Festival Felting and Booth Blunders

I have been gearing up to join FRAA's "Taste of Art and Wine Festival" in Florence, Oregon again this weekend (February 17-18, 2024).  This is always a favorite show of mine.  It gives me time to rest after the holiday market but gives me something to look forward to for the winter months.  I get to spend time with wonderful people and fantastic art.  The festival used to be a part of the Music Festival in January but was branched into its own festival a few years ago.  I always enjoy sharing my felted pieces in Florence, they are popular in the coastal culture.  I recently joined Backstreet Gallery in Florence as well and am excited to be a part of the Florence art family.   I have not had a lot of time to be able to felt new pieces due to extra shifts at work but I am hoping to finish a piece I am working on that is specifically for the festival which will celebrate Oregon vineyards.  

Over the weekend, my husband and I finally lugged out our very heavy booth setup we'd purchased on FB marketplace last summer.  We had used the same 10x10 EZ Pop-Up canopy for almost 20 years of shows and the same handmade panels we'd used for the felt art for the last decade.  Our equipment was tired and worn and so we were we.  I had been squawking about a professional set up for a long time but never wanted to fork out the money with just doing a couple of shows a year.  With graduating recently and downsizing to a part time position at my job, I had more time to work on my art business.  We came across a used Flourish Mesh Panel set with Trimline Canopy and complete booth setup in Eugene that was too good to pass up.  I had always wanted to use mesh panels for my setup for a more professional look that would be "easier" for me to transport.  I hadn't counted on buying another booth but the mesh panels are difficult to find used and this was a complete package at a great price.  We hauled the carload of equipment home in August.  We pulled out the mesh panels to adapt with our 8x8 setup at the Eugene Holiday Market.  In 2022,  we were able to start selling all weekends at the holiday market and needed a better setup.  Unfortunately fitting the 10x10x9 mesh panels to an 8x8x7 setup proved to be a labor-intensive project but we were able to jimmy rig them for a new setup at the market now that we are selling during all 6 weekends. 

With application deadlines for summer shows looming and a sunny Saturday in February upon us, I commandeered our plans to set up the full booth in the backyard for learning how it goes together and to take photographs for the applications.  On Saturday, we downed our coffee and began the process of unpacking the 5 heavy bags of steel pipes, fittings, walls, mesh panels, roof material, and bungees. After four hours, dozens of instruction pages, and many mistakes, we had the booth towering over the neighbors' fences in our back yard.  I began hauling out all of the show furniture and artwork to set it up enough to take photos for a professional booth display.  After two hours of setup, I gawked at the height of the beast and it quickly became apparent that I had my work cut out for me to make bigger pieces of art and more of them. After a few minutes of taking photographs, I started the long process of taking down all of the artwork before dark set in.  My husband and I shoved a frozen pizza in the oven and collapsed on the couch.  It had taken 6 hours to figure out the setup and I began to wonder if I had made a mistake buying this behemoth of a booth.  My idea was to invest into bigger and better shows.  The setup is beautiful and daunting at the same time.  it's nice to feel like we have a truly professional setup to move my art career forward but scary at the same time.