Karla's Cottage – Page 28 – by Karla Nathan

A learning curve or a squiggle?

By Karla Nathan / February 19, 2023

For a place that is only open two days a month, I sure spend a lot of time working on Good Juju stuff. It is all things I like to do, make pretties, buy junk, fix up old things, repurpose, and then decorate with it all.
But- I really, really, really put too much time into it.

Like setting up this display at home as a practice look before even getting the crap to the venue.

Some of the problem is that I’ve not even been doing this a year yet and my booth space changed four times during those few months. I don’t exactly have a firm feel of what I need to fill up my spaces. Every time I take a load in, I think I’m done, then I realize I could fit another carload into the area, so I bring in more.

When I began, I had zero inventory. It was right as we were emerging from Covid seclusions, and I, like many other people, did major closet clearing during lock down. I gave truckloads of things from my storage areas, garages, cabinets and just things I was tired of looking at, all to Goodwill.

And I had a pretty serious concussion that affected me more than I realized at the time. Looking back, those couple of months after my dog’s head slammed into my head, are all fuzzy and seem like I was peering through a dark tunnel.

Also, I am still trying to figure out what will sell. When I craft, I usually go all out and make a ton of that item in many variations. And sometimes, I’ll only sell a couple. Or I will sell most of them, make more for the next sale, and everyone who wanted one already got it earlier. Or I’ll sell out of something online by showing photos ahead of time, and not have any for my booth.

I guess my issue is that I love everything about the creative side, but struggle with the marketing end of it all. It’s a learning curve and I might think in a squiggles shape with curves all over the place instead of a gentle arc.

Then there are the things that I make or display that are just because I want to, not because people will be buying them After hanging big snowflakes from the rafters above the entry to our booth for winter, I decided I want to do a different theme each season.

This month, it is birdcages. But once I got these minis up there, I didn’t think they make enough of a statement. I had plans to hang big cages and white frames too, but needing to use a ladder the size of a skyscraper (that weighs as much as a building too) had me adjusting my plans.

Still, I do enjoy my obsessions, I mean themes. Like all of the handmade nests I spent an entire day on.

And as far as marketing goes, I might never figure out what is the best way to go. I am hoping that as I build inventory up, and get used to just how much I can squeeze into my booth, I can become more efficient in my set ups.

And I’ll keeping on completely immersing myself into my projects, because it’s just my nature. Sure, I could get nests wholesale and pop eggs from the hobby store into them. But I loved spending a day making a few dozen hand crafted nests and repainting those purchased eggs just the right color of blue, so they’d all look pretty together.

We survived The City Museum and can’t wait to risk our lives there again

family, Travel

By Karla Nathan / February 16, 2023

My poor Rich has spent the last 3 1/2 months working in Ohio at a consulting job, with minimal visits home. He only has a couple weeks left and will finally be back with us soon.

We have always celebrated Valentine’s Day as a family holiday, with special memories for us and our boys. This year with Ryan gone and Adam so far away, and Rich working in Ohio, we sadly thought it might just go by without our typical festivities.

Rich had the weekend off, but not long enough to get home so Sugarwings and I met him in St Louis and we had an outing at the City Museum as a slightly early Valentine date, then went to The Hill (the historic Italian district) for a fancy night out.

We were not all together as a big group, and it wasn’t exactly on the 14th, but it helped, and was quite special.

The City Museum is crazy.

Completely, totally, beyond crazy.

See that iron slinky? It’s made for humans to climb through. For floor after floor.

And speaking of floors, there are pits every where. Most aren’t lit up, they are just black holes meant for kids to disappear into. Some come out around the corner, others lead to the basement. And there are dozens of them. The gift shop sells miner’s helmets for kids to wear to explore the tunnels.

Other crevices lead to slides, stairs, or to bubbles inside of an aquarium. You just don’t know where you will end up if you slip into one of these black holes.

It has to be one of the most imaginative, creative places a kid could have to play in, it is well done and just beautiful too. But I can’t believe it is safe.
I was so glad I had never been there when the grand fairies were tiny. My mind would've exploded trying to keep my eyes on them.

It was one of those rare times in life when you thank god you have a teenager.

It was funny to me that this area was gated off. What, kids are not allowed to play in the giant box fan? Why not, it seems safer than some of the other areas.

We didn’t even see a fraction of it, there are billions of nooks and crannies, a rusty, ten story slide with a rickety spiral staircase, and a whole sharp, pointy, rusty, sky high climbing grid outside as tall as the big building.

Everywhere you looked, there was something clever, funny, intriguing, or deadly.

It goes on for floor after floor with interactive spaces, play areas, and death traps. (Sooooo many tiny holes for kids to skitter away into) AND SO DANG COOL!

And an aquarium. And it’s a museum. Not just a twisted playground aimed to tease all phobias.

There were actual museum cases with artifacts surrounding one playground.

And genuine architectural elements everywhere. Not to mention murals and mosaics galore. And a bug/animal skeleton room with specimens behind glass. We spent a long time in the craft room making art too.

And in the art museum looking at displays.

There were tons of details about the old building it is in.

And odd details like walls made out of baking tins.

If I lived any closer, I’d have a season pass. There is no way to see it all in one day.

More mushies

how to's, mushrooms, the Boutique at Karla's Cottage, Tutorials

By Karla Nathan / February 12, 2023

Well, as I mentioned with my last post, and as you might have noticed if you have ever read my blog over the last 16 years- I tend to get obsessions.

I have been making these fabric, no sew fungi since Guncle Randy and I came up with the simple design last summer.

And I love making them so much, I just don’t burn out.

See what I mean? I sat down and whipped up 75 in a couple days. I just get too excited about trying different fabrics and want to keep making more!

If you’d like to go schroomie crazy too, the tutorial is only $9 and the materials are cheap to get. You can find it here:

http://www.karlascottage.com/category_59/Online-Tutorials.htm

ps- new tips have been added to the instructions if you already purchased it, make sure you check back!

More fairies? I cannot help myself.

fairies

By Karla Nathan / February 9, 2023

Recently, I found a few more old dolls to redo. They were not exactly the best, so I completely repainted their faces.

They all got new hair too. And clothes pieced together from vintage bits and pieces.

One became a St Paddy’s Gal. She wears a vintage shamrock dress and her crown holds a green top hat snapped off of an antique stir stick. Her hair is a pale green.

And her bodice is a vintage, tatted butterfly.

One of her arms was upside down. I thought about cutting it off and trying to reattach it, but decided to camouflage it with a big bouquet instead.

Making these dolls is an indulgence for me, they really are not something most people have in mind when shopping at Good Juju. If I were smart, I’d be working on something that fits in at the venue better. Or stockpiling these for Christmas, when people are excited about frilly angels.

I am trying to adjust my likes to what my customers like. But I sure do loooove fairies!

Distractions

flowers, paintings

By Karla Nathan / February 6, 2023

While putting away my endless forest of Christmas trees, I decided to clear space in an upstairs closet to stash a tree that just did not want to go into the under stairs storage. I came across some old paintings. This drawing was done about fifty years ago from a family photo I found at my mom’s. But I have no idea who the people are and the piece was in the back of the closet for decades. So I’m taking it into Good Juju to try to sell.

It can honestly be categorized as vintage!

There was an ugly painting lurking in the closet too. It was flowers with a hummingbird and butterflies. I looked at it and thought, decent frame, pretty colors, just needs work. So I thought I’d “touch it up”. Haha, so much for that! A few hours later, it was entirely covered with a landscape.

There is not an inch of the original painting left. It did not get a makeover or touch up, it got a cover up. It’s still not done, the flowers in the foreground are just roughed in.

But I had a fun day – much more fun than cleaning out closets. The distraction of painting means that there is still a half cleared storage area that needs attention. Maybe next January when I need to find a space to cram a tree into.

Overflowing

Good JuJu, Hearts

By Karla Nathan / February 3, 2023

Mountains of Valentines!

Good JuJu

By Karla Nathan / January 31, 2023

My favorite days of the month are just about here!

First Fridays sales at Good Juju are always such fun.

Laughing with friends, exploring the goodies the other dealers bring in, watching happy shoppers find just the right treasure.

And trying to prevent an avalanche when guests come into my space. I might go a bit over board on my layers of goods…

When someone asked me recently what I call my style, instead of replying “Romantic Cottage” as I usually do, I said “Frilly Avalanche”.

There is a lot going on. (The back is Beth’s and she was still in progress with her area. She tends to fit just as much in her space, but in a much tidier way, no danger of being buried alive in hers.)

I’m always surprised at how much I squeeze in. Maybe it’s because I’m still sorta new at this, I am not good at knowing how much to bring in.

Each month, I rearrange it all, taking home items from the last sale that no longer fit, changing up the furniture layout. I don’t sell much furniture at all, because you can barely see it under the piles of inventory.

Which is funny because in my previous incarnation as an antique dealer, I specialized in hand painted furniture. Now, I try to concentrate more on mountains of small and hand made pieces.

I still paint most of the tables and cabinets, but also go with natural tones of wood too.

I have discovered that what works best for me is to have a couple of larger tables, and a ton of smaller ones balanced on top, stacked underneath, and lined up. More than I should, because they look more like wall units of shelving than individual pieces for sale.

Every once in a while one sells and

gosh!

You should see me scramble to unload it, and find somewhere else to stack my crap! It’s crazy.

Part of my problem is that I looooooove to make things.

And I am prolific about it. If I create one doll, I’ll just go ahead and make ten.

One little gnome might be lonely, so of course, I need a dozen.

And I probably shouldn’t even talk about my mushroom addiction. I’ve probably whipped up a couple hundred by now.

I feel very blessed to have such a lively, fun environment to market my excesses in!

Holiday Decor is My Fave!

antiques/junking, Good JuJu, Hand painted, Hearts, holiday decor, jewelry

By Karla Nathan / January 28, 2023

Lately, I have been leaving jewelry making supplies out on one studio table. That way, when I feel the whim, I can quickly make a piece without dragging out boxes. The room is a wreck anyway from using a chunk of it as storage, so I have kind of given up on keeping my poor studio tidy.

My most recent creations have been Valentine themed. Either with hearts, or just an air of dress up and romance.

The last few months at Good Juju have been absolutely delightful for me. I simply adore decorating for Christmas, Valentine’s, and Halloween. I tend to be into flowery and over the top, romantic, even gaudy stuff that isn’t exactly what the crowd there loves on a regular basis. The venue leans toward rustic or primitive and my corner screams “fussy” to a lot of the shoppers.

I do throw in lots of neutrals and even natural woods and browns, but they end up buried under my foofiness. And holidays were a good reason to have the exception.

I guess I still have Easter to look forward to…. But after that, it will be a long stretch til fall when I have an excuse to make things my way. Till then, I’ll try to reign myself in a little and focus more on neutrals.

My Treacherous Journey

collections, fairies, studio tour

By Karla Nathan / January 24, 2023

Before our January sale at Good Juju, I made some Sweetheart Fairies.

I’d found a boxful of vintage, handmade heads a few years ago and had just been waiting for inspiration to figure out what to do with them.

I had absolutely loved making angels from old dolls at Christmas, but was out of the vintage dolls, so couldn’t make more. Then I remembered the big glass bowl of doll heads in my studio.

Since I have been vending at an antique mall, I’ve started collecting furniture to fix up. Which meant I needed storage. I had to give up a corner of my studio to stack the pieces until needed, and to camouflage the area, I cordoned it off with hinged together doors.

Well, I hate it. But it was needed. And worked out okay, even though it ruins the natural light from the big window and is an eyesore. I have covered the doors with gowns, but it kinda feels even bulkier this way. I should take these down and paint or wallpaper the doors to make the room feel less crowded.

The cluster of tables and dressers behind the barricade also blocks everything back in the corner behind the stacked junk furniture.

And that is where the heads were.

Getting to them was quite the scramble, and I could only squeeze through and grab a handful at a time.

Making the Sweetheart Fairies has become a slight obsession, so I find myself navigating the maze and reaching my way too short arm through a gap to snag another handful of heads on a regular basis. I should just move some furniture, get the bowlful of doll parts and keep them in a more convenient place.

But that would be too easy.

The bodies are wire and wool roving, and I dress them up in bits and pieces of vintagey goodness. Most of these sold at the last sale, but I braved the treacherous trail through mountains of precarious piles and snatched another handful of heads.

More to come!

Sweetheart Gnomes

fairies

By Karla Nathan / January 21, 2023

I learned a new cell phone trick! I’m still not quite sure how to use it, but somehow or another you can cut the background out of a photo while texting. Why while texting? That seems odd, why not just in edit photos?

I plan on playing with the function a bit more, even though I am not sure I need it. It’s fun to manipulate pictures, so I guess I do need it? One more toy?

Speaking of toys, these little guys look playful, don’t they? I’ve been on a gnome kick.

Sweetheart Gnomes, for Valentine’s.

Although I am not sure about this one’s vintage earring nose. I go back and forth between thinking it’s cute or that he has a medical condition.

I have always been a gnome fan. I figure they are probably good friends with fairies, even if they can act a little gruff, they are probably very loving toward the little sprites.

Any any friend of a fairy is a friend of mine.