'Tis the Season

O tannenbaum, o tannenbaum,
Wie treu sind deine blatter!
O tannenbaum, o tannenbaum,
Wie treu sind deine blatter!
Du grunst nicht nur zur sommerzeit,
Nein, auch im winter, wenn est schneit.
O tannenbaum, o tannenbaum,
Wie treu sind deine blatter!

Nearly everyone who celebrates Christmas does SOME kind of Christmas decorating.  A tree, a string of lights, a wreath on the door, hanging a few Christmas cards.  For lots of us religion doesn't matter; Christmas has adopted everyone.  That's pretty fitting because it's been stealing traditions for a very long time.

Chainmaille Ornament - Click to Purchase

Evergreen trees have had deep meaning for people for ages; they resisted the darkness of winter and refused to shed their leaves.  They seemed magical when everything else withered and died.  So naturally, they became associated with solstice celebrations and the return of longer days.  

Saint Boniface was a dude that lived in Germany, where there was a tree that was holy to the pagans who lived there - Thor's Oak.  (sometimes called Donar's Oak).  It was associated with Yggdrasil, the World Tree.  Boniface talked smack about Thor and started to chop the tree down.  Suddenly, a wind came (legend says) and took the tree down before he could cut it... and immediately an evergreen sprang up out of the four parts of the tree.  Since Thor did not strike Boniface down, the people converted to Christianity. 

For this the dude was sainted.  

I read this an entirely different way than the ancients probably did, but whatever.  Miracles are always open to interpretation, right?

Awesome Ornament Hooks - Click to Purchase

Martin Luther is also reported to have been so inspired by the pretty stars twinkling through the branches of the pines that he chopped one down and took it home and put candles on it in an attempt to recreate his experience for his family.   Fire hazard, right?  I am very thankful for LED Christmas lights.  

The Christmas tree as we know and love it really didn't come into vogue until the middle 1800s, that age that we take sooooo much of our tradition and weird hang-ups from.  Also lots of terribly skewed history  (Longfellow, I'm talking to you).

Clear ornament with Wire Wrapped Tree - Click to purchase

No matter.  Christmas is cool.  I spent a lot of years not celebrating and I am currently doing my best to make up for it.  I LOVE Christmas.  I love putting up my tree, hanging ornaments and telling stories about each one.  Seems like every one has a story.  (Which is why I think those fancy, heavy-gauge ornament hooks are awesome... check those out.  I don't know about your ornaments, but mine deserve the best).  

My hubby is usually not terribly enthused about the tree-putting-up ritual, for two reasons:  1)  he's a mailman... I haven't met too many who love this time of year and 2)  he despises glitter.   So my son, now in college, comes home for the tree decorating, and the two of us put up a tree while listening to lots of Nat King Cole and similar sappy old favorites.  Lights, garland, strings of beads, bows, star  (no tinsel... cats and tinsel baaaaad).  And then we turn the lights down, cozy up on the couch with a mug of hot chocolate, and reminisce.  It's absolute magic.  And I get up early the next day to look at the lights softly twinkling before I turn the room lights on.  And I do it again when I play Santa on Christmas morning, admiring the sparkling packages under the tree lights, dozing there until my family wakes up.

Martin Luther, I think I get it.

Interlude [EB Carnival]

The question: How are you going to prepare your business for the holiday rush?

The short answer: I'm not. Not really.

The long answer:

So far, I've done four craft shows in the past three months (two of them "holiday" shows), all with moderately pleasing success but nothing to write home about. Sales both online and at fairs have definitely picked up since the onset of the holiday season, which is great because it means I can afford more materials.

On the other hand, it has also meant cranking out massive amounts of the same thing, something I do not particularly enjoy and that turns art into drudgery. The last thing I want. This is still a hobby before it's a business and I'm honestly not sure I want that to change.

I really wanted to do this Dickens of a Christmas Victorian show in "historic Franklin Tennessee" thing, but I'm too late to apply for it. Besides that, the booth fee was $165, it's a drive, and if it decided to have a blizzard on December 14, 2008 in Franklin, Tennessee... well, sorry, no refund.

That's a bit scary.

But I have decided that it's time to prepare myself for bigger shows with bigger advertising, bigger attendance and therefore bigger booth fees, so that is the direction my business has decided to take. I think for the most part, unless one comes up and bites me like it did last week, I'll skip most of the upcoming Christmas craft shows. I also am considering setting my sights on Middle Tennessee Renaissance Faire and will need to work on some themed things for that.

One thing I HAVE done is prepare a custom item catalog where you can pick a design, pick your colors, choose a focal pendant or your beads, and I make your design to specs. More info about that on my website: http://www.youvegotmaille.net The great thing about that is that there's no stress of building up a stock. I love doing custom orders, too.

Reason two: I'm suffering a little burnout. I have wanted very much to try some new techniques, new stuff, new designs, and have had to back burner everything to make sure I had enough stock for craft shows. So the near future holds for me some experiments in macrame, peyote bead weaving, wire wrapping, polymer clay, wire tree making, and a wacky idea I had "Christmas Ornaments for Geeks." I used to paint Warhammer miniatures and I have half a closetful (well not quite) and I thought they might make cute and amusing Christmas tree ornaments if adapted. They will show up on Etsy, maybe even in time for Christmas decorating. A lot of the above may get integrated with my first love, chainmaille. I love the way wire wrapping looks but doing it is stress for me (especially when, as with the pendant above, the results are nothing like the picture in my head), whereas weaving maille is like needlework: mostly mindless and relaxing, once I know the weave well.

But I've decided not to stress about ANYTHING related to the holidays, because that takes the fun out of them for me, so I am going to have a chat with my inner child, sit down at my workbench and play instead of working. The results of that are usually better, anyway.