the space, there is an abundance of tributes to the holiday sprinkled about.

But the entry is mostly jewels. I set up a small table with Cheifs colored pieces since we are located in KC and the Super Bowl is this week. And to not be just an opportunist, I actually watched a game (for the first time). While I cannot call myself a football fan, I am a huge Kansas City fan, and love the way my adopted town’s citizens support it local teams, events, the city itself.

By the way, that might be the last game I watch. As a person who has had multiple concussions myself, watching the crashing bodies gives me the willies.

There is a row of gigantic metal poles down the aisle of Good Juju that support the high ceilings. I have one at the left side entrance in my area, and I refused to ignore it or treat it like a wasted space. Instead, I used magnets to wrap the top in vintage wallpaper and the bottom in silver velvet. Then I added more magnets with hooks and hung necklaces from them.

Eyesore into asset, with just a few magnets!

With the expanded dimensions I now have, I could bring in another full table of old earrings. And of course, if you layer upwards, you get even more display space.

I’m taking advantage of the extra wiggle room to bring in more handmade bits too.

When I was a kid, one of my favorite games was playing “store”. With this new, improved, larger spot, I actually feel like I’ve gotten past the make believe stage of my game and have a real, live store of my own. The walls we built and the spacious layout of the area combine to bring a more professional look to my junk and treasures.

Fingers crossed that my jump to a larger spot (and higher rent) pay off. Whether it improves my sales or not, it has brought me joy.

Heartfelt

Good JuJu, Hearts, Painting with thread, sewing?

By Karla Nathan / January 22, 2025

January’s sale at Good Juju was cut short due to horrid, terrible, awful, nasty, cold, blizzardy weather.

Surprisingly, we had quite a few customers brave the oncoming storm and shop with us. I was quite pleased and thankful that those guests came to see us.

Still, it wasn’t quite a full crowd.

Typically, holiday goods are sold in advance of the actual month of the celebrations, so January is when most of my Valentine inventory would be on display. Since we didn’t have our regular, larger turnout, I’m using that as an excuse to keep making heart themed crafts and bringing them in, even though the sale is only one week before the holiday.

Honestly, I love making hearts. And in my opinion, they aren’t seasonal. I figure I can keep bowls of velvet and lace hearts out year round. Right now, they look like they are blatantly Valentine’s Day items. But without the candy boxes and other decor around them, I think I can keep on making these to bring in.

But not this one, it is going as a gift to someone special.

It isn’t taking long to fill up my new booth at Good Juju with my junk, you can’t even see the beautiful walls we built any more

antiques/junking, Good JuJu

By Karla Nathan / January 19, 2025

Well, I’m moving in!

The new space is approximately divided into two areas, the back is my regular stuff while the entrance is jewelry.

With a larger space, I realized I needed bigger furniture so it would feel more to scale. This cabinet had to be pilfered from my studio so I’d have a solid “anchor” piece in the back. The door was placed next to it for the same reason. I didn’t want to use too many white tables stacked up. That worked well in my half space, but a full booth required substance.

This felt like it gave the room more balance.

Small, white tables were definitely used a lot, they work great. But before I brought in the big cabinet, that section needed more umph.

I still need to get a clip light for that top shelf in the cabinet, then this side is ready to roll for First Friday weekend.

I love, love, love, love, love the pergola/entryway Rich built for the doorway leading to Beth’s space next door! So much so that I told myself I would leave it empty to show it off.

Hmm, it seems to have some things hanging on it. Oh well, I tried! At least it isn’t completely covered. You can still see the structure.

Not quite the entire front half is jewelry. One wall is still stuff. I think this area is complete too. I’m still working on the jewelry spaces and will show that later.

“IT’S SO FLUFFY I COULD DIE”- As Agnes says in Despicable Me

antiques/junking, Good JuJu

By Karla Nathan / January 14, 2025

Despite the harrowing cold, I bundled up, then we filled the truck with wood, paint, and power tools to overhaul bare two by fours into making my new booth feel cottagey and welcoming.

In a week, we faced two walls with tongue and groove. This one got distress painted.

This one was painted a soft, green/blue.
And columns were added as trim.

Two other walls were crafted from a rougher lumber, some with a live edge. I liked the look so much, I decided to leave them raw and natural.

One got an iron shelf and the second, a hand painted garland of roses.

We also hung clusters of chandeliers to block the sight of a big vent, added more lighting and some decorative pieces. I wrapped the giant metal pole in vintage wallpaper and crushed velvet, and will use it to display necklaces hung on magnets.

Oh! And look at this! I love this walkway to the next door neighbors! (Although from the look on that neighbor’s face, she seems a bit judgey)

Seriously, I love it all.

It was sooooooooo much work, but exhilarating to do, because I was extremely excited about how each area was turning out. I love every square foot of my new cottage at Juju. We had such lucky timing to be gifted truckloads of attractive lumber. Those various textures and sizes of boards add so much more character than the plywood we would’ve had to use without the freebies.

We worked so hard, that I wasn’t even cold. I actually pulled off a couple layers because I was getting overheated. The temperature inside the building is set just high enough to keep the pipes from freezing and it’s always chilly inside. I surprised myself by not even being bothered by it. The worst part was unloading the truck in icey snowdrifts. The outcome was worth the effort.

Much of it is more than I really needed to have done. But we had the week to do it, the free materials, and to me, having a wonderful back ground will bring joy to me every time I go into work. I’m already filling it up, and it hurts a little to cover up my pretty walls. Still, I’ll know they are there, peeping out from behind my piles of stuff, and it will make my heart happy,

What I did while it snowed

Good JuJu, jewelry

By Karla Nathan / January 11, 2025

While avoiding the swirls of snow and freezing winds, I snuggled into my studio and made jewelry.

Along with valentines candy boxes.

Mostly jewelry. One day, that was all I did, til time to make dinner and watch tv. I do not allow myself to sit in front of the television before six, or that would be all I did instead of create.

I finished lots of watch face pieces and charm necklaces.

A handful of charm bracelets. (Or should I say an armful?)

Including Cheifs themed ones.

After whipping out a bunch of Cheifs colored pieces, I had a mini panic moment. As a non sports type, it dawned on me that I do not know anything about football season ending dates.

With my venue only open two days a month, my time to hawk these was pretty limited, and did I completely miss the time of year when people would be donning their red and yellow gear and cheering on the team?

I looked it up and saw that the Super Bowl was still an option in February. So if the local team is playing there, I’ll have a huge opportunity. If not, possibly the fans are still backing them and not fair weather followers? I should stick with what I know, and not try to follow trends or teams, or use colors that do not appeal to me because I think they could be popular, huh?

Although, if I were to be a supporter of a team, I’d much rather wear some vintage jewelry in the jersey’s colors redesigned into something new. And I really liked the way they came out.

Not all of the necklaces I made were vintage. This one is a silver chain with some simple stones on it.

This is a 14kt gf chain with faceted amethyst beads holding an amethyst pendant framed in 10kt gold. I don’t know if this type of thing will fly at Juju, most of my pieces are lower cost, this will have to be a bit higher.

I do love working with both the old pieces and the precious or semi precious. And doing minor repairs instead complete do-overs. I’d been collecting vintage pendants, that needed new chains, or stones reset, or other little fixes. So a pile of those were completed too.

My two days of playing with baubles were too short. By then, Rich got the drive plowed and we were off to working on the new space at Good Juju. That was not nearly as much fun, and we are still doing the manuel labor to get walls built, chandeliers up, electrical cords strategically placed and painting done before moving in. Rich has been an amazing help in this project and I’m excited about how it will turn out.

It might be more fun to create jewelry, but this booth make over is very exciting. And I’ll be glad that we made the effort once it’s finally done. Plus this spot is twice the size of my previous booth. I can devote an entire quarter of it to my jewelry display.

My job

Good JuJu

By Karla Nathan / January 2, 2025

First Friday Weekend at the Old West Bottoms is tomorrow.

I went all in on Valentines for this sale.

Our sale is Friday and Saturday 9-6 at Good Juju.

I celebrated the upcoming season of love with giant, vintage wallpaper hearts to decorate my booth.

Quite a bit of my previous holiday decor got recycled into Valentine’s Day. I enjoyed my painted ponies too much to tuck them away too soon.

I like decorating the ceilings in my space, changing it up seasonally is a fun project for me to plan.

Making things, crafting and decorating are probably my main reasons for having a space. I’ll sure never get Rich doing it. I’d probably be better off working for an hourly wage somewhere instead selling my stuff.

But between being at Juju with friends, talking to my kind customers, and making stuff, I’m pretty happy there.

I love my so called job!

A few new pieces for Good Juju

Good JuJu, holiday decor

By Karla Nathan / December 6, 2024

Our bonus shopping day at Good Juju in the Old West Bottoms of KC was super busy!

And while I made sure I was very well stocked for our five dates for holiday sales, I felt like I needed to make a few more pieces for the last two days.

So, for this First Friday weekend, I crafted a couple boxes full of new pieces.

Honestly, I probably had plenty of goods.

But if I have an excuse to make something, I'm gonna take it!

A nice day out

Good JuJu

By Karla Nathan / November 25, 2024

On Saturday, we had a bonus shopping experience for Good Juju.

We had some good traffic, and honestly, I’m not quite sure what I sold. I think I did see someone pick up my two net trees.

They stand out because they are big and colorful. I know lots of other goodies left too, but was so exhausted by the end of the day, I did not take stock.

Working on the bathroom renovation after the guys repaired the structural issue wore me out.

Then, the clean up afterwards was brutal. We’d set up a plastic sheet to hold back the worst of the dust, thank goodness, but the cottage was still buried in a heavy layer of it.

A mere dusting wouldn’t clear it up. As I’d wipe it down with a wet, microfiber cloth, I’d get a smear of mud. So, it was heavy duty cleaning time, til everything sparkled.

Needless to say, my butt was dragging after all that. I’m so glad my booth was set up and ready before all of that!

After that, I went ahead and decorated the house for Christmas, so wore myself out even more. I kept reminding myself that I’m closer to 70 than I am to 60 now, but that didn’t change the fact that stuff needed doing, right?

I wonder when the point comes that I simply won’t keep dragging that tired butt around and not get done with what I’ve planned?

So when the time for our sale came, I was so happy to be out of the house and done with all the physical labor, I felt like I had a day off.

It was such a lovely day, festive and fun. I loved all of the Christmas decorations around the mall.

It was a great day, hanging with friends, talking to customers. And now I have about a week to gather up more goodies to bring in for the First Fridays weekend. But for today? I’m taking a real day off. Kicked back, watching endless tv in my comfy sweat pants, and sipping licorice tea while the Christmas lights twinkle.

Thanks to everyone who came to see me this weekend

antiques/junking, Good JuJu, holiday decor

By Karla Nathan / November 4, 2024

We had an action packed weekend at Good Juju.

Although we were right on the tail end of Halloween, you’d never know that only the night before, trick-or-treaters are ghouls were roaming the streets.

On November 1st in the aisles of our store, it was full on Christmas time.

My booth was probably 60% handmade holiday decor, 35% vintage Christmas, and a mere 5% other stuff.

Now, don’t quote me on this numerical division, it’s just a guess. What I’m saying is, I doubled down hard on the holidays myself.

I love every moment of Christmas decorating and crafting, so am thrilled to have five days of holiday sales at the venue this season.

Not only our First Friday weekends in November and December but a bonus shopping day on Saturday the 23rd.

And you know me, I went all out, over producing since I was doing what I love.

So I will need that extra day to get rid of, I mean market, my inventory.

No worries about you coming to see us on the last date of our holiday sale and not finding anything. We are overstuffed, especially me. I still have a table filled with goods in my studio to bring in, and most likely will have so much extra that I’ll be packing it up for next year too.

That’s the nice thing about vintage goods, or arty goods made with vintage style and ingredients. There is no expiration date. A fifty year old item will just be even better fifty years from now, right?

An elf on steroids

antiques/junking, Good JuJu, holiday decor

By Karla Nathan / November 1, 2024

It’s my favorite time of the year for creating! I’ve been whipping out tree after tree, angels, ornies, and more. Santa’s little helpers have nothing on me, I could out tinker them any day.

This season, I might’ve gone overboard…

But I kept thinking, okay that’s enough, but wait, just one more?

So of course, I’d make ten more.

Who am I kidding- I’d make twenty more!

How could I possibly let any dove go unglittered and crownless?

Or leave a stack of tulle in a pile when I knew it deserved to be a tree?

No old, broken dolls were going to the Island of Misfit Toys on my watch, they needed a do-over.

And wings!

Just because vintage satin balls were missing a way to be hung, didn’t mean they couldn’t be glued onto a wreath. Someone had to do it and that someone was me.

No candleholders were going to be left empty and bereft of use. They needed to be topped with sparkling trees and tiny deer.

Same with the boxfuls of lanterns I’d gathered at garage sales all summer. I was not going to let a single lantern go unlit. They were stuffed with twinkle lights, trees, deer, and any other glittery item I could shove inside.

See what I mean? I couldn’t stop. Luckily, our foundation is collapsing and we have a major reconstruction project to start today. That will finally stop my uncontrolled holiday crafting obsession.

More about that later. Ugh.

Come and see us at Good Juju for First Friday weekend today and tomorrow to see some of my creations. We also have a single bonus day to be open on the Saturday previous to Thanksgiving before our next First Friday weekend on 6-7.