Another busy weekend ... a Saturday trip to Delaware for the North American Sea Glass Association's annual Sea Glass Festival.. and Sunday, a marathon session at my crafting table as I tried to finish a few projects and build up my Etsy shop inventory and try to get my craft show inventories back up. 2 weekends from today, I have 2 shows (at different locations) and following a one week break, I have shows on back-to-back weekends.
After my all day creating spree, I took a short break to check out a few blogs and went over to the EtsyNJ team's page and what a surprise I received when the page loaded! My Blissful Autumn bracelet staring me back at me. It seems my bracelet was nominated and selected for a weekly promotion.
It's a nice little promotion because our street team's advertisement in the October edition of WeirdNJ just hit the news stands. The ad links interested customers to both all of the team's Etsy shops and the EtsyNJ website ( http://etsynj.com/ ), where my bracelet is (proudly) displayed.
So back to the Sea Glass festival. If you're new to my blog, I'm into sea glass. I love getting out on the beach, walking block after block to see what the ocean left behind. I love using sea glass in some of my jewelry creations and I also have jars filled with sea glass displayed around my house.
So finally, the Sea Glass Festival was on the east coast and only an hour away. My hubby and I originally planned on attending both days, but because of my upcoming show schedule, I knew it'd be best to limit the festival to one day.
The festival was held in a small-ish facility that was part of the University of Delaware and the turnout was HUGE. If I were a vendor at the show, I would've been very excited by the volume of people pouring into the rooms and then a bit angry as the crowds kept coming. Each room was just a huge log-jam of people.
There were many times I was trying to see specific exhibits and was just stuck in the same spot for what felt like 10 minutes or more. During these times, I couldn't move more than 6 inches in any direction, much less get near the table I was trying to see. The few tables I did get to, I was trapped once I was there because the people also trying to get to the table were 3 and 4 people deep and there was just nowhere to go!
Had the fire department arrived, I wouldn't have been surprised to see them close down the whole building. I don't know what the building's occupancy was, but I would venture that it was exceeded by 3x or 4x the amount and that doesn't include the folks outside hoping to get back in!
For myself, the highlights of the show included meeting a few exhibitors that I have purchased sea glass from on the Internet and I was able to meet Richard LaMotte, author of a book on sea glass that I consider my "bible on the subject". He signed my book and evaluated 3 pieces of sea glass for me... telling me my black piece dates back to probably the mid to late 1800s and the latest exciting find from this summer, a beautiful, frosty teal piece that I found on Long Beach Island, looks to be at least 100 years old and is rare in it's coloring. When held in the light, the piece exhibits more blue tones than found in most teals. He called it a rare find and one he hasn't come across but once or twice. (this one has already been made into a necklace...wire-wrapped and will remain in my personal collection)
Overall, it was an okay day. I had a chance to see a few colors of sea glass I've never seen before...lots of beautiful reds, blues and lavenders and even several pieces of the the ever-elusive orange color. I like many other people who went to the festival were disappointed by the small rooms. Unlike many of the people, I stayed for a few hours trying to get to see all the exhibits.
Unfortunately, many people left after a few futile attempts to see the exhibits and many of those vendors would probably be disappointed to see that many potential customers take their money home with them.
I know, as a vendor, I would have been more than just a bit upset. Oh well, maybe next year.
'til next time...
R
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2 comments:
Congrats on the bracelet! Bummer about the show. Hopefully they plan better for next year. Cool about your teal glass.
The thing I always wonder about sea glass -- how do you know it's real sea glass and not just glass thrown into a tumbler?
Therasaj,
Good question! Perhaps a blog entry will be needed to explain.
The quickest response I can offer is... a piece of sea glass will have a "frosted patina". The salt water/tumbling in the sand for decades will leech chemicals out of the glass. leaving this frosted look.
It's not always a desired look for jewelry, but can easily be diminished with lavender oil (and brought back with rubbing alcohol)
I'll try to add a blog entry in the very near future, explaining in a bit more detail what the differences are between sea glass and the less-expensive craft glass.
Thx for stopping by!
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