A Vendor’s Life

Memorial Day fountain shenanigans

My booth

Shirt model

Smaller Shirt model!

Church Street at it’s busiest

My poor feet at the end of Monday

I write this to you while slurping down a huge caffeinated  drink and wearing comfortable shoes on my poor battered feet, and noise canceling headphones on my ears. Yes, it is the day after ViVA Vienna. What’s that you say? You don’t know what ViVA Vienna is? Have you, or have you not been following my blog over the past few years (probably not, according to my wilted stats!)?  Anyway, just for you, ViVA Vienna is a huge Memorial Day Carnival that takes place in my hood, Vienna VA. It is big, brassy, noisy, and fun filled, and I never really get to experience it the way my family does because I’m a craft vendor at the festival.
Despite missing out on all the rides, performances, and carnival fun, it is still one of my favorite weekends of the year, because I pretty much know EVERYONE in Vienna, and I get to catch up with friends and socialize, and show them what I do for a (sort of) living. I get a lot of love at ViVA Vienna.  I’ve blogged a lot about this event, so I won’t go on and on about the love that is showered on me at this event, and how really sweet Vienna is. If you want, you can read more of that stuff here  and here, oh and here (but if you’re at work, it’s probably best not to waste too much time). The Town of Vienna really should think about hiring me as a publicist.

So, highlights and lowlights from this year’s bash:

-I sold a LOT of shirts. This still amazes me, people like my stuff enough to buy it! Sometimes I’m not sure whether I’m doing the right things in life, but a successful fair always gives me a boost of confidence. I’m a proper designer and all that.

-My children ate more free candy, and brought home more free junk and flyers than I would have liked (it’s tough being that cute, people just foist stuff on you apparently).

-Whenever I got hungry, a friend would suddenly appear with a cookie (yay!), then my six year old would materialize out of nowhere and demand half of it (boo!).

-I met a buyer from a local boutique, who may be interested in stocking my shirts!! I also met a teenager who wants to be my printing assistant. I also met a strange old man who insisted that my American Apparel shirts were all made in India (what?).

-Despite being on my feet non-stop for nine hours a day, and suffering from monumental aches, pains and swelling, my Fitbit steps were non-existent. My husband gloated that he had 25,000 steps after spending a a day of riding the Dizzy Dragons and eating pizza, pffft. They should give me an extra 30,00 steps per day when I’m at a booth. Sore loser, me? Never!!!

-There were horribly quiet periods when I took to counting how many times the man dressed in a parrot suit walked past my tent (nine, if you are interested).

-I got my cute baby fix for the year. The Noctiluna tent gets the best baby guests ever, I will never stop making onesies as long as the babies keep visiting. Sigh.

-My daughter went around picking up tickets left on the streets, and got herself into two rides for free. She told her friend about her scheme, and she found five tickets and five dollars! They are planning a “friendly” competition for next year.

-Neighborhood friends just turned up and put up, and took down my booth for me. They bought me food and water, and spread the word about my booth, and made sure my kids were always looked after. So many friends stopped by for a chat, and my kids’ school teachers turned up to say hi. My heart feels ten times bigger now.

Today, I’m going to take things slowly, but I still have one more Spring fair to go. The Old Town Arts and Crafts Festival takes place in Alexandria on June 11. See you there?

Have a beautiful Monday.