Breezeway Staging Has Begun

Even though Monday was a holiday for most, I always take the quiet time to catch up with work. In the evening, I had a jewelry buying meeting. I thought I was only going to see a few Native American pieces but it turned out to be so much more! I bought hundreds of sterling silver budget-friendly rings with genuine gemstones from JTV (Jewelry TV.) Most of the rings have never been worn and some still have the original tags. This lot was almost twice what I normally pay but I am not raising the prices on them. Now there are plenty of rings to offer! There were some beautiful Native American pieces as well as pounds of interesting silver. Because this was a pricey lot, instead of posting new items to the online store I focused on polishing and pricing the new jewelry. About half the rings are complete and a good chunk of the silver. I offered most all of the new Native American pieces for sale Sunday evening, as I will discuss later.

Wednesday morning was the first round of testing as homework to prepare for Mother's pulmonologist's appointment in October. The test results came back but they are very technical so I am not sure what they mean. It seems that some things are OK and maybe some are not. The big test is next Wednesday - after those results are in, we will let the doctor know and also find out if there is anything else she would like us to do before our appointment. I want to be well-prepared so we can finally move forward with a treatment plan.

Thursday was a big sorting day for jewelry to prepare for Mike's arrival to help get jewelry ready to sell on Friday. I was able to sort just about everything that was priced, finally working in everything I had polished and priced in Scottsdale and shipped here. I also was even able to hand polish a bunch of pieces which had developed some tarnish. The Mexican jewelry definitely looks better polished.

On Friday Mike came over to fill jewelry cases for the caravan. It definitely helped that I was more organized than usual. He filled six medium size cases, two small and one large and was able to set up one corner of the breezeway. I decided on vintage unsigned silver tone jewelry featuring clear rhinestones. It was great to have a different point of view - I would not have thought of just making things simple and displaying everything in the metal and plastic trays but this way a lot more pieces can fit in the space. I did a little tweaking such as raising up the trays in the back so the pieces are easier to see. I knew I had a good selection of this jewelry but the area was not large enough to display everything. There are still a bunch of earrings and necklaces so I will set them up on the opposite side on top of the matching dresser. I took close-up photos as well which I will post to Facebook and include in the newsletter. The jewelry caravan is all set to go with lots of fresh new finds and for now, everything sorted with like items together which was the main objective for the day.

Saturday was a make-up day for our house cleaner - she gets migraine headaches from time to time and although she tried to come later in the morning, she ended up having to cancel our scheduled visit two Mondays ago. It is inconvenient to have to preparing the house for her to come an extra time but I know she cannot help it. Because of the extra two weeks of dust buildup, she only had the energy to do a light cleaning in my room. She will be back to do it all over again in two weeks and hopefully things will be back to normal. It turned out that Mother had her house cleaner the same day along with an at-home physical therapy visit so we were not able to go to her house right away. Kuochun was thinking of going to a park to hang out for a bit but I figured on a Saturday and a nice day all of the parks would be crowded. I suggested we try Oakton Community College because it is close by and they have huge parking lots where we could park away from people. We ended up going to the faculty parking lot because it had a shaded area. It was perfect because not a soul was around for the dogs to bark at.

Once the coast was clear, we drove up to Rammy's Sub Contractors in Wheeling to pick up lunch. I had taken our work group to the one in Elk Grove Village a few years ago and it was awesome. I am always up for a great sandwich. We went to the Wheeling location because Elk Grove Village is closed on weekends. Unfortunately Wheeling was closed this particular Saturday and Sunday so we went to Big Ange's in Arlington Heights since Mother had her heart set on Italian beef. Johnnie's is not too far from her but there are no options for me there. At least at Big Ange's I can get a nice chicken sandwich. We got Mother "Grandma's" Fresh Squeezed Orange/Lemonade and she just adored it! She could not believe it had oranges in it, she said it tasted like mangoes. Kuochun finished off the cup and Mother was so disappointed that it was all gone. I was going to get her the gallon but she said no. Now she said she wants two gallons!

As we were leaving and in the parking lot, all of a sudden a man approached us and gave Kuochun a big hug. It turned out to be the son of the department head at our former company. I remember him as a kid but Kuochun said he worked for the company after I left and they played fantasy football in the same company league. They were so happy to see each other, he said he had just eaten there and saw Kuochun going in, so he came back to meet him. It was meant to be because we were only there because Rammy's was closed. His dad and stepmom (who also worked for the company) moved to Scottsdale a number of years ago and he said he had just visited them. Kuochun mentioned that we are there now too and he suggested that they get together and play golf. I do not think he will, he used to call him C.B., short for Crazy Boss and his wife is no prize. Kuochun called her Dragon Lady. I will never forget what she said to me once. I had a bicycle accident where I broke my two front teeth and my face was messed up. Instead of taking a week off to recover like I should have, I was more concerned with keeping perfect attendance and receiving the $150 annual bonus. When I was leaving the building for lunch one day that week I ran into her and she said to me "oh, did your husband beat you up?" I said a quick NO and kept walking. What a horrible thing to say!

Sunday was a marathon of paperwork due to being away from home or out of commission more than usual but I was able to make a quick post of some of the recent new arrivals. All of the necklaces are spoken for except for the 5-strand Royston on the left and the 3-stone cuff bracelet has been claimed as well. The other pieces are available. There were a lot of great Fall colors represented here and I made the prices reasonable on the necklaces. I did expect them to sell quickly and I am glad that I will not have to put them online.

There is still a ton of paperwork to do as well as Mother's test but later in the week I will continue to work on the breezeway. It would be ideal if I could get it all staged this week so I could start working on the garage next week. I would also like to post some new items online. This past week I sold a unique Navajo ring on Poshmark Tuesday, a cute Navajo butterfly cuff bracelet and an elegant charm bracelet with Navajo and Zuni charms on Poshmark Friday, as well as one of my favorite new pendants by Donovan Cadman, pictured above. I had posted this piece before signing up for Vendoo so it was only on eBay and Etsy but it sold on eBay. One less piece to put up on Vendoo! Then the same Poshmark customer who purchased the two items Friday decided to buy my other charm bracelet with Native charms! I am getting a good number of likes and favorites on Etsy and Poshmark and I want to keep the momentum going.

Until next time!