PBS is a Major Distraction

No, not Public Broadcasting System, but PaperBack Swap. I signed up for this free service a little over a month ago and its been more than a little distracting. It works like this: you go through your bookshelf, pull out books you want to get rid of, you post them on you PBS Bookshelf, other members request them from you, and you send them off and receive 1 trading point for each completed transaction.

Initially I thought this would be a quick and easy way to get rid of my excess of paperback books. The thought of trading books I'd read for those that I want was just too tempting. But then, after an initial surge of requests for my newly posted books, I stopped getting requests. So, after a little trial and error, I discovered that I could purchase points and get the books I wanted that way. Hey, wait a minute! Wasn't I supposed to be getting rid of books?

Here's what I've learned - For the cost of shipping one paperback book from my bookshelf, $2.02, I get a fresh copy of a (much desired) book that would have cost me $7.00 or more from Books-A-Million or Amazon. That's a good deal. And I can purchase a point for $3.45, which is still half the cost of buying new. However, if I shop garage sales or library book sales, I can purchase more commonly available books for as little as 25 cents each. So, I save my points for those books which are hard to find used (like those of favorite authors Charlaine Harris or Piers Anthony) and that I plan to keep. Otherwise, I request books from the library.

In the meantime, I still have a box of books in my office. Anyone interested in a trade?

Garage Sale Update

Once again, I covered our pool table with boxes of fat quarters, set up two folding tables and put out additional odds and ends, acid-free papers, rubber stamps, etc. I advertised on Craigs List and was fortunate enough to get a few quilters to come, which made up the largest part of my sales.

All in all, it was a lovely day for a garage sale. The temperature started out in the mid-70s, and gradually worked up to the mid-80s by the time I shut the garage door at 1:00 p.m. sharp. Traffic was a little slow, as the 1st weekend of November is the busiest garage sale weekend of the year around year and our neighborhood was competing with at least a dozen others holding subdivision-wide sales.

My next-door neighbor traded me a box of paperback books in exchange for fabric, so I grabbed an Alex Cross murder mystery and enjoyed a leisurely stretch on the sofa in the garage during breaks between customers. I still have lots of fabric to get rid of, so it's back to Ebay, 20 fat quarters at a time.

Yikes!

How did that happen - almost three weeks without a blog entry? I also haven't been reading many blogs or checking my email or the daily deals on Amazon.com or Woot.com, etc., etc. Why not?

Well, I had a last push to get everything ready for the Big Fabric Sale. A week ago Friday, everyone from our local quilter's guild was invited over to partake of the great deals on fat quarters from my selection. Many did come and, although the afternoon was unseasonably warm in my garage, shopped a good deal. I was able to condense the collection a fair amount and add some cash to my rainy-day fund, but still have many, many fat quarters left to sell. That means it's back to Ebay. I may try and sell more during our neighborhood garage sale on November 8, but since the majority of garage sale shoppers are not quilters, I don't expect too much turnover then.

I've also been super busy at work - actually working! By that I mean not playing, and catching everything up, going over the books to clean them up and get ready for year end, catch up on collecting monies owed and try to find ways to cut expenses. The business is getting hit hard by the recession, just squeaking by, and the squeaking would be a little easier if we could cut out some of the overhead. I offered to cut my hours, but nobody took me up on my offer!

Did I mention how much I love my Hello Kitty purse, shown at the right? It doesn't look like a Hello Kitty purse, but it is and I just love it! Here it's draped with a scarf I bought on my very first day in Paris. Apart from water and food, this was the first purchase I made in France. I took this pic after arriving home from the gala 15th birthday party we attended for my niece Yuriana where I wore my scarf and carried my purse for the first time.

Overkill

I spent a good part of this past weekend up in my sewing room. I sorted, cut, folded, filed and trashed. I brought down a stack of boxes full of folded fat quarters for the garage sale. By Sunday morning, I had come to the end of all the fabric sorting and had started organzing and packing up the keepers. What a great sense of accomplishment! I could even see the top of my cutting table for the first time in six months.

Newly motivated, I decided to tackle the stacks of plastic storage bins under the cutting table. As way of explanation, my cutting table fits into an alcove in the corner of my sewing room and is bracketed to the wall on three sides, with space for storage underneath. Normally, I keep unfinished projects, batting, and scraps in bins under there.

About six months ago, we re-carpeted my sewing room and the upstairs landing. While the re-carpeting was going on, the entire contents of my sewing room were shoved into the boys' bedroom, mostly on Petie's side of the room. Once the carpeting was finished, Petie could not wait to get my stuff out of his room and happily began pushing boxes and bins out of his room and back into mine. He even pushed bins back under the cutting table. What a sweet boy!

Now that's the background on this story. With my fresh zeal and readiness to tackle the bins under the cutting table, I started pulling them out. Then I see it. Oh no, it can't be. How could? When? What the....? Behind the large bins in front, there lay in wait more fabric. Not just a little more, but yards and yards and yards of fabric. And most of it purple! How could I have this much fabric, out of sight and forgotten, and not realize it was missing! We're not talking about a box of fat quarters here, we're talking two stacks 2 feet tall of flat-folded cotton fabric, no piece larger than 2 yards. And all this fabric needs to be sorted, cut, folded and packed.

I'm discouraged. (Big sigh.)