Occoquan Arts & Craft Show Results

We had a wonderful time at the 45th Annual Occoquan Arts & Crafts Show!

 

 

With a  crinoline beneath my voluminous skirt I couldn't resist vamping for the camera before the crowds arrived.

 

Our pink vintage refrigerator and stove really helped draw people into our booth.

 

 

Both of the appliances were full of aprons during transit which cut down significantly on the number of bins we normally cart.

 

 

Doing my best Vanna White impression...the stove displayed my pot mitts.

 

 

The crowds were huge and the weather warm and sunny.

 

 

We sold lots and lots of aprons to women of all ages, shapes, and sizes.

 

 

 

 

 

Sold a few pot mitts...

 

 

...Quite a few shower caps and sleep masks...

 

 

...And a record number of insulated travel flat iron cases.

 

 

What really made the show extra special was seeing so many friends and family!  My brother and his family visited (that's him on the left, goofing with Captain Project).

 

 

My step sister (on right) and niece visited too!

 

 

It was a great weekend for Retro Revival which makes me a very happy gal!

 

Post Christmas Glow & A Blog Giveaway Winner

I hope you all had the merriest of holidays!  Our son and daughter-in-law visited us and that made for a wonderful Christmas.

 

 

 

Now we're lazing about, slowly putting away the decorations, finishing off the abundance of Christmas treats, and I'm managing a bit of sewing.  All the while, I'm enjoying the quiet and post Christmas glow.  You know that feeling you get when you're so content, so happy that you feel as though you could burst?  Yep, that feeling.  It started Christmas day when Davey and Yujin arrived.

 

 

And even though they're back in Ft. Stewart now, I'm still feeling the love of family!

 

 

And speaking of love...thank you for all of your sweet comments to my December 10th blog post!  Your encouraging words really made my fourth blogiversary special.  From your comments, I randomly drew a winner for a set of my Pot Mitts.

 

 

Congratulations, Little Susie Homemaker!  Please send me (Cindy@RetroRevival.Biz) your address so that I can ship them to you.

Arts & Crafts Show Results

Retro Revival showed at the 38th annual Micanopy Fall Harvest Festival last week.  Our fourth time doing this show, we were well prepared, relaxed, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

Captain Project is such a good sport, doing most of the heavy lifting, and rockin' an apron like no other man!

And I'm obviously biased, but he's awfully handsome too!

On day two of the show, we moved the steel clothes rack (Captain Project made it for me) that we normally place front to back:

...and rearranged it to run side-to-side, across the tent and near the entrance:

Don't know why we hadn't thought of doing this before now!  It made lots more space for buyers to navigate around the tent and try on aprons.  I design the aprons I take to sell at shows as "one size fits most," but my customers love to try them on when deciding which one to buy ~ and often agree to strike a pose for me:

Can't blame them for wanting to play dress-up ~ I did it all weekend long!

The Vintage Sheet Blog

Happy Friday all!

Wanted to let you know that I'm a guest blogger on Heather's blog today.  I discovered The Vintage Sheet Blog a while ago and am a huge fan!  Since I'm a huge collector of vintage linens and use them in many of my Retro Revival products, her blog is a real inspiration for me!

I hope you'll pay her blog a visit ~ you'll see the Pot Mitts tutorial I wrote and have a chance to win the pair I made (using vintage pillowcases, of course) for her post!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend.  I'll be busy sewing another stack of these for my upcoming show!

Mmmmm Pie!

A couple of weeks ago Retro Revival exhibited at the 9th Annual American Pie Festival (sponsored by Crisco) in Celebration, Florida.  My dear friend Renee flew down from Bloomington, Indiana to help with the show -- how great is she?

With over 20,000 visitors the place was seriously buzzing and the tent had a steady stream of apron-loving women (and some men -- mostly buying for their wives and mothers).

Most of my customers shared their apron-wearing adventures and memories of their mothers and grandmothers with me; pile on the fact that everyone there loved pie and it was possibly the happiest place on earth that day!  We had a great time and nearly sold out of the 95 aprons I took to the Festival -- yay!

 In addition to the aprons, we also debuted three new products -- hand crafted pot holders and oven mitts:

(Many of the pot holders and oven mitts match or coordinate with Retro Revival aprons)

And eye/sun glass cases:

(Don't forget to comment on this blog for automatic entry into the May Blog Giveaway where you can win a lovely glasses case!)
Within a few weeks I expect to have these new products loaded onto my website, http://www.retrorevival.biz/cart/

At one point during the Festival, I stole a few minutes away from the tent and met "The Pie Man:"

And hitched a ride on the Pie Cart (look at the pie detail on the roof!):

And then the "Pie Girls" visited us!

Each girl represented a different type of pie: blueberry, lemon meringue and cherry; the hems of their dresses were sewn to look like pie crust and their sashes said Sweetie Pie, Cutie Pie and Sugar Pie.  Very cleverly designed and just adorable!

A huge THANK YOU to all of you who came out to shop and munch on pie! We had an absolute blast - from a punchy and hilarious early morning setup, through hours of selling and interacting with the most delightful customers, right up to our celebratory dinner at iHop. Yum, a pancake dinner was the perfect ending to an exhausting yet totally satisfying and successful weekend!

(One of my customers Jennifer, along with her beautiful baby girl, Julie)