Et Voila!

Among other body parts, I really value my legs. I love biking, love hauling my stuff to market without a car. This was the second year I loaded into Holiday Market with my trailer, and this time it took four loads, kinda sorta, instead of the six from last year. But I ended up taking one little load piled on my bike, and then this week took one more, so it's still six, really.

I have the same amount of merchandise as last year, though it is displayed a bit more compactly and is easier to browse. My sales for the first weekend were double what they were last year, and we shall see if that is just an anomaly or some kind of trend. Nothing is for certain, says the 8-ball.

For the record, I am not the only vendor who is human-powered. Raven got all of his stuff there in one load, just like every Saturday of the season. Kimberly still used her wagon and walked a little farther. Brandi and Nat admitted they got a ride for one load since it was pouring out, but they walked the rest of it in. Michael had a disaster and ended up having to walk 4 1/2 miles dragging his cart/booth up the road when his trailer broke.

Elise came for this second weekend, and said it took her three loads. We love our haulers, built here in Eugene by Human Powered Machines (The Hauler).

There were probably others. I asked the soap lady, after reading in the Weekly that she delivers by bike, and she wants to, when she gets a trailer. Next to her at HM, Tyler with the steampunk accessories walked his booth and wares in. There are at least a dozen people who always or most of the time set up for Market without a car. We're thankful that we can!

I took the full nine hours to set up, as usual. I had spent an unknown amount of time making the wall display, and thinking about the arrangement of the racks and shelves, and still had to wing it on a few of the ideas I had. I used a lot of zip ties. The baskets came and went and arrived again on Sunday to fill an empty space. Goodness knows I don't want any empty spaces. I took a few more sticks and arranged them to fill the empty spaces in my hat racks. Goodness knows I wouldn't want to leave anything home.

It's a relief to have some open space in my studio again, and I'm looking forward to the winter months when I will get some scarves made. I'm still hoping to finish the ones I started last spring, tulips and birds and other springlike designs. I like having scarves at the show, even if I don't sell any. People like to feel them and want them and it's an entry into a different art form for me just to put them out there. This week I made them more visible and added some more display, so will take more pictures on Friday. Yes, it's Buy Nothing Day, but long ago we decided that it was okay to support local artists on that day without being an ugly Amurrican Consumer. Rationalization for the win.

For my really old age I hope to have less production stuff and more art items. The scarves are light and beautiful and maybe they are the way to go. I may also handpaint shirts, though the price limits on clothing are a problem. I ended up hand-painting the spadicies (spadixes?) on my new Calla Lily design because the yellow print just didn't work, turned out too greenish with the black of the shirt showing through. It took a few hours. I toyed with the idea of hand-painting the flowers, and did one (the shirt had a hole in it anyway, so nothing to lose), but I just don't think I can add $20 to the shirt price and still sell them. Might need a fancier type of shirt or something. I'll work on that. I could use my sewing skills and get some hempy drapey things, although that rough fabric would cause problems. I really like the idea of printing and then hand-painting over it, so will probably develop a product using that to see if I can make it work for me. I have to do less printing, but I'm not sure more handwork hunched over my table using a pinch grip on a small utensil will be an appropriate technological solution for aging.

There's always retirement, though I can't even imagine how I would manage that. It definitely won't happen if they change the social security age to 65. I guess they wouldn't do that for those of us who are almost there, that would be too cruel, and get the old folks riled up. We can be a big problem when we get riled up.

Okay, off to Thanksgiving dinner. Because the sun is out and it's daytime, I will put the three pies into boxes and bungee them onto my bike. I can, therefore I will.