GREENWOOD ANTIQUES, BUSINESS CARDS, AND A SHAMELESS PLUG.

Aye yi yi! I fell off the blogging bandwagon for a bit, but have actually been a busy bee in my silence and have much to share with you!

First, I’ve been in the process of updating my very own space at Greenwood Antiques and have been quite the painting machine! Walls, furniture…..nothing is safe from my paintbrush these days. Here is a quick evolution of my space since Feb. 1 (forgive the quality of the photos – most were taken with my phone!):

This is the space before I moved in. There are definitely some cute pieces, but I was ready to shake things up a bit and add a little pizzazz….

The space was a bit of a mess at this point, but I was in the process of moving in! I started by painting the wall, which somehow took far longer than intended. Painting straight lines is not an easy feat! And while I still need to paint one more stripe on the wall, I think it adds a fun pop of color, yes? The drum table, turquoise mirror, and cola cooler that you see in the pic quickly sold so I immediately had to reorganize…

I think the hardest part about this job is having to sell pieces that I absolutely LOVE. Frankly, everything that I have in my space I have either had or would have in my own home – and they are not easy to part with! That perfectly rusted industrial arrow, for example, was love at first sight and when it sold, I cried a little on the inside. And that obelisk topiary that you see behind the pink chair, oh my! This was a piece that I immediately brought to the store because I knew if I brought it to my home, it would never leave. I cringed the moment it sold. *sigh* But in the end, I suppose this is not a bad problem to have!

This is what my space looks like now (that fan is another piece that I had a hard time parting with!). And I’ve got a few more pieces in the works that I’ll be sharing with you later in the week!

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Next, thanks to Natasha from My Cute Lobster, I’m excited to finally have business cards!

I know, a long time coming. And for just a little shameless self promotion, if you are within the Charlottesville area and want to add that extra oomph to a piece of furniture or require some added inspiration for your party planning, feel free to contact me!

MY ETSY SHOP IS BACK UP AND RUNNING!

Hello my dear friends. I know, I know, I’ve been absent for a few days – I managed to get myself distracted with a few projects around the house, and more importantly….MY ETSY SHOP!

Yep, my shop is back up and running, and while I only have a few items listed at the moment, I’ll be adding much more throughout the week. In the meantime, take a peek around and let me know what you think!

TGIF – enjoy your weekend!

BACK–OR BEGINNING–IN BUSINESS…

Well, after very unintentionally floating in blogdom limbo for the last week…I am back!

Now, I am not the most tech savvy gal by any means, but in my recent attempt to establish a site on WordPress.org, I simply felt….stupid. First, I had no idea that WordPress.com and WordPress.org were so vastly different from each other (a good tip here: do your research!). Generally, WordPress.com is a free blog site, similar to Blogger, Typepad, etc. with basic templates, a few customization options, and other additional options you can purchase for a fee. In order to look slightly more professional (even though I have no idea what I’m doing most of the time), I chose to purchase my domain name for a small yearly fee so that my site reads “themodagecottage.com” rather than “themodagecottage.wordpress.com.” Yes, I realize that my business name is already long enough without adding that additional hodge podge!

Anyhow, with this amateur attempt to up the ante, I found a host to support the WordPress.org application, made all the appropriate purchases, tried to transfer my meager content along with my domain name…and failed miserably. So I have spent the last week trying to make sense of the whopping mess that I created – installing themes, adding widgets, blah, blah, blah, so that I could proudly publish to the world at least a semi-professional site that I put together all by my lil’ self.

But heck, there comes a time when one must face reality. My reality, just this afternoon, in fact, was telling me that I wasn’t yet prepared to wrap my head around WordPress.org and all the CSS BS that goes with it, and to go back to what I actually enjoy doing, which is writing for my blog instead of customizing it.

So here I am, a week later, back on WordPress.com and loving every minute of it! I say all of this to you because I imagine that one day, when I actually have readers and followers, some of you may be in the midst of starting a business, or thinking about it, and I am here to say that no matter how much potential you may have and no matter how bad you may want it, everything will not happen to you all at once (something like “patience is a virtue…”). You will hit road blocks, and many of them, but a road block is not the end of the road and you WILL find a way around it – even if that means reigning in your ego a little and starting back at the beginning.

SO, now that I’ve gotten this business talk / inspirational message out of the way, let’s get to the good stuff! Here are a few things that I’ve been thinking about over the week that I have been M.I.A….

Easy, breezy, and bright summertime style. Love, love, LOVE that boyfriend jacket! Time to go shopping…

Cool, calm, and collected summertime style. Seriously, could she look any cooler?

Time to brighten up that living room, change out the slip covers, throw in some flowers, and add that dramatic touch (I recently found a HUGE, vintage milk jug, and just ordered these branches in white, not to mention….repainted my entire living room)!

Inspiration for a little something I’m working on….

Indeed!