Happy Thanksgiving!

I've been busy and haven't updated my blog in awhile! Tonight seems like a good time to do that!

It's Thanksgiving Day and what better day to think of all the things we're thankful for, the things we often take for granted.

Today I ran my 2nd 5k, First, I need to say it was a fundraiser for cancer research. That brings me to to a reason to be thankful; my health-and my familys health (please place the apostrophe in the proper position (familys', families, none of those look right- I've totally forgotten all the things I was taught in school-it's been a few years).

Okay I do digress as usual.

Oh-yes-the 5k! That was so much fun, I am so addicted to 5k's now, I must enter another soon! Here's what I'm thankful for....being older! Yes, I found a positive about being older! You see, when you're in a 5k, female especially, in the "upper categories", you have more of a chance at getting a medal! So I glanced around to see what my competition might be. Not too many of "my kind" there! Guess what!? I won a silver medal...yep! I placed in the top three for my "age category"!! I haven't found out my time yet, but am curious to see what I ran. I should mention, my first 5k! I placed first in my "age category" (I won't mention the part about there only being one other woman in my age category, and she walked, and the fact that there were only about 45 runners all together!).

It goes without saying that I am thankful for my family. I am so lucky! My husband, Bob, is the best! In fact, after dinner, we were sitting around the table just chatting, all but Bob that is! He was cleaning up everything! At one point my friend Lori stopped and said "I feel like we should leave a tip for Bob since he's doing all this work!". (She actually did leave a great tip-a 6 pk of Christmas Ale~!).

I have three fantastic kids! Bob and I still can't figure out how the got so darn smart! We do know where they got their looks! (from me of course (hehe)

I am always thankful for the armed forces...and their families! What a sacrifice they are making for us! Can you imagine? These men and women are far away from their families during the holidays; their children are without one or two of their parents. Thank you so much for all you do for our country!

There are the simple pleasures in my life that I am also thankful for! I can't do a blog about being thankful without mentioning twitter! Non-twitter people can skip this part because you just won't understand! All of my twitter friends will understand! Thanks for cheering me on when I post about my 5k or when I tell you about a resent sale in one of my shops! Thanks for the RT's and for always viewing my new listings when I post them on twitter!

I could go on and on, but I won't; oh, except one more thing! I am thankful for my blog followers~! Thanks for reading my blog!

I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season! As promised, I will be posting some vintage holiday decorating ideas very soon!!

My best to you,

Jen

1000th

My 1000th sale came today and I owe it all to twitter!! I told you twitter is fantastic! My twitter friend saw these cute tea towels I had just listed when I put a link on twitter to show the new listing (I usually let twitter know first!)...and she bought them within minutes--and I had them shipped out within that same hour!

I have since gone on to my 1001st sale (I thought it would be 1000 "th", but my smart son, Mark, tells me it's 1000st!)....oh yeah-that makes sense!! (silly me)

So-thanks http://www.twitter.com/ (if you haven't signed up for twitter, well...why haven't you!? It's not only a great marketing tool, but also a great place to meet knew friends with your same interests!

My best to all!

Jen

999!!

999! Yep! I've almost reach my goal of 1,000 sales in my first shop!http://www.jenscloset.etsy.com/ I'm so excited!

I'll probably throw a party or something when I get that 1000th sale!

I have so much fun shopping for new (old) items for both of my shops (don't forget http://www.mymilkglassshop.etsy.com/ )!

So this is just a quick blog to say thanks to all of my customers! And a special thanks to my repeat customers!!

Happy Holidays!

Jen

Vintage Hankies

My latest purchase is 3 oh so pretty vintage Christmas hankies from my friend Laura! Thanks so much Laura, I love these! You must check out her Etsy shop at http://www.ilaura.etsy.com/ full of gorgeous vintage linens, tablecloths, handkerchiefs, and more!

I made a table runner out of 3 hankies-and all you need is fabric glue! I saw this idea in an antique shop and it looked like something even I could do! I made one and sold it as a sample (since it was my first one)! I'm planning on making more, and I thought it would be nice to have a Christmas one!

Table Runner this is my first table runner!

Soon to come, more vintage holiday decorating ideas!

Jen

Christmas On Etsy

If you haven't visited Etsy yet...you must! http://www.etsy.com/ full of fabulous vintage shops, including mine! http://www.jenscloset.etsy.com/ and http://www.mymilkglassshop.etsy.com/ and also full of amazingly talented crafters! You'll find everything from gifts for your pets, high fashion, great little vintage kitschy items, jewelry, and so much more!

I'm trying to do as much of my Christmas shopping through Etsy. My latest purchase was this darling crocheted snowman from http://www.crochetbymommaj.etsy.com/ -please check out her shop and you too will find something you just have to have, whether it's a gift for someone else, or a little something for yourself! I can't decide whether this will be an ornament for my tree, or if I can bear or is it bare-no, that would be naked, anyways bear to part with this, it would make a cute little topper for a Christmas gift!

Stop by my blog for updates on my latest purchases-and soon to come, some more ideas for decorating with vintage for the holiday's!

My best to you!

Jen

Buy From Etsy!

This year why not do most of your Christmas shopping from the convenience of your home!? I am going to do just that, and started with a beautiful Christmas card from http://www.enchantedquilling.etsy.com/ all the way from Australia! Absolutely gorgeous, even better than I expected! I love this card so much I am not sure I want to give it to anyone! I may just frame it! Janice also added 2 beautiful gift tags to my order! Janice & I are twitter friends!

The detail on this card is amazing, and it looks like there's a lot of work that goes into it! (I just know I wouldn't even try to do anything like this-it would be a disaster!)

So please shop on http://www.etsy.com/ -I know you will be pleasantly surprised! There is wonderful talent there (not to mention great vintages shops!)!

Thank you so much Janice! I will definitely shop at http://www.enchantedquilling.etsy.com/ again!

Jen

You Better Watch Out

You better not pout! Before you know it the holiday season will be upon us! I've come up with a few ideas for your vintage holiday decorating!

I took a milk glass lacy compote and weaved Christmas ribbon through it-add a votive candle, and that's it!

Beautiful Kings Crown Green goblets can be transformed easily into Christmas glasses with just a touch of holiday ribbon!

A large hobnail milk glass vase just needs some touches of gold to make it sparkle!

Take the simplest of items-Fenton hobnail ashtray and add a votive candle and some Christmas flowers!

I'll be bringing you more ideas in the next couple of weeks so stay tuned!

Jen

Veggie and Cheesy Pasta Casserole

Okay-I got creative today! I knew I wanted to use the fresh zucchini and squash I had here, and I knew I wanted to have pasta too--so I just started using my imagination, and poof! I had a yummy veggie & cheesy pasta casserole!

This recipe can be tweeked with whatever you have, and if you want a more lightweight version, just skip some of the butter I use and instead of the heavy cream, just regular milk should be fine. Same idea with the cheese-low fat should be fine! But I always say, as long as you don't eat like this all the time, go for it!! Life is too short-live life to the fullest-that means eat cheese and pasta!

Here's how I started:

I sauteed chopped (all bite size) zucchini, squash, yellow pepper, red onion, white onion, some shredded carrots in olive oil and butter-just until the veggies loose a bit of their crispness, but don't overcook it-not sure how long that took-maybe 8 minutes. Add salt & pepper-and my favorite ingredient-red pepper flakes-whatever amount is good for you-it will add an extra kick-I probably used about 1/2 tsp or so. Oh geez-almost forgot-after that was all sauteed-at the last minute, I added chopped cherry tomatoes and button mushrooms (silly me!).

While I was letting that sautee and stirring occasionally-I got the water boiling for the pasta-I used elbow noodles-but any pasta will do-I cooked it just until al dente (is that how that's spelled?).

This is a multi-tasking recipe. While doing those other two things, I was also preparing the sauce. I cooked some butter and then added a few T. of flour-cook that over low for about a minute-keep stirring. I then added about a cup or so of heavy cream (I warmed it in the microwave for about 45 seconds). Stir that in until all lumps are gone. I then added about 1/2 jar or so of marinara sauce, stir that up. Almost forgot-add some italian seasoning and garlic salt to the sauce!

Everything should be ready about the same time! Drain your pasta-but leave just a bit of water. Pour the pasta, sauce, and veggie mixture into one bowl or one of the pans you've already used (why mess up a clean bowl when you don't need to!).

Mix it up. Pour it into whatever casserole dish you like-I used a more shallow longer one-but the deeper ones would be good too! I grated fresh parmesano reggiano, but you could use the jar stuff. Then I sprinkled shredded mozzerella cheese over that. And...in case it wasn't decadent enough, I melted a little bit of butter, then mixed in some italian bread crumbs, and sprinkled that over the top!

Bake at 350 for just 15 minutes-and it's ready!!

Hopefully I didn't forget anything!!

Enjoy! It's quick and easy-although you will have quite few pans to clean up!

Jen

It's Been Awhile

Where has the time gone! I've neglected my blog again...last blog post was 9/18! So again, I have come here without a plan, and shall just ramble (as usual) and maybe something will pop into my head! Wait...there's something there-oh, never mind, it was a donut.

Since I mix it up in my blog with personal stories, inspirational stories, and information about my shops http://www.jenscloset.etsy.com/ and http://www.mymilkglassshop.etsy.com/ (you know I had to do that), I think I'll write about my Etsy shops.

As some of you may know, I started my first shop in April of 2008. At over 900 sales now, I feel pretty good about the way things are going! I have 229 sales, so far, in my milk glass shop also!

So I think I'll talk about the things I've learned so far, the trials and tribulations, the good, the bad...and the ugly! Actually, there really hasn't been too much bad and ugly!

Let's start with shipping! I would have to say that has been the toughest challenge. Most of the items I ship are fragile and usually pretty heavy. I have my official USPS scale to weigh my items. What I do when I'm listing an item is to put a box on the scale with some bubble wrap (that gives me more of a realistic idea of the weight when the item is actually being shipped), and then put the item on top of that. I will still add a little weight to that and check my handy-dandy postal sheet that shows me the cost for priority mail for all zones. Let's say the item weighs 2.5 lbs, I will usually use the 3 lbs information and go with the farthest zone, zone 8, which would be $11.95.

This really shouldn't be a new paragraph because I'm still talking about shipping, but I've read that people become disinterested if you write too much in one paragraph!

Okay-so back to shipping! I would say in my first year, I messed up quite a bit on shipping, and lost some money since I didn't charge enough! This year is going so much better (okay, so I'm a slow learner!). What I do now is refund the buyer if shipping costs are less than my quote, but I do add a small fee for packing material, since I usually use a ton of bubble wrap! Shipping to Zone 1 or 2 is obviously going to be quite a bit less than zone 8 (e.g. 3 lbs for zone 1 and 2 is $5.50 and zone is is $11.95!).

I know I've blogged about shipping before, I think because it has been the biggest hurdle. Of course, my most favorite part of having my Etsy shops (if you haven't check out Etsy, you must.. http://www.etsy.com/ there is so much talent there!) is shopping! I now have an excuse to shop for all the pretty things I love and pass them on to others!

I also love wrapping everything I ship out so the buyer feels like they're receiving a gift!

I think in my next blog I'll talk about the listing process (that's right, there is no sequence to my blogs!). So stay tuned, I promise not to be gone so long next time!

Thanks for stopping by!

Jen

Think Outside the Box

You've heard that before, right? "Think outside the box". Do you know what it means? It means, do not settle for second best! It means you've gone this far, but it's not far enough. Keep going, keep thinking, keep working, keep motivated!

I've mentioned twitter at least a few times on my blog. The non-twitter people just don't get it, but the twitter people, well, they know...twitter is great!

For example...while on twitter several weeks ago, an event planner http://www.eventjubilee.com/ sent me a tweet asking if I would be willing to send some of my vintage china to her for a bridal photo shoot, which will most likely be featured in at least a few bridal magazines in Connecticut! I didn't think twice! I thought outside the box! I love both of my vintage shops and they're doing quite well, but I know there are more opportunities out there!

What prompted this post is another opportunity that I found out about tonight! All I can say is I'm shipping out a pair of milk glass candlesticks to New York City (love NYC!!).

So don't settle-never settle-think outside the box! Live the best darn life you can. The way I see it is, what do you have to loose? Do you want to be 80 years old thinking, "why didn't I do this-or that"? Go for it!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Jen