Monday, September 20, 2010

ARRR! Shamble Ramble Shows It's Pirattitude At Market

Ahoy there me hearties! Thanks for putten inter port here at Shamble Ramble. If ye be worth yer salt then ye knows that yesterday be Talk Like A Pirate Day, ARRR!, but alas, all good things must meet their end, this holds especially true in the life of a Pirate. So all be it gone, we be wanten ter shair with ye how we celebrated talk like a Pirate Day.

For us Talk Like A Pirate Day was on a Sunday, which for us is market day. We set up at a local flea market every Sunday if we can. We decided to do some thing a little fun, so we decorated our booth with a pirate theme and held a giveaway.

I've got two boys who just love all things Pirate, so we have allot of pirate themed items around the house. For Tyler's birthday last year we we had a Pirate theme party so I had allot of Pirate decorations. We borrowed a really neat looking pirates chest from Korbin that he bargained for during a community yard sale. We filled it will pirate doubloons, gems, strings of pearls and Mardi Gras beads, a skull, some bones, a pirate flask, and a treasure map. We got allot of lookers stop at our booth from this alone. Being that we were set up at a flea market we included a sign that said our chest and booty was not for sale... sorry I just couldn't resist a pirate pun.  We decorated our tent with pirate pen-nits, pirate flags and large treasure maps, and signs that invited every one to come by and celebrate talk like a pirate day with us.










For our give away we offered three of our pirate themed necklaces. One we like to call captain jack, a pair of wire and seed bead wrapped antique pirate keys and a seed beaded skull and crossbones cameo necklace. It was free to enter our giveaway, we had the participants fill out a slip with their name and a phone number or email so we could contact them later and get a mailing address. The names were drawn after we left market for the day and we called the 3 winners later that day.




We also sold some pirate related items at our booth, left over party decorations. I put together some goodie bags of pirate toys and swords for the kids and sold these at $3 a peace. We also had 3 different styles of pirate bandannas for $1 ea. and make your own treasure maps, the buyer got a large sheet of pirate themed stickers and a blank pirate map to put them on. These were a big hit at our son's birthday party with the kids.






We all dressed up in costume too, this is Stacey in her wench costume showing off her pirattitude. She turned allot of heads walking around the market.

Even my kids participated. We helped Tyler the night before cut up an old black T-shirt for his costume, which he paired with some stripped paints he had from a previous years Halloween costume.

We were so happy with how this all turned out, the day was allot of fun for our whole family and for every one at the market who participated in our drawing. We met some old friends who also love Pirates and Renaissance, and some new friends who share the same interests with us in jewelry making and crafts. That is probably for me one of the best things about setting up at market every Sunday. Were getting to know other vendors on a regular basis, as well as the market crowd and making new acquaintances every time we go.


It's also a great experience for the kids when they come, we don't bring them every time, but it's a great activity for them when they do. They get some fresh air on beautiful days, they get to walk around the grove with us as we take turns away from the booth and learn how to bargain hunt and make a deal when they spend their money there. Korbin loves antiques, I often have to bite my tongue when he wants to buy some one's old mug or glass or some other thing, I feel we don't need, but he sees value in it. He says he wants to be one of those people on antique rode show or antique hunters when he grows up. They also get a little bit of business experience as they help us out around the booth, setting up or taking down the tent, helping us through out the day, learning to give change to customers and picking up trash when we are finished for the day. I'm glad I have the opportunity to share this with my family and for them to be apart of my passion for crafting.


Thanks for reading, and please tell us how you celebrate Talk Like a Pirate Day this year or any other year!

Nicole











1 comment:

  1. What a fun way to celebrate Talk Like a Pirate Day! Why aren't there flea markets with vendors as awesome as you in my area?! I've never seen a handmade giveaway, let alone a pirate-themed one, at Bargain Bill's in Delaware. :p

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