A Recap of Yesterday

Godd morning blogland!

Okay though it sounds really chipper, it was a bit of a rough start this morning as my day yesterday was on overdrive!
We (Danuta and I) picked up the sign in St.Pierre from the thrift shop and while we were loading it up I found 3 doors with glass panes that were marked free! Bonus!
So we loaded those into the van and then went and shopped and I picked up another bookcase for the store for $5.00 Wow, if you have a chance to stop in that thrift shop, you will find lots of fun goodies and some great prices. The Village Connection in St. Pierre!

Snap and darn it all! I forgot to take pictures of the outside of the building and the doors with glass but I will do that after the weekend. By the time we got those items into the store (did I mention that we must take everything down a flight of stairs?) we were both huffing and puffing.

We were supposed to go back for a desk but I knew that we would not be able to get that down the stairs without removing the drawers so will go back for it with the hubbyman (Tom) on Tuesday.

After that we picked up a collection of donations and did some shopping at the MCC store in Steinbach. I swear, half of Vita was out shopping at both of those locations yesterday. I ran into many familiar faces. Dont worry I wont tell if you dont! :)

My van was already loaded to the maximum or so I thought, and while we were at MCC I saw this little wooden and very distressed trunk for $5.00. It needed lots of TLC and so I passed on it and in my mind I said thank-goodness Lydia wasnt here with me today or she would have bought it and we would be trying to squeeze it into any airspace we had left in the van.
Well the thought had barely vanished from my head and while I was in another area of the store I heard Danuta yell for me and so I came up and here she was holding the trunk with a panic look and asked me if we could fit it into the van, she had to have it!  We managed to fit it in but the air in the van was getting thinner.
We made one more stop before heading home and while at this other store we saw 2 ladies putting out new clothes stock. As they were doing it, they were throwing the plastic bags into a huge bag. I went up and asked the girl what they were going to do with that big bag of bags? She did say it was going to be recycled and so I asked her if we could have it and she said yes. I did explain why I wanted it and she was happy to let us have the bags. Thank-you Amanda! (shes my newest BFF) Danuta just rolled her eyes and if you would have seen the 2 of us trying to stuff this giant pillow of plastic into the van you would have laughed. I sure many people going past us in the parking lot must have thought we had lost it.
Below are the pictures and I am sure you can tell that we pretty much had to roll down the windows to get air to breath.

This is the side view with the wooden trunk, and you can sort of see the big sign we picked up

Same side of van

This is the back and I am really surprised that bag of bags didnt explode when I opened the back of the van.

After I unloaded the van at home, I had to re-load it with all the stuff I was taking to the Tolstoi sale.
The sign had to get reloaded too because I was dropping it off to Lydia. She is going to create something wonderful! I can't wait to see the end result!

A very loaded topsy turvy van (I hit a corner a little too fast)

Just a closeup.

So after unloading the van at Tolstoi (Thank-you Denise for helping me) I spent the rest of the evening (till 1130pm) setting up my display. It is still not quite finished and I have more to bring today.
By the time my head hit the pillow last night it was 1:30 I think.

I am awake and will be fine after a few more cups of coffee but I am expecting that I will be a walking zombie by mid day.
I hope to see you at the sale if you are in the area. There are lot of treasures and beautiful pieces, I have already made a couple of purchases myself.

Have a great day! and stay tuned for more later this weekend!

kim

Website Email and stuff

Hi Everyone,

Not a lot to report this morning but hopefully some pictures later today. This morning (5am) was about getting more internet presence so I have set up the website page.

You can visit it: www.artistpivot.com it just has the basic information that you see here but will have more content once the store opens, including the option to purchase items on line.

You can also contact us by email: kim (at) artistpivot (dot) com
The email address needs to replace the at with the @ and replace the dot with .
I did this to prevent robot spammers from reading my email address of this site and flooding my email with junk. For those of you that know me you will be able to contact me through my other email address too.
While I was at it, I printed some business cards this morning, they turned out pretty good and I will take pics later to show you.  The are printed on recycled kraft card stock from used file folders.


Other than that

• Wendy is working on my insurance for the store.(Hi Wendy at BSI! :) )
• I am picking up a sign from The Village Connection (got a great price for their old sign) to be painted with our logo (more info later)
• I will take pictures of the outside of the store building today
• make a few pickups of stuff that has been donated
• then rush home , unload and reload the vehicle for the Tolstoi sale
• Head over to Tolstoi and set up my display booth.
• Back home and upload the latest pics for you to see.

Are you tired yet? LOL I am and I haven't even started.
See you all later today!
kim

Something Pretty

After the overuse of the word ugly these last couple of days, I decided to show you something pretty.
This piece is approx 3.5 x 4.5 inches. I made it using one of those old metal brass photos frames that were so popular in the 60's and 70's. You know the ones with the glass and the cardboard back with a little flap so the photo can free stand.
I took the glass out and glued a pretty paper to the cardboard back and then collaged items on top to create this pretty little 3d art. I used scrabble tiles and spelled Time. The little girl is a vintage image reproduction and she is most likely deceased, or if not she is very very old. Someone's Grandmother? I am sure the thought never crossed her mind that she could be someone's Grandmother someday.

So it made me wonder, if I could go back in time and relive one day in my life what day would that be?
It is a toss up of 2 days. Either the day I met Tom or the very next day. I still can't decide.
 What day in your life would you want to relive?
Anyway this piece of art will be available at the Tolstoi Collectibles and Crafts Sale this weekend.
Click here for dates and times or click the link on the right hand column to visit the blog.

That's all for today!
xo
kim

Fixtures for the store

They look pretty ugly eh?

Ugly seems to be my new favorite word and catch phrase these days.
But give these pieces a chance, I think you may be as impressed as I was, when you see the end results.

Just in case you didn't know, you can click on any of these images on my blog to get a larger closer view.

Tom spent a couple of days painting all of these items and more, in between football games and working on the patio. All 3 of these pieces are painted a periwinkle/lilac colour. They look stunning!

This one is a desk I picked up at the Village Connection Thrift Shop in St. Pierre for $3.00
It will be used for our guest book and opens up to store pamphlets and literature related to The Artist Pivot.

Our sales counter. Lydia and I found this one at the Steinbach MCC yeah for $20.00 (steal) I love the cubby hole and I think we will use it to hold bags. A drawer for cash and bottom cupboard for stuff. All hardware works well and drawer slides nicely. The top counter is actually larger than it looks.

This was the prize of the day at MCC.
A 3 legged corner table with little drawer and ornate metal drawer pull for $20.00
Luckily I  found it first, and Lydia has already called "dibs" if we ever don't need it.

An uuuuugly bookshelf, this was a free one donated and the person donating it just shook his head in disbelief that I was actually happy to take it off his hands. (Thank-you) Ohh yes I did agree that it was pretty ugly but I saw the potential. You wont see the missing boards when it is filled with wonderful things. Tom said if he has time he may replace the missing boards.
Not sure where it is going yet but it has been painted a dark brown colour and it looks great!
 Most likely to hold books or heavy glass bottles.

I love these darling retro coffee tables. Tom has painted these in a light teal/mint green. I may stack them to create a funky wall unit. These were donated by Violet (Thank-you Violet) along with several boxes of goodies, and I still have a couple more pieces coming from her.
They too will be painted the same color and will be used with the other ones to create a fun display.

Okay that is all you get, Tom will be taking pics of his finished painted pieces and then we will move on to the next batch soon.
Stay tuned!
kim

Store pictures

Hi Everyone,

Okay I have uploaded the images from my camera of the store as it looks right now. I just realized that I didnt take a picture of the outside of the building. Okay I will do that on Thursday when I stop by there again.

All the pictures sort of look the same but I will add some captions along the way.

At the front entrance the long hallway leads up to our back receiving door, this will be what we call The Gallery. 90 feet x 2 sides to be filled pictures, photos and more

Store selling area and a peek at some of the little rooms. this is where we will do the sales transactions and keep smaller items that are for sale. The rooms will be leased out to artists by piece of wall, whole walls, rooms or table tops.

The rest of the front sales room

The door to my favorite room, The Workshop, this is where we will hold classes, and I am hoping it will be where me and my gal pals (aka the SE Scrappers) will hang out once in awhile.

It is huge and bright and lots of windows. I already have 12 chairs for this room, just gotta find some tables.

In the workshop looking down the 2nd hallway. Walls will be filled with lots of artistic goodness! Anyone looking to rent some art space?

This is a cute little room and already I have named it the Book Nook. I want to have shelves of art and craft books and magazines and a small table and comfy chair to sit and read and drink coffee. So far I have lots of books, I have the table, I even have the coffee, still need some shelves and that small comfy chair. Got anything in your basement you are not using?

One of 4 rooms in that hallway that will be designated as selling space. They all look the same right now. I can't wait to see what they will look like.

They all have great lighting!

The end of the hallway as we approach the kitchen, on the right is the doorway to the "Nearly Free" room, where donated items that rank high in nice from the donations will be sold for a "nearly Free" price.

Kitchen is well equipped with cupboards, I have a small fridge, a microwave and a coffee machine and lots of beautiful cups I found in one of the donation lots. Picked up 4 ugly kitchen chairs that I will cover someday with fabric, but still need a kitchen table. Eventually I would like to have a couple of small round table and chairs sets like the old icecream shop style. If we go into long term leasing, I will get internet for the building and we can use our tablets and laptops and hangout having latte's and eatting bonbons. Did I mention that St. Pierre bakery is just around the corner?

 Ahhh yes, but I will have lots of work to do

This leads back to the Gallery Hallway

Another peek into the Nearly Free Room
I am wishing for lots of shelves and tables for display to fall from the sky. So far I have picked up a few things and Tom (my wonderful hubby man) has been painting everything I bring home.

Still in the NF Room but now you can see the Free Room aka the Depot

There it is, the Free Room. the whole length and width up to the pole on the left side. This will be the divider wall where the sorting room will be.

 The back corner is where we will sort items to put out. Again major analysis of items will take place including the scratch and sniff inspection.

Receiving area and holding room.

Holding room will serve as an office too. I think this is the only room with a door and lockable.

Everything needs cleaning before we can paint.

okay now we are at the other end of the Gallery looking at the front door. Hey a free mirror!

A huge bathroom

Our backdoor leads to one parking stall and delivery area. We have 2 huge bins gifted to us from the former thrift shop to use for donation drop offs. Cool! Thank-you Anita!

Whew! Are you as tired as I am? Well just imagine what the future holds.... Thanks for reading and looking.
kim

Cleaning some of the stash stuff

Hi everyone,

Sometimes when I pick up stuff from my different sources, it requires a little TLC.
Whether it is a good washing because of dust or sometimes extreme washing because of being stored for a long time in some dark grungy place.

Regardless, all items are inspected by doing a visual inspection and then of course the most important "sniff test" is by far the most revealing as to whether an item is ready to be put out for re-use.

So to give you an example, the items below did not pass the sniff test and were then subject to extreme washing methods using very hot water, pinesol and other cleaning products.

These wreaths and garlands are only a small sample of what I washed that day.

It was hot, very hot, and so I put on shorts, a gallon of sunscreen, a hat and was a barefoot bottle washer. I will add a few captions for you as you peruse through the pics.

An assortment of Christmas flowers and pine pieces

Pine garlands were washed and left to dry all over my lawn

This was my prize of the day, a huge piece of burlap in very distressed condition. I had to wash it 3 times and then where to put this huge piece? So I spread it all over the lawn and let it dry in the sun.
I am sure you are thinking, what on earth could that grungy looking thing be good for? Well you are just going to have to sign up for one of my classes to find out. I have already put it aside for the class. I will keep you posted and remind you about this again!

My outdoor wash tub. This thing is a life saver! I picked it up during the St. Pierre weekend town wide garage sale for a mere $15.00 Merci!
We have hot and cold running water out door taps, but I tell you on this day it was all about how cold I could get the water and still get things clean.

These are 3 of the ugliest tv trays I have seen in a while. They are rusted, dented, stained, stinky and full of cobwebs. All I ma doing right now is cleaning them up enough to be able to store them until the store opens. I plan to paint them so that they look okay for displays. Be sure to ask about these when the store opens. Maybe I will post an after pic before then.

My painted toes got in the picture with a pair of Toms sandals on my feet.

ugly metal tv tray legs