All those tassels....

Well, I did it. I made it to 100 tassels. Oh, they were so pretty. And 92 of them still are. Yep, I sold 8. Eight. That would be 8. Out of 100.

I guess I had my expectations set too high. No, I KNOW I had my expectations set too high. But while not selling more of my tassels was disappointing, I saw God work. I'll start from the beginning.

Sound Man and I stayed up working until 2:45 in the morning getting ready for the next day. I said I wanted to have 100 ready, and by midnight I had 98. So, by golly, I had two more to do. And did them I did. (Wait...what?) Anyway, so after getting about 2 hours of sleep, we were up the next morning, headed down to Hernando, MS for the A'Fair. As we were driving down, I kept looking to the west to see the clouds forming. Man, they were ugly. As in, U.G.L.Y. As in, "you ain't got no alibi" ugly. As in, I'm starting to panic. As in, hyperventilating. Well, I hadn't gotten quite that bad, but I was a hair's breadth away from it. I did want to throw up. I did want to turn around and forget the whole thing. But I stuck with it. Partly because my husband kept saying, "Would you STOP looking around at the clouds?"So, we got down to the square (I had a REALLY great spot, by the way) and started to set up. Our friends Jeff and Lisa came and helped ALL DAY (I couldn't believe they were there at 6:30 in the morning!) and while we were setting up, this U.G.L.I.E.R. cloud came up. As in, it looked like the kind that come up before it tornadoes. I'm not kidding. The lady organizing all of us told us that whatever happened, we could run in the courthouse and be safe. But you know what happened? Nothing. The cloud moved over us and it started to clear up. That is, until it started raining. It rained pretty hard for about 15 minutes, scaring me to death. We got everything under the canopy, thinking it was waterproof. It wasn't. My tables started getting water all over them. I started to cry, but Sound Man wouldn't let me. Thankfully, I hadn't gotten my tassels out yet. But after 15 or so minutes, it was over. And that was it. Flood warnings had been posted for the whole area for the whole day, but it rained less than 30 minutes. Can I tell you how good God is?

So, even though my tassels didn't sell, I sent out a lot of business cards (oh, that's a whole other post in and of itself!), and got good responses from the people who did come in and look. All of them said they were "pretty", "cute", "beautiful" but I think they just didn't know what to do with them, even though I had cards and a sign that explained what you DO with a tassel.

I learned so much. I learned that I CAN set out and do something scary and out of my comfort zone. I learned that I CAN meet a goal even though I procrastinate until it looks like I've forced myself into failure. I learned that I have a husband who is proud of me and believes in me, even when I don't believe in myself. I learned that I have friends who will stick by me, no matter what. Not just Jeff and Lisa, but all but two of the tassels that sold were to friends. God love 'em.

But the most important thing I learned was this: God is still faithful, even when we don't understand what He's doing. He kept the rain away, but He didn't bring in the throngs of buyers. Why would he answer one prayer and seemingly ignore the other? I still can't say, but I know that He is faithful. I have learned that over the years, and He keeps reinforcing it. Even during circumstances I think shouldn't be.

Now, having said all of that, I want to show some of my sweet tassels. These are the ones I love the most. Well, some of them. I love most of them. The Ole Miss really took a lot for me to make. Ahem. (I didn't even bother to make any Tennessee tassels...I would have been disowned for sure)

Anyway, back to my pretties. Here are my faves. At least some of them...

My favorite. Oh, how pretty she is. Pretty pink and brown toile, pretty pink fringe...
And one of my sweet puppy dogs.

A fun rooster with toile ribbon and black fringe.

Another favorite bunny. She's tiny...much tinier than this picture shows.

My favorite black rooster with gorgeous ribbon. You can't really see it, but the ribbon underneath is black with beautiful red scrollwork all over. Bee-yoo-tee-fulllll.

Another bunny. He was my favorite until I found those flop-eared bunnies, poor guy.

And here's this thingie. I'm not even sure what to call it. It's a frame with a toile background with a black and white gingham checked button in the middle. So, what do you call that? It's cute, anyway. I had wanted to make a lot more, but just ran out of time. Lessons for next year.

And my favorite of my double tassels. No, I take that back. My second favorite. For some reason we didn't get a picture of my favorite. Anyway, WHY would someone not want to take these cute little chickens home? Cute, cute, CUTE! Oh, well.

Will I participate next year? Probably. Sound Man wants to. I think he was delirious when he said that. You know, lack of sleep. But I picked up an application for next year, nonetheless. I learned many lessons, from having a variety of things to choose from, to pricing, to displaying. Lots to help with next year.

But will it be another year before you see these tassels again? Oh, I'm thinking not....

Just wait till my NEXT post!